Dave Murdick must have a little bit too much extra time on his hands at the track. As if running one car at Lernerville Speedway weren’t enough, Murdick is running two this season. It’s not done often, and it takes a special driver to pull off the feat. “I always like driving other cars, and it doesn’t matter what it is,” Murdick said. “I could drive a Pure Stock and have fun doing that. I drove the Sprint Car; I drove a Pure Stock one night; I drove a Limited modified, and I thought to myself that I always wanted to drive a Late Model. This opportunity came up so I said, ‘Why not?'” Along with his regular V-8 Modified, in which he won two track championships, Murdick is running the 1J Late Model for Jimmy Pitkavish. “I talked to Jimmy a couple years ago about driving the car,” Murdick said. “I drove it in hot laps once and blew it up, and we were still friends after that. He got it fixed and drove it some. Then he came to me last year and asked me what I thought, and I wanted to try something else.” Even though this is Murdick’s first attempt to run a full season in a Late Model, he ran some last year so this is not an entirely new concept to him. “I ran the car last year about five or six nights, and we were just missing a little bit,” Murdick said. “(Pitkavish) bought a new car for this year and so far it’s been really good. We didn’t run the heat — just the feature the one night — and we were coming up and passing some cars; that was a good sign.” The results have been mixed. In the Late Model, Murdick has finished 21st and 22nd. He also placed 13th April 25. Last week could have been the breakthrough race because he finished fourth in the feature. Last week he was leading the V-8 Modified feature when the car suffered a broken axle with less than 10 laps remaining. “We are going to run both this year,” Murdick said. “It’s going to make my crew work harder. It means they will have to make some more calls on their own, instead of relying on me. Other than that, I hope we don’t have too big of a learning curve. “I’m excited about it,” Murdick added. “It’s something new. I think we can win with the car, I really do. It’s a good car. The competition is a big thing because there are some very good cars out there in the Late Model division.” Murdick is not the biggest guy, so there are some differences that he has to deal with just in how the Late Model is built differently than a V-8 Modified. “Your line of sight is a lot different from the Modified to the Late Model,” Murdick said. “I’m like a little grandmother in this car because I am so short and I can barely see over. I have a six-inch mud-plug to sit on.” That difference in sight lines is a concern when Murdick is on the track because he is not totally acclimated to the car. “I guess it is harder to run right next to someone in the Late Model because I am not exactly sure where the car ends,” Murdick said. “Whereas in the Modified, I have been running that for 28 years now and I know where that point is.” Murdick’s father Carl has raced at Lernerville since the track opened in 1968. Although the elder Murdick is known most for his work in the Modified division, he did race a Late Model for a few years “Dad ran a Late Model for about six years (in the 1970s) so yeah, I talked to him a bit about it,” Murdick said. “I did go to Rocket’s (Chassis) racing school. I’ve talked to Chuck Kennedy and Chuck Sarver, too. “The guy who puts on the school is not really from Rocket,” Murdick added. “He just does the school. He starts pretty much from the tires on up and he tells you what things do and then he builds the car up from nothing. I think I found a couple things we could use on the Modified. I know I used some last week.” So when the dust settles and Murdick becomes fully comfortable in the Late Model, he has some clear goals for the 2008 season. “I’d like to win a feature,” Murdick said. “If that doesn’t happen, we are definitely going for a top-10 in points.”

Dave Murdick, 1J Late Model Hometown: Slippery Rock LM Chassis: Rocket LM Engine: Ford Main sponsors: Highland Tire, Blackburn’s Pharmacy, Peiffer Farm Equipment, KC-C. Highlights: Murdick has won two Lernerville Speedway V-8 Modified championships, 2004-05. He is the son of long-time driver Carl Murdick, who won a Modified title in 1970. He is also the brother of Sprint Car driver Sheila Rankin.

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