NSSN Correspondent

Jon Stanbrough turned 40 years old last month. This is a milestone that signals black crepe paper and pointed jokes for many of us. Over the hill — a time to look forward to the ride down the other side, and at the same time become retrospective of our lives and what they mean. 
However, Stanbrough is not really like most of us. For one thing, he’s won 30 sprint-car features this season and is at the pinnacle of his racing career. There’s no time to look down, or back — just the anticipation of the next race.
With the Midwest season over, Stanbrough competed in the Oval Nationals and Western World Championships in a car owned by Glenn Crossno. He will go to the Turkey Night Grand Prix and he’ll have his helmet bag with him in case a ride turns up. No, he’s not slowing down at all.
Although he makes a living by hustling a sprint car around very fast dirt tracks, making breathtaking passes while running on a ragged edge, Stanbrough is a low-key, calculating race driver.
He can calculate his odds quicker than any championship poker player. His thrills come from making rapid-fire decisions, one after the other, relying on instincts calibrated by many racing laps. He doesn’t need to go all-in on a straight draw to kick his adrenalin up a couple of notches.
Thirty victories. That gives Stanbrough 51 victory lane photos over the past two seasons, making him among the most productive sprint-car drivers in the world. All but a handful of those triumphs have come at the wheel of the Foxco No. 53 DRC. 
Stanbrough and the Foxes are probably getting tired of being asked what their secret is.  The big secret is that there is no secret. As with any great team, success is the result of a combination of factors and in their case, it consists of good equipment, highly skilled members, a ton of experience — and chemistry.

Brad Fox	Steve Fox

They keep it simple. Brad and Steve Fox put a solid car on the track every time they unload. Nothing fancy, a lot of sweat equity goes into the preparation of the DRC chassis and Foxco motors. A decade ago, Brad Fox was a championship driver in a sprint car that Steve fielded, and they bring as much knowledge of area tracks and how to prepare and tune sprint cars as anyone else. 
During a 20-year career, spent mostly running the small dirt ovals of the Midwest, Stanbrough has experienced it all, including fielding his own car. Prior to joining forces with the Foxes, he had driven for many of the top teams, producing seasons with 15 or more victories on more than one occasion.
Stanbrough, Steve and Brad Fox and Tim Mehner have known each other most of their lives. They went to school together, Steve and Stanbrough in the same grade. Then they spent years racing against each other. Stanbrough drove their Plastic Express Silver Crown car occasionally, and finally in 2005, circumstances worked out for him to wheel their sprint car in a handful of races. When Stanbrough won two of five, it was a short off-season conversation that led to them teaming up for the 2006 season.

SUPPORT: Jon Stanbrough gets a hug in victory lane at Gas City (Ind.) I-69 Speedway earlier this year. (David E Heithaus Photo)

As many owners of racing teams learn, you can buy good cars and motors and hire skilled personnel with a lot of experience. But chemistry, the fourth element, doesn’t have a price tag and can be very elusive. Like spontaneous combustion, if all of the conditions are right, it can just happen.
With Stanbrough and the Fox brothers, the chemistry is based on trust and respect. Each trusts the other to do his job. Steve, Brad and Mehner have the car ready and make the right adjustments for the conditions each night; Stanbrough achieves the best possible results.  The trust is based on respect for each others’ skills, experience and commitment.
This allows them to go about their business with a quiet focus. There isn’t any yelling or tension in their pit, and there aren’t any Irish jigs or Iggy shuffles when they win; they’ve all been there before. When they don’t win, each knows the others gave the best they had. 

JON STANBROUGH
Age: 40
Hometown: Jamestown, Ind.
Wife: Holly
2007 Sprint Car Victories: 30
Titles: 2006, 2007 KISS Champion
18 career USAC Sprint Car victories

Consider the USAC-sanctioned Indiana Sprint Week race at Bloomington Speedway, for example. Stanbrough had won three of the previous six Sprint Week races and led the Sprint Week points with only two events remaining. But on his first qualifying lap, he slid over the banking exiting turn four and ruined both laps. Then he slipped over the banking again during the non-qualifiers race. Since the team wasn’t high enough on USAC’s provisional list, they didn’t make the feature. 
When the points were tabulated a night later, they had lost the championship by less than 20 points.
“Actually, we never said anything about it,” Stanbrough says. “It was just a bad night and I know that when I’ve made a mistake there’s no yelling or screaming. And whenever they’ve made a mistake, we go on and we don’t worry about it.”
The team doesn’t discuss it. They know that you have to run on the ragged edge to win, and sometimes you will slip over. That is the chemistry that makes a team a winner. 
Stanbrough says that there won’t be much of an off season. 
The Chili Bowl will be here soon, and he’ll also compete in Arizona and Florida during the winter. He’ll be busy in his fabrication shop near his Jamestown, Ind., home. In addition to the racing parts that he builds, he’s restoring a ’67 Corvette. “This one will be back to its original condition when it left the factory,” he promises.
Riding the crest of one of the most successful seasons in recent history, Stanbrough admits that he does contemplate the future, then adds, “I want to keep racing as long as I can because this is part of the way that I make my living. Obviously, it’s been good and I want to win as many races as I can. Not that it means anything to anybody else, but one of these days when I’m older, I can sit back and be proud of what I’ve accomplished.”