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For McFall It's All About Having Fun
Elwood's Bruce McFall started his 36 year of
competition at
Anderson Speedway and it continues to be fun.
McFall is competing this year in the Street Stock and Figure-8
Divisions in cars he owns and works on during the week.
"I'll keep racing until it's no longer fun," he said recently in the pit area at
the speedway. "It's fun. It's like another job, but its something to do."
Over the more than three decades McFall has raced in the Figure-8, Street Stock
and late models, but he always returns to the dangers of the crossover.
"I started in 1973 in the old style Figure-8 cars," he said. "I stopped running
the Figure-8's in 1985 or 1986 when they changed the rules and started racing a
late model."
From the late models McFall returned to the Figure-8 Division, then Street
Stocks and after a few years away from them he made his return to the Figure-8
Division this season.
"I liked the outlaw Figure-8's, the speed of them," he said. "Those cars were a
lot faster than a regular Figure-8 car. I just like the adrenaline rush."
McFall got into racing through his father, who used to race at the now closed
Armscamp Speedway in Alexandria.
"I have a picture of me next to a 1939 Ford Coupe with my hand on the running
board," he laughs.
For many years McFall campaigned one of the few Ford powered race cars at
Anderson.
"I switched to a Chevrolet I bought from Keith Barnes in 2003," he said. "I
bought that car for less than my last Ford motor. It was a matter of economics."
McFall recalls the first night he raced at Anderson Speedway.
"It was a Friday night and you were supposed to be 18 to race," he said. "It was
the weekend before my 18th birthday. "It was a heat race and I started second or
third. I was leading until the white flag lap, a guy got under me in an old 1959
Chevrolet. I finished second in my first race."
McFall remembers a Street Stock feature he won on July, 7, 2007.
That win came one day after his wedding anniversary.
"It's tougher to win," he said of the competition at Anderson
Speedway. "There are more competitive cars now than there was. It used to be
there were guys real serious about racing and guys racing for fun."
McFall will compete in the Thunder Car endurance races in 2009 but has no plans
of driving in the division full-time.
"I don't want to have that much fun," he said. "There is a rule that you can
only run two classes a night. One car is enough, two cars is probably too may.
Three cars would be overdoing it."
As with any driver McFall has had his share of racing incidents, but has
never flipped a car at Anderson.
"I've tried to move both pit gates," he laughs. "They don't move. One time it
knocked my helmet off and crushed the cartilage in my nose. Another time I burnt
the area around my eyes. The gas line came off and I had the face shield up on
my helmet."
McFall said his daughter, Sarah, would like to race."My wife doesn't like the
idea," he said. "I might build her a car next
year."
McFall worked for 31 years in a machine shop in Frankfort before it went out of
business and now works at factory in Fishers.
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