Richard Wright is a third generation racer from Glen Allen, Virginia and a Hardcore Race Fan through and through. The 43-year-old has been watching racing for most of his life and competes with his father on the local short tracks throughout the Virginia area. A true Hardcore Race Fan, this is Richard Wright’s story.
After seeing his first NASCAR-related event at the Southside Speedway in Midlothian, Virginia at the age of five, Wright has been hooked ever since. His father raced at Southside for about fifteen years before moving on to other tracks around the area such as Orange County Speedway and South Boston Speedway.
“We ran asphalt on Friday and Saturday night and dirt on Sunday,” Wright told HardcoreRaceFans.com.
Getting into racing at an early age, Wright learned from his father and his grandfather who both competed at the local level. His father has been racing for 35-40 years throughout the Virginia area and is currently working on a dirt modified they are racing at Virginia Motorsports Park. The team has an asphalt car they run in addition to their dirt program.
While his father gets the job done behind the wheel most weekends, Wright has run a number of Enduro races in the past, coming in second three times.
These days, Wright and his father continue to work on their short track program – both asphalt and dirt – and hope to go even further. The family has purchased a Nationwide Series car and is in the process of preparing it for competition.
“We are trying to get sponsors to make the Richmond race,” Wright pointed out. “We’ve got about $20,000 in donations already, but that’s not going to cut it. We need about $25,000 more.”
While he has ambitions to run at NASCAR’s top levels, Wright is still a Hardcore Race Fan at heart.
Not only watching the races on television, Wright has been taping every race on VHS for the past seven or eight years. Now with a collection of close to 300-400 VHS tapes, Wright admits he watches old races two to three times a week.
“I go back two or three years to see who was competitive and that’s how I make my picks for the race pool for this time.”
The race pool Wright is referring to is no simple task. For the past fourteen years he has organized a race pool amongst his friends and family. Each weekend participants draw numbers 1 through 10 which indicate your starting position. For example, say you pull the number 3; you would have starting position number 3, 13, 23, 33 and 43. Wright then keeps track of the points throughout the year just like NASCAR does and decides a winner at the end of the season.
A fan of Dale Earnhardt Sr. for many years, Wright now pulls for Tony Stewart and Kyle Busch.
“Earnhardt was my man and then he died,” Wright explained. “Tony Stewart has the same attitude and so does Kyle Busch, that’s why I like them.”
Even though he still watches loyally these days and pulls for Stewart and Busch, Wright believes today’s racing just does not live up to the action of the past.
“I like the old style of racing, but then it became business, business, business,” Wright pointed out. “The new car of tomorrow is more competitive for everybody, it’s more back to the driver than the car. I think Earnhardt would be awesome with that car if he were alive because it’s such a hands on driver car – more of a wheelman’s car than engineering and stuff. You watch Carl Edwards and Kyle Busch on the in-car cameras and you’ll see who’s driving the car and who ain’t.”
For most of his life, Richard Wright has had racing running through his veins. Following in the footsteps of his father and his father before him, Wright enjoys both the competition and the thrill racing provides. A Hardcore Race Fan through and through, Wright’s story is a mixture of competitor and fan, but is one that deserves to be told.
