POUGHKEEPSIE, NY (March 20, 2019) – At noon Friday at Memphis International Raceway when Chris Dyson climbs into the cockpit of his car for the opening practice session for the USAC Silver Crown Champ Car Series season-opening event, it will mark Dyson’s first laps in a pavement Silver Crown car and the first laps CD Racing’s brand new blue, white and black Thetford / ProtectAll Beast.
The Memphis 100 also marks the expansion of the CD Racing’s previously dirt-only 2018 effort to the full 12-race dirt and paved Silver Crown Championship this season.
“I really enjoyed running the dirt Silver Crown races last year when my other racing commitments permitted,” Dyson said. “We made good progress over the course of the season, so it made sense to add the pavement races to our 2019 schedule. I’m really happy that this year there are only two conflicts with the Trans Am schedule, and I think there may be a solution in both cases.”
Because of the technical differences required for the different track surfaces, CD Racing has obtained a pavement stablemate for the Beast-chassis car Dyson raced in the series’ dirt races last season. “Bob East builds great cars and he is at all the races with his own car,” Dyson said. “Bob was really helpful to us last year, so we ordered a new pavement Beast for this year.”
While Dyson began his racing career racing karts on the dirt, most of his two-decade plus driving career has been road-racing on asphalt. About six years ago Dyson began driving sprint cars and midgets on dirt and he has worked hard to develop those skills. The three-quarter-mile tri-oval Memphis track will bring Dyson back to racing on a surface where he has many years of experience.
“The cornering forces are bigger on pavement, which is something I’m used to,” Dyson said. “Otherwise, it will be interesting to see the similarities and differences in setting up the pavement car versus the dirt car. And I’m eager to get out on track and run with some of the experienced guys and learn as much as possible. Fortunately, there’s an open practice session Friday afternoon, so we’ll have the opportunity to shake down this brand-new car and work on setup before we go racing. We want to make as many strides as possible before practice and qualifying on Saturday.”
From A Pile of Parts to a Race-Ready Car in Three Weeks
Working long days and six- to seven-day weeks, Sean Michael, who prepares and fields the CD Racing Silver Crown champ cars, sprint car and midgets, and his two assistants have spent a total of about 1,000 hours over the past three weeks assembling the new #9 pavement car following the team’s appearance at the USAC National Sprint Car season-opening Winter Dirt Games X in Florida.
“We’re just putting on some finishing touches,” Michael said earlier this week as the team prepared to depart for Memphis. He noted that because the Silver Crown series is rebuilding following a couple of fallow seasons, assembling the car was the biggest challenge. “The parts aren’t as readily accessible for a Silver Crown car as they are for sprint cars. A lot of guys who built parts for these cars stopped making them. The situation is getting better as the series gets stronger, but it’s still more work than for a sprint car.”
While the technical rules for pavement and dirt Silver Crown cars are almost identical, the different demands for racing on the two surfaces mean that other than engines there are essentially no interchangeable components between the two car types. “The engine is mounted much lower in the chassis on the pavement car, so it has a shallower oil pan,” Michael said. “We ran a pavement engine we bought from Tony Stewart Racing in our dirt car last year. That engine will be in the pavement car at Memphis. We bought another engine from Tony for the dirt car, this one with the deeper oil pan.”
On-track action at Memphis International Raceway gets underway on Friday, March 22, with pits opening at 10:00 a.m. Central, leading into a practice which begins at noon.
On Saturday, March 23, the pits open at 8:00 a.m., with practice sessions running from 10-10:30 am and 11-11:30 a.m. Fatheadz Eyewear Qualifying hits the track at 11:45 a.m. An autograph session in the main concourse is set for 12:30 to 1:15 p.m. Driver intros are slated for 2 p.m. with the green flag for the “Memphis 100” set to fly at 2:20 p.m.