Crew schoolmates pitting Hooters car

Keith Parsons

Thursday, June 21, 2001 | 8:25 a.m.

Jon Kerley has a built-in excuse for any loss on the Hooters racing circuit. He can blame it on his inexperienced crew.

But no one expects them to be as good as some, because they aren't in it for the money. In fact, no one gets paid.

His team of 18 is part of the 4-year-old Bobby Isaac Motorsports Program at Catawba Valley Community College in Hickory, N.C. The program has sent about 190 graduates to jobs in auto racing. The students on the race team pay tuition for their year on the road with the stock car series.

Kerley drives the team's Chevrolet on the weekends and doubles as lead instructor for classes during the week. He's 18th in the series standings with a career-best finish of third in 19 starts.

"We try to run this thing as close as we can to what a Winston Cup or Busch deal would be like," Kerley said. "We've had some failures that have come about just because of inexperience, but you try to teach the students why it happened and move on."

The program is named for the late Bobby Isaac, the 1970 NASCAR champion. Isaac's sister, Peggy Hall, gave the school an initial donation to start the program.

"He never had a high school diploma, but education was something near and dear to his heart," program head Joyce Watson said.

About 200 students have completed the six-class program since it started, and about 1,000 have taken at least one class. Each session lasts eight weeks, but the members of the crew for Team Concept stay throughout the season.

Mark Davis, director of the program, worked for years with NASCAR teams in various capacities. He oversees all the work done at the school and at the track, offering advice and instruction.

"I'm going to tell you right now, the Pro Cup stuff is cutting edge," Davis said of the Hooters series. "It's great for the kids. They do everything from build the cars to put the body on them to paint them and decal them."

Although CVCC doesn't have dorms, Watson said about 90 percent of the students come from out of state. Some are recent high school graduates, but retirees also have taken advantage of the program.

"I just talked to a man on the phone last week who's an architect from Massachusetts," Watson said. "He's retiring at 60 years of age, and he said he's made all the money he wants. Now he wants to do something fun."

Kerley is a second-generation driver who grew up following his father around what used to be NASCAR's Late Model Sportsman division. Kerley was good enough as a mechanic to get a job with Roush Racing.

But Kerley wanted to drive, and he hooked up with Davis two years ago to join the CVCC team.

"We've got aspirations of moving this deal up to the truck series or a Busch deal, but the biggest thing we're fighting is space and financial support," Kerley said. "The college is working to solve the space problem, and Mark is on the phone every day with different people to find more sponsorship."

The program is not limited to men. Three women have come through, including a fabricator from last year's group.

"She came to the program with her fiancee, and they both finished and got jobs working in the industry," Watson said. "From what I understand, she's a better fabricator than he is."