Team AMSOIL Wins Offshore World Championship Title in Key West
Team AMSOIL offshore powerboat racers Bob Teague and Paul Whittier traveled to Key West, Fla. on the week of November 2-9 to compete in the annual UIM/SBI Offshore World Championships. With races scheduled for Wednesday, Friday and Sunday, the preceding days and the days between races were designated for testing.

In order to decide on the proper set-up for the traditionally rough Key West water, Team AMSOIL tested extensively before taking part in Wednesday’s opening race. The testing paid off, and when the green flag dropped, Team AMSOIL took the lead and never looked back, finishing ahead of second place Team Popeye’s by nearly a minute.

The conditions were slightly rougher for Friday’s race. A quick green flag at the start caught Team AMSOIL still coming on plane, allowing Team Popeye’s to grab the lead into the first turn. Team AMSOIL dogged the Popeye’s boat for the entire race, but Team Popeye’s drove defensively to prevent Team AMSOIL from passing. Although Team AMSOIL ran the majority of the laps with a faster time, Team Popeye’s finished three seconds ahead for the win. The close second place finish still left Team AMSOIL in the overall lead by time and speed.

After two races, Team AMSOIL and Team Popeye’s each had one win and one runner-up finish, setting up a winner-take-all showdown for Sunday’s double points race. Team AMSOIL spent the entire day on Saturday testing different prop and gear ratio set-ups to make sure the boat could win on Sunday. With winds in excess of 20 knots, Sunday’s race presented the most challenging conditions of the week. At the start, Team AMSOIL established a several second lead over Team Popeye’s going into the first turn, but Team Popeye’s remained within three to six seconds behind Team AMSOIL for most of the race. With approximately four laps remaining, Team Popeye’s made a hard push going into a turn, hooked the buoy at a high rate of speed and flipped violently. Team AMSOIL also hopped a few times, but maintained control. Now with a significant lead on the rest of the Super Cat fleet, Teague and Whittier raced with a little more caution, earning the win and the UIM/SBI Super Cat World Championship.

Winning the UIM/SBI Super Cat World Championship capped off a near-perfect sophomore season for Team AMSOIL, which also won the OPA Cat Lite High Points Title, the Geico Triple Crown and the Cat Lite Offshore Super Series National Championship and High Points Title.

Next, Team AMSOIL travels to the Salton Sea in the Southern California Desert on December 4-7 in an attempt to set a new class speed record.

AMSOIL Championship Snocross Series Kicks Off November 28-30
The 2008-2009 AMSOIL Championship Snocross Series gets started on the weekend of November 28-30 with the AMSOIL Duluth National at Spirit Mountain in Duluth, Minn. The action begins Friday night with the Monster Energy Slednecks Invasion Tour, where race fans will see Slednecks team members perform jaw-dropping backflips and other acrobatics aboard their snowmobiles. The rest of the weekend will feature the top snocross racers in the world, including Team AMSOIL riders D.J. Eckstrom, Shaun Crapo, Matt Judnick and defending Pro Open champion Ross Martin, as they begin their season-long championship quests.

Noelke Crowned 2008 Monster Nationals Racing Champion
The AMSOIL-sponsored Big Dawg/TailGator monster truck team and driver Doug Noelke recently finished off another successful year. Noelke was crowned the 2008 Monster Nationals racing champion after competing in 30 multiple-show events over the year, a little over half of those with both trucks.

Now that the racing season is over, the team has begun working on the trucks. The Big Dawg truck is undergoing a major overhaul. The chassis was totally stripped, reinforced, sandblasted and painted, while the engine has been disassembled and is currently being "freshened up.” Meanwhile, the TailGator chassis is undergoing some minor changes, including the addition of wheel tethers. Noelke plans to have the trucks reassembled and ready for the first show of the 2009 Monster Nationals Tour on January 9-10 in Huntington, W. Va.

Brady Smith Concludes 2008 Racing Season
Brady Smith and his AMSOIL #2 team wrapped up the 2008 racing season on the weekend of November 7-9 in Georgia and South Carolina. Following a rain-out at the Boyd's (Ga.) Speedway on Friday, the team trekked to the North Georgia Speedway in Chatsworth, Ga. on Saturday evening. In his first-ever visit to the Peachtree State speedplant, Smith qualified 23rd fastest and later ran third in his heat race to advance to the main event. During the 40-lap Turkey Rumble, Smith put on a show on the lightning quick oval, passing 10 cars en route to a fifth place finish.

The team's season finale took place on Sunday, November 9 at the historic Cherokee Speedway in Gaffney, S.C. Smith timed in 14th quickest in the O'Reilly Southern Allstars Series (OSAS) qualifying and transferred into the Blue/Gray100 with a fourth place heat race effort. Rolling off from the outside of the seventh row, Brady finished 23rd in the feature event.

“We had a really good car for our first visit to North Georgia,” said Smith. “Our qualifying effort left a little to be desired, but we ran well in the heat race and in the feature. I would have liked to have started further towards the front, but given our qualifying time, a top five finish was an excellent night for us. Then at Cherokee on Sunday, it was a typical daytime race. We wound up getting a flat tire, but the track was one-grooved and very hard to pass on unfortunately. It was a good season for our AMSOIL team and we will work hard this off-season to get ready for Brunswick in late January.”

The Brady Smith Racing team entered 52 Dirt Late Model events during the course of the 2008 season, racking up five victories, 13 top five finishes and 25 top 10 finishes. In the seven races taped by SPEED, Smith notched a top five finish and three top 10 finishes. In addition, Smith accumulated 14 heat race victories and seven B-Main wins.

Championship Off Road Racing Cancels Final 2008 Race
Championship Off Road Racing has regretfully announced the cancellation of its final race weekend of the 2008 season scheduled to be held in Chula Vista, Calif. on December 6–7, 2008.

Championship Off Road Racing CEO Jim Baldwin issued the following statement:

“The current national financial crisis has impacted our series to the degree that it has become impossible to produce the quality off road racing experience that our fans, racers and sponsors have enjoyed. While it has been our most sincere effort to hold this final event, every possible avenue was exhausted before reaching this difficult decision. Although we have been forced to prematurely end the current season, we are strongly committed to providing the ultimate off road racing experience on the most extreme tracks while continuing to grow the sport. We apologize to our sponsors, teams and especially to our loyal fans for any inconvenience that this has caused. Our commitment to this sport, sponsors, the teams, and fans that support us is unwavering. We will continue to vigorously pursue our objective: To build the most exciting nationally recognized short course off road racing series in the country.”

CORR is in the midst of establishing a solid 2009 race schedule. This confirmed schedule, to be released shortly, is comprised of 12 rounds of racing to be held on six weekends in 2009. There are currently discussions underway with the objective of increasing that number to as many as eight race weekends and 16 rounds.