FEATURE - From the Tower by Bob Frey

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Thu, 2 Oct 2003, 06:01 PM

Bob Newberry….Simply Stated, He’s One Of The Best!!

By Bob Frey
Photo by:Auto Imagery, Inc.

Bob Newberry in Chicago Winner Circle.

Anytime that you can win a drag race you know that you’ve had a good weekend. Anytime that you win one when all of the best cars in the sport are there, well, that has to be even more special, and such was the case for Bob Newberry this past weekend in Chicago. Driving his Valvoline-sponsored Chevrolet, Bob beat Tate Branch, Indy winner Jeff Craig, former world champion Jay Payne and Doug Gordon en route to his forty-third national event win. Along the way he ran a personal best of 5.568, just one of three passes in the exclusive 5.50 range that he made during eliminations in what was one of the more dominating performances of his great career.

Bob Newberry has been running and winning since back in the 1960’s. His first car was a 1955 Chevrolet that he bought from a local junk yard for thirty-five dollars. With his mechanical skills, Bob promptly set the car up with a 265 cubic inch engine that fit nicely into Stock Eliminator. A few years and a few cars later he was running Corvettes in Modified Eliminator, still utilizing the old small block Chevrolet engine, an engine that would prove to be very good to Bob Newberry. In 1979, with a small block, Bob ripped off a series of wins on the local and national level that he parlayed into the World Championship in Competition Eliminator. After running and winning in that class, Bob said that he got tired off making his car go fast only to have it slowed down by the index system that is still in place, so he moved up to the alcohol ranks. “I love making my car go fast and it got frustrating when you’d get hit with the index,” he said just before leaving for Maple Grove this weekend. The decision to step up has proven to be a wise one, both from a racing and a business point of view. Today Bob is one of the best racers in the country and his business, Bob Newberry Racing, is doing very well, too.

Bob racing his A/EA in Comp at the 1980 Gatornationals.
A simple look at the numbers will show you how successful Bob has been. In addition to the ’79 World Championship he also won the Top Alcohol Funny car championship in 1992. He has those forty-three national event wins to go along with a staggering fifty-nine divisional titles and he has been the Division 1 champion eleven times. If he never did another thing in the sport Bob Newberry would have to be ranked among the best and most successful racers in history. But there will be more, much more. “I love everything that I’m doing right now,’ Bob said. “The racing, the business, it’s all pretty good.” Now that’s an understatement. In addition to making his own car go fast and win, Bob sells parts, components and complete engines to other racers in both the alcohol class and in the Pro Mod category. “We have some guys who run our compete motor setup and others who use some of our parts. In Pro Mod, for example, Al Billes and the Stott’s are using our engines and we’ve just started working with Jim Oddy and Fred Hahn on their car.” Bob also pointed out that Cy Chesterman, who set the national record this weekend in Chicago at 5.531 was using Bob Newberry cylinder heads. “We came up with a new design and Cy had those heads on his car this weekend. We call it the ‘big valve’ head and it has big intake and exhaust valves that no one else is using,” Bob said. After Cy’s performance this week, I expect others will be using them soon.

Newberry launches hard.
Bob has had a great season by most standards, a “pretty good” season by his. “We’ve been in the finals at every race except Indy and the Cecil County points race,” he said. “At those events a couple of little things kept us from winning, a throttle cable here, an ignition failure there, and that’s frustrating. When you can reach out and touch the finish line, but you don’t get there first, that hurts,” he added. And it’s got to be a little frustrating running in the division where Frank Manzo is, doesn’t it Bob? “Hey, I live in New York, Frank lives in New Jersey and that makes us both Division 1 drivers, so this is where I’m going to race. I had a pretty good run as division champ and now it just happens to be Frank’s turn. Besides, if I can’ t beat him I don’t deserve to be champion. I respect Frank for everything that he’s done, plus, when you beat him you know that you’ve beaten the best.”

Bob says that his car has always been his calling card. “When you run well it’s great for business, and my customers know that everything that goes through the shop I will be a part of, whether it’s a fuel system or a complete motor.” Bob also works with another one of the greats in the business, Ken Veney. “Ken does all of our cylinder heads and no one’s better at it than he is. It’s been a good relationship that works for both of us and, best of all, it’s good for my customers.” Those customers continue to be very loyal to Bob and it’s easy to see why, all you have to do is look at the track record and you’ll see that cars running with BNR motors always do well. Bob acknowledges that the engine business is very competitive so you have to stay on top of it. “We don’t just sell you an engine or a fuel system or a set of heads,” he said. “We’re there to help you and answer any of your questions.” He’s also there at the track showing them just how good a Bob Newberry motor car run.

Newberry in the Indy Winner Circle.
For a guy who has been doing this so long it’s refreshing to know that he still enjoys it as much as he did in that old ’55 Chevy. “There’s nothing like driving your car, getting to the finish line and seeing your win light come on. I still get a thrill out of that every time.” And, from the looks of it, he’ll be getting that thrill for many more years to come, in fact, he could get it again this weekend in Maple Grove. “I’ll run this race and then Dallas and that will be it for the year. I love Maple Grove and Dallas is just such a good fast track and that’s the kind of place you like to run your car.” Bob added that the Texas market is also important to his sponsors and he thanks Valvoline, Hussey-Copper Gaskets and Childs and Albert for all of their help. Maybe those folks ought to thank Bob, I know I do, because every time he comes to an event you know that the race will be that much better. When I asked Bob if any of the wins were extra special to him he said that they were all nice, but his Indy win in 1998 may have been the best. “I tried for so many years to win Indy and never had any luck, so I guess that would have to be one of the real highlights.” In addition that the ’98 Indy win over Tony Bartone, Bob went to the finals there in 1985, ’95 and 2002, losing to some of the greats in the class, Brad Anderson, Pat Austin and Frank Manzo. Still, how many guys can say that they made the final round at Indy four times? Or how many racers can say that they have enjoyed the success that Bob Newberry has?

Bob Newberry Racing is located in Schenectady, New York and can be reached at 518-864-5575, or you can catch Bob in the winner’s circle. He lives with his wife of thirty-one years, Toni, and their two daughters, Kelly Jo and Bobbi Jo.