USAR Hooters Pro Cup Series
Photos and story © 2005 Dwight Drum
Web work by Gary Larsen

Driver, No. 11 JEG'S stock car

"Never let the highs get too high. Never let the lows get too low."

Zoomster.com roots are deep in NHRA drag racing where JEG'S is as ubiquitous as Nitro and wide tires. The extensive Columbus, Ohio mail order racing parts firm keeps a constant presence where founder Jeg Coughlin drag raced as a young family man. His JEG'S organization grew under his business skills and expanded with the rising popularity of motorsports.

Zoomster.com grew more recently to include stock car racing in Hooter's Pro Cup, ARCA and NASCAR (CTS, NBS & NEXTEL Cup Series) and we weren't surprised to find JEG'S on an oval track too.

The JEG'S family team members have been familiar interviews on Zoomster.com over the past five years of NHRA coverage and now we include a champion stock car driver sponsored by JEG'S. The track is a lot straighter in NHRA, but the colorful team logo, "Big Yellow" adapts well to oval tracks too. The up-and-coming Hooter's Pro Cup Series is a good venue for sponsors because of SPEED channel coverage, top driver and team competition and the popularity of Hooter's restaurants.

We bring you a standout driver in an increasingly stand-up sport.

Time: Season Finale 2005
Place: USA International Speedway
Event: USAR Hooters Pro Cup Championship

Dwight asked Gary St. Amant:

"I've always looked up to John Force. In 1998 we won the ASA championship and it was probably the 1999 season that I watched a documentary about John Force and I always remember what he said, 'You win your first championship you're all right with the fans. You win your second championship, now you've done something.' In the year 2000 I took that to heart and we went out and won our second championship. He was right. I really feel the gratitude and what it did to me inside to win that second championship. It feels a lot more like you've earned it a lot more when you win that second championship."

"The big reason I like Hooters Cup racing is number one, it's a short track racing series. I've been brought up on short track racing. I've been racing since 1983. It's what I love. It's something I've done all my life. I love being a part of racing. You go race at a lot of places and it doesn't really involve the team. When you race on a quarter mile up to a three quarter mile racetrack I feel like that's a lot more on the driver and team you have behind you. On a bigger race track a lesser driver with good equipment can win. When you go to a short track all of a sudden a good race car driver with lesser equipment can win there."

"Here where you making live pit stops it involves a lot more people to make it all happen. I like that part of it. You put that together with the fact that I love 200 or 250 lap races and it's definitely my style of racing. I like the team part of racing -to pace yourself for 250 laps. It's a team-oriented sport and when you throw a lot of pit stops in, I feel the Hooters Pro Cup Series is by far the best short track series.

"I guess a lot of my personality outside the race car is just like inside the race car. Patience is probably my best virtue inside the race car and I'd say in l life I'm a fairly patient person. I try to stay even-keeled as much as possible. Never let the highs get too high. Never let the lows get too low. One thing in racing you learn is that you never look back. You never look back at the good things. You never look back to the bad things. You might use them in the future to help yourself out but you never dwell on the past. "

"It's amazing to see the loads on the tires going though the corners. I was lucky enough to do a lot of tire testing for BF Goodrich. The infrared camera that we put inside the race car was pointed at the right rear tire really showed the load on the tire in going through the corners. Infrared when it's white it's maxed out on heat and it was a total white out going through the corners. When you go down the straightaway it starts cooling back down. As soon as you turn the wheel the tire went right off the chart again as far as the heat in the tire. That really amazed me the difference in the tire itself going through the corners. You come back and replay the camera and you can see how hot the tire gets. That really taught me an awful lot about a tire and the load on a tire going through the corners. "

"I probably get my desire to race. I'm a very competitive person. I've learned to refine that when it comes to racing. You can't think you are going to win every race, because if you do that you're going to be disappointed a lot. You're not going to be happy. I've kind of learned that. I don't know, it's just the way I've been my whole life. I had a bad year two years ago. My worst year in racing and I thought that I was ready to quit. And you get to that last race and there's a little checker flag. If you're ready to quit, you start thinking about something else to do, but chances are most racers that have the desire to race, they'll start thinking about next year right after that checker flag falls for that last race. That's exactly what I did and knew that I wasn't ready to hang up the helmet."

"I love the sport. Short track racing is what it's about for me. I've raced on big tracks. I won an ASA race at Dover. To me there's nothing better than a one quarter to three quarter mile racetrack. I feel like that's real racing. Anything over a mile puts a lot more on the equipment that you're in. You get under a half- mile racetrack a guy can win with a lot more talent than a guy who has lesser talent with a lot more car. Short track racing is what it's all about for me. Going back on the Hooters Cup the difference of that into it also, because I love the short track racing."