BY MARK McKEON<\/p>\n
BRADFORD, VT Usually, New England Auto Racing Hall of Fame member Denny Zimmerman likes nothing better than spending quality time behind the wheel of one of Skip Matczak\u2019s Midgets, slinging dirt down the straightaways and power sliding through the turns. But Zimmerman isn\u2019t scheduled to race when the USAC Dirt Midget Association debuts at Bear Ridge Speedway on Saturday May 28; instead he plans to be in Indianapolis as an honored guest at the 100th Anniversary of the Indianapolis 500.<\/p>\n
Every living driver who ever competed in the Indy 500 has been invited to attend a series of celebrations, including what\u2019s being billed as the world\u2019s largest autograph party. In 1971, Zimmerman finished eighth and was named Rookie of the Year, so he\u2019ll have special status at the anniversary celebrations and has been invited to give a speech.
\n
\nCar owner Matczak, a Hall of Famer himself, is tight lipped about who\u2019ll be taking Zimmerman\u2019s place behind the wheel. \u201cLet\u2019s just say it will be somebody very interesting and the fans will be happy,\u201d Matczak said with a smile.<\/p>\n
The debut event on Memorial Day Weekend marks the first of five appearances for the USAC Dirt Midget Association at Butch Elms\u2019 Bear Ridge Speedway and Zimmerman plans to compete in all the remaining events. He\u2019ll be joined by fellow Hall of Fame member Ray Miller, Sprint Car veteran Scott Holcomb, 30 time Midget feature winner Scott Viets and a talented cadre of rookies and veterans.<\/p>\n
About 20 cars are registered with the Dirt Midget Association and at least 15 are expected at the season opener. USAC is the oldest and most prestigious open cockpit sanctioning body in America and the Dirt Midget Association functions as a USAC Regional Midget Series. For more information on the Dirt Midget Association, visit www.dmaracing.org.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
BY MARK McKEON BRADFORD, VT Usually, New England Auto Racing Hall of Fame member Denny Zimmerman likes nothing better than spending quality time behind the wheel of one of Skip Matczak\u2019s Midgets, slinging dirt down the straightaways and power sliding through the turns. But Zimmerman isn\u2019t scheduled to race when the USAC Dirt Midget Association […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4154,126,200],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5201","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bear-ridge","category-new-england","category-vermont"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5201","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5201"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5201\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5201"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5201"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5201"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}