c11.23.06_003___L_BPT_0080

Photo ID #	c11.23.06_003___L_BPT_0080_1
Car #:	#3 & #L
Driver (s) :	Jimmy Horton and Billy Pauch
Location:	Bridgeport
Date:	Early 80's?
Photographer:	Bob Sweeten
Photo provided by:	Ralph Richards
Comments:	The battle that's been going on for 30 years plus. Kinda like an episode of Star Trek I seen when I was a kid where these 2 guys were battling each other across the galaxie, from planet to planet, from star date to star date in an eternal conflict. I think the show ended with them moving on to a new part of the galaxie, finding a new place to continue their battle again. For those who were fortunate enought to be at Bridgeport on 11/18/06, you saw the lastest in a continuing series between two of the all time best. In the first feature, Jimmy and Billy battled hard with the 2 making a little contact between 3 & 4 as Billy tried to move up a groove and Jimmy wouldn't have any part of it. The end result was Jimmy getting the win and Billy getting a leg full of power steering fluid. In the second feature, Billy recovered from an early race spin and caught Jimmy with a handful of laps to go and made the move under Jimmy between 3 & 4 for the lead. Again, the 2 bumped a little..., not to take each other out, but not cutting each other any slack either. This time, Billy held on for the win. Exactly what you'd expect from 2 guys who've been on many occassions, a nerf bar apart... Exactly what you'd expect from 2 guys who respect each other's ability inside a racecar.

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Date:	Visitor's Name:	Comment:
11/23/06	Rarjar	The picture of Horton & Pauch is from an 80's "run whatcha brung " show, in which Hortons car is actually the Statewide URC Sprint car with an attached sheet metal body. I was there and remember the car had the tail tank under the sheet metal, and had to be push started. It was a Buckley chassis, if you look you'll see it still has the tiny front bumper on it.
11/24/06	Bob Becker	It's the same Statewide Buckley car in the photo on open wheel page 3.
11/24/06	3-Wide	Now that's what I call bringin' a gun to a knife fight!
11/28/06	David Kauffman	Shortly after Horton did this, the practice of "door skinning" was outlawed for most 'run what you brung' shows. Many drivers complained about "heavies" on the track with sprint cars having an unfair advantage. A lot of tracks made it simple, bottom rail must be 2x4 construction, viola no sprint cars.
01.01.10	Jim Donnelly	Wow, I just found this. This is the Statewide sprint car that I had confused with Fritz Epright's car from one of these same Bridgeport Bandit shows, I think they were called, in the stumper a couple of weeks ago. I was at this race too and remember Horton absolutely blowing the field away in the feature. I'm pretty sure it was also the same event, run on a Sunday in the very late fall, where the dust got so bad that you couldn't see either corner from the start-finish line. I vividly remember Billy, who was in the winged Leidl car, coming to a stop in front of the flagstand and gesturing with both palms up, like, "What do expect me to do?" The feature probably should have been flagged, because a watering didn't help, and Horton was already running away with it anyway. It's a good idea that the rules were immediately changed to "East Coast modifieds only" for these uber-opens. Running sprints and modifieds together is really unsafe, which at least one New England track found out the hard way. Go ask Dick Berggren.