How I got started....

[Loyd Blackwell]

   
  When my Dad first started karting he had sprint cars for quite a few years. They raced at a little track in Rendon just south of Ft. Worth. There was another small track between Ft. Worth and Dallas that they raced at and sometimes practiced at on off days. I was really to young at that time to race, this was early '60s, but I had the burning desire and just getting a ride was big fun. I guess I though they were big bumper cars. One time at one of those little tracks I conned a ride promising to go slow and be careful. I managed to get around a couple of times and was just getting into it when they started trying to flag me in so I decided to get one more lap in and coming down the straight I floored it just to feel the power. Well that old Mac torqued so hard it pinned my head to the back of the seat and before I could get off of it I was in the old tires at the end of the straight...... didn't get hurt or bend any thing but I didn't get anymore rides for a long time either. But that one short burst down the straight had hooked me and after that I would do anything just to get my hands on one, even if it was just cleaning parts. So for a long time that's all I did was clean parts. The Dad and several friends would all go to the races on the weekends and the kids would stay home because they were out past our bedtime. After a while I started to earn the trust back got some rides at the Green Stamp warehouse parking lot. Going round and round breaking in new engines.
  Then sometime in the mid '60s Dad asked me if I wanted to ride down to Waco with him on a Saturday. I ask why? To pick up a new kart. Duh??? Would I like to go, what are we waiting on!!! So we went to Waco to Mercury Machine Tool and picked up a new enduro kart. I'd never seen one, or anything like it as far as that goes. I rode all the way back to Ft.Worth looking out the back window of the pickup at that marvelous looking machine in the bed. I don't know what ever happened to those old sprint karts. But those new ones were the thing, those long track machines. It was during this time Dad met George Dixon while doing some electrical work at the Santa Fe depot in Ft.Worth. George was a carman for Santa Fe and also raced. They started building and racing karts together. We had a lot of fun hitting every long track within a days drive. When I got into High School they started entering me in races after I got my license. They had another young driver, a family friend of Georges named Corky Daily. He was a natural. He won more races than anyone else I was ever around. That guy was something else on the track, he and another driver came around me on the outside of a turn at Green Valley one day and I couldn't believe how fast they were going. Of course I tried to keep up with them but it didn't last long. Just like High School, seemed like forever, but then it was over. I started an apprenticeship with the Electrical Workers Union and between working days and school at night there was not time for much else. Kart racing got left behind.....