Mike O'Leary

July 26, 2010

Friday Night Under the Lights: DeMoss and Sterrett

Few experience success in racing at the level that Clint DeMoss is this summer.  His record is astounding.  Not only has DeMoss won six of the nine UMP modified feature races at Bloomington Speedway, he scored second, third and fourth in the others.  Now, with four events remaining in 2010, DeMoss holds a 78 point advantage over Bradley Sterrett. 

Friday (July 23) was another brutally hot afternoon as crews unloaded sprint cars, modifieds and street stocks along the pit road.  Outside his trailer, parked behind the pit grandstand, Bloomington's Bradley Sterrett was working on his car by himself.  In his fifth year racing a modified, the 19-year-old isn't a one-man band, he assured us, even though his is a small team. 

At second in points, his best season yet, Bradley admitted they had a pretty big wreck during the previous event (on July 9), and weren't able to run the feature, which cost critical points.  “Clint's going to need to break a night or two for me to be in the hunt – which is really possible, so I just don't want to give up.”

Racing with sponsorship from Economy Pest Control, Sterrett said that winning a division title is everyone's ultimate goal.  But a change in the way he approached this season appears to be paying dividends.  With a smile, he explains, “Really, the previous years when we worried about coming out and winning a championship, we haven't done so well in the points.  So this year, we just came out to race and everything's just kind of been falling into place.  We've been running good and consistent and we're right there in the hunt.”

Sitting in the shade of Sterrett's trailer, the youngster is well spoken and obviously serious about the direction of his racing future.  As the car owner, he is concerned about finances.  In addition to his father's business, he has a couple of smaller sponsorships.  “That only gets you so far - we spend that way before now.  It's pretty much out of our own pocket.  I wish we had a big sponsor,” he says.  Then he adds that he is thinking of moving to a sprint car next year.

“It's something that I think everybody that races wants to do eventually,” he explains.  “Sprint cars are a pretty big deal in Indiana and it's something I've wanted to do, so I think we're going to try it out next year.”

Clint DeMoss is pitted further north, the last trailer at the end of the row.  Finishing hot laps he checked his tires, and then relaxed for a few minutes before the heat races.  Another Bloomingtonian from a racing family, he is friendly, easy to talk with.  If he wins the modified division championship, it will be the first of his career. 

“We feel pretty good about it,” he said with a grin.  “We've had a good car here most Fridays and we feel that if we can just keep going on the same stride that we're on right now, we'll hopefully end up in pretty good shape.  Definitely the race car has been exceptional.  Ryan and Heather (Thomas) have done a lot of work in helping us out on setups and stuff like that, where we feel like we've got the thing pretty good.”

Clint has been racing at Bloomington Speedway for ten years, and recalls that he was the Rookie of the Year in the modifieds in 2000.  Even though he has finished each year in the top-10 in points, his best result has been second.

“The main thing is that we just try to enjoy it and have fun.  I think that when a person gets too wrapped up in the points and thinks about things too much, it tends to come back and bite you,” Clint says.  He recalls his grandfather, Erwin Cooper, racing a sprint car at Bloomington, and he and his brother, John, growing up around the track.  Winning a track title would clearly mean a lot.

“Everybody that hits the race track out there has the intentions of winning,” he says.  “But, you just kind of take every scenario and situation as it comes.  You give it your best effort and sometimes it seems like it falls in your lap and sometimes it doesn’t.  That's our outlook when we hit the race track, but we're not out there to run second or last.  A guy just has to be smart about what he does, and try to make smart decisions and quick moves.  Make sure you take the right lines and that type of thing.”

Driving the familiar 78c, a car fielded by his grandparents, he finished second in the season opening race, then scored back-to-back wins.  He finished fourth on Memorial Day weekend, and then notched another pair of victories.  He ran third in the Fourth of July race, then won his fifth feature the last time the modifieds competed at Bloomington. 

The biggest change that he has benefited from has to be going to work for Ryan and Heather Thomas at Diamond Race Cars in Martinsville.  Although he admits that he might be biased, DeMoss says that the Diamond machines are a notch above the other cars he competes against, but even more important, he now has his head in the game every single day. 

“I've probably learned more this year than I have the whole nine previous years of racing as far as what to do to the race car and a lot of things that maybe was overlooked or we just didn't know about before,” Clint says.  He points out that the modified division has been evolving and that it is important to not only stay on top of the technology, but even experiment to get a step ahead of the competition.

He says that younger drivers and their fathers have started to come to him for advice.  He recalled a recent exchange, when one father asked him, “Well, man, what do you think the deal is here?  He'll run really good one night and then the next night he looks like he's got his head stuck up his butt.”

Clint laughed, then explained, “Like I told him, heck, I went through all of that, too.  It doesn’t just happen over night.  Years and years of racing and experience play a huge part in just being able to pick your lines right and reading the traffic ahead of you.  Being in this for ten years now, I kind of feel every time I hit the race track, I've been in about every scenario and situation that a guy can have himself in, so you've learned something from it every time.”

“I've got to the point where I feel real, real comfortable about things.  I think it takes some time.  A lot of people think that a guy comes out here and races two or three years and he ought to have it down.  It takes a little bit longer than that to really feel like you're in your prime or on top of the game.”

DeMoss is clearly on top of his game this summer.  Lining up third for the feature, right behind Sterrett, who had the pole, the two quickly broke away from the rest of the field.  Clint stayed on Bradley's heels until a caution at lap 9.  On the restart, he charged into the top lane and took the lead through turn four.  With the clear track ahead, the 78c quickly opened a half straightaway advantage and smoothly completed the rest of the laps.  Sterrett held on to second position, ahead of Brandon Short at the checkers, and congratulated DeMoss in victory lane. 

With his sixth win in the bank, Clint, his family and team, loaded their equipment into the trailer under the Friday night lights.  The victory lane celebration was short, and they knew that there was plenty more work ahead.