It may have been a few years
since Jani-King last sponsored Grand American Race Cars (GARC),
but that hasn’t stopped the team from winning races and
building winning cars. GARC team owner Frankie Grill has been
building stock cars out of his Alabama race shop for more than 40
years. In that time, Frankie and his business partner earned a
solid reputation for building the best cars, proven by not only
his team’s winning record on the track but also by the
countless victories of those who have bought racecars from him.
According to Frankie and NASCAR, GARC is the only team to
complete every lap of every race in one season — something that
has never been done before. That year, the team took home the
All-Pro Championship for the second time.
‘Over the years, GARC
has won about 300 races,’ said Frankie. ‘These were good
races with good drivers. We’ve had Davey Allison, Red Farmer,
Bobby Gill, Jeff Purvis and so many more of the best short track
drivers in the country in our cars.’
Frankie may not be a
one-man car builder, but it’s not a big shop either. In fact,
there are only two employees in the shop, Frankie and his son
Augie.
Augie has been around the shop his entire life and has
been turning wrenches inside race cars since he was three. For
ten years, Augie built cars all week and was the team’s crew
chief on the weekends, calling the shots for some of the biggest
names in short track racing. As Augie’s experience around the
race track grew, so did his passion for racing and his quest to
move from crew chief to driver. ‘Augie’s always been
around good drivers, he just watched and learned from the best.
He knows exactly what to do out there,’ said Frankie.
In
2003, Augie slid behind the wheel for his first stock car race.
He finished second in that race, then took the checkered flag in
his very next attempt. Augie has amassed an impressive resume
that includes over 25 wins in the six years he has been driving,
including winning the 2007 and 2008 Snowball Derby, widely
recognized as the toughest, most prestigious short track race in
the country.
These were not Augie’s first trip to victory
lane at the Snowball Derby. Augie has been around the Derby since
the first time he was carried into Five Flags Speedway in
Pensacola, FL as a one-month-old in 1976. He had been to victory
lane in the Snowball Derby two times with GARC cars, both times
as a crew member on Wayne Anderson and Butch Lindley’s
efforts.
Most recently in 2009, in his #112 Jani-King racecar,
Augie qualified first and finished second at Five Flags Speedway
in Pensacola, FL on Friday, May 30, then turned around the next
night and qualified first and finished first at Mobile
International Speedway. It took just over ninety minutes for
Grill to lodge his victory in a race that was halted 12 times by
caution flags due to minor spins and equipment failures.
Augie
gave up the lead on the 51st lap, electing to go to the pit and
put on right side tires. He took back the lead, for good this
time, on lap 72 when then leader Bubba Pollard of Senoia, Georgia
went to his pit area. In winning the race, Augie also posted the
best lap time during the race at 17.317 seconds, and he logged
the top speed at 114.339 MPH measured on the front
straight-a-way.
Look for Augie, GARC and Jani-King Racing in the
news!
