Although they come from different racing backgrounds, the paths of Eric Gunderson and Chase Catania crossed briefly last year.
And while they are presently following different tracks, the San Diego County teenagers are two of the area's top young drivers.
Gunderson, 15, is racing on the U.S. Auto Club's regional Ford Focus Midget series this season. Catania, 18, is preparing to travel to Charlotte, N.C., to compete in the final races of the Summer Shootout Legend Car Series.
Both Gunderson and Catania have been racing three years and neither has a clear vision of what the racing future holds. But both have drawn interest from some of racing's top names.
Midget and Sprint car legend Wally Pankratz has helped Gunderson make his transition from karting to hybrid open-wheel pavement and dirt cars.
And Catania will be living with David Ragan in North Carolina and hanging around the Roush Fenway Racing stable.
“It's a great opportunity,” Catania said. “Like anyone, hopefully, I'll go as far as I can go.”
“My ultimate goal is to be a professional driver,” Gunderson said. “But I'm very open-minded. You can only take it a year at a time. This season has made it more difficult to project what might happen.”
Gunderson, who will be a sophomore at La Jolla High, is the son of an engineer and a pilot; until recently he was more involved in restoring airplanes than preparing midgets for dirt track racing.
Catania, a senior at Grossmont High, is the son of former Cajon Speedway street stock and modified driver Doug Catania.
“I watched my dad race for 10 years,” Chase Catania said. “I think I picked up some things from him and he knows what to do and what not to do.”
Gunderson parallels his background to what makes Penske Racing successful – attention to detail.
“We're not a racing family; we don't have an extensive background in racing,” Gunderson said. “But our team is big on preparation and attention to the smallest thing. That's my dad's (Charles) strength.
“And that approach has helped us with the learning curve.”
Gunderson started karting at age 11, won an International Karting Federation race and a Region 7 championship and moved on to other forms of racing in 2007.
“We reached a point in karting where I had learned a lot and wanted to know about other forms of racing,” said Gunderson, who, despite his youth, already handles much of his own marketing and sponsorship commitments. “So we were looking for the next step.”
Gunderson even dabbled in Legend Cars, where he raced Catania at Toyota Speedway in Irwindale in 2008. “He's fast,” said Catania of Gunderson.
Real fast. Gunderson won 10 races during the season and finished second in the final Legend standings and was named the track's rookie of the year.
It was during the 2007 season that Gunderson attended Pankratz's driving school. The teacher took a liking to the student.
“I'd tag along and he helped me,” said Gunderson, whose parents own his pavement Focus Midget while Pankratz owns his dirt Focus Midget. Both cars are prepared by Tres and Stewart Van Dyne in Huntington Beach.
Gunderson has run 11 races this year starting with a win in the season-opening pavement race at the Bullring in Las Vegas. He followed that with a second in his dirt opener at Bakersfield. Recently he ran fifth at Ventura and third at Perris.
And there lies part of the problem. The closest of the nine tracks on which Gunderson races is Perris. He has run as far away as Arizona, Nevada and Northern California.
Like Gunderson, Catania has run at five tracks this season along the Interstate 10 and I-15 corridors from Lake Havasu, Ariz., and Las Vegas to Irwindale and Perris. He has scored wins at three tracks and ranks seventh in the national Legend points standings, although he has had far fewer race opportunities than the drivers down south.
“Going to North Carolina will give me a chance to race at different tracks only miles apart,” Catania said. “It's a huge opportunity.”
Catania started racing at age 15 with Santee's Darren Amidon, who won a total of three Legend season championships at Irwindale and Orange Show speedways before cutting back on his schedule.
Professional race driver Eric Gunderson, a budding star at 15, understands the value of having a strong support team. And it’s paid off with victories.
It doesn’t hurt that in the spring and fall he got a jump-start from his La Jolla High teachers, who shared the 9th-grader’s passion to become a big-time race driver. He was given homework assignments early so he could leave town Fridays for Saturday night races. Those trips were to Hanford, Ventura, Irwindale, Perris and even Las Vegas.
“It comes down to getting my school work early and to make sure I’m on top of it,” said the straight-A honors student.
Where Little League involvement includes costs for a uniform, shoes and a glove, this sport is expensive. A Focus Ford midget, the kind Gunderson races, can cost $22,000 new. And he has one for pavement and one for dirt track racing, plus a small Legends stock car.
“I tried baseball, soccer and football before getting into karting,” he said. “Didn’t find those to my liking. When I was 11, I saw a picture of a go-kart in a magazine and I told my mom I’d like to try it.”
A few months after driver’s school, he was on the road circuits and winning.
He admits he’s on a learning curve with the midgets, but he won the first race he entered this year in Las Vegas.
Gunderson has been successful on pavement tracks and feels it will take time to adapt to broad sliding on dirt.
“We will be climbing multiple mountains this year, taking on two forms of racing,” said the articulate youngster, who helps prepare his news releases. “It will be difficult, but we have learned over the past several years that we can accomplish a lot in a short period of time if we stay focused and committed, and work with the right people.
“I am obviously very young to be involved in so many types of racing, but the crew members on my cars bring literally decades of championship experience to our racing programs. Last year was my first in oval track racing. I won 10 of the 27 races I entered. I competed against racers of all ages, some of whom have been racing Legends cars for 15 years.”
His pavement racer is kept at a shop in Chino and the dirt machine in Huntington Beach.
A midget car weighs 900 pounds and has 400 horsepower. It is modified with mechanical fuel injection to operate on methanol fuel instead of gasoline.
“Mom and Dad have been very supportive from the start,” Gunderson said.
And that involvement means spending hours on the road and at the tracks.
His team involves many people who work on the cars and serve as crew chiefs and instructors.
“My mom videotapes the event, and then we go to my instructor’s place to clean the car and go over the race to talk about what I did right and what I did wrong,” he said. “It’s all a part of the accelerating process.”
His driving coach is Wally Pankratz, a prominent sprint car driver.
Gunderson said he felt like an outsider at the start because most of the other drivers were from families who had been involved in racing for years.
“Aside from airplanes and an interest in cars, my family knew nothing about racing,” he said. “But I like to think our approach in coming to the track and how we achieve success will help us gain respect from our competitors. I’d like to be a force to be reckoned with.”
And he’s almost halfway through a 24-race season to prove his point. Next up is Perris Auto Speedway on July 4.
“Dirt track was the greatest transition,” he acknowledged. “Legend cars are a little sensitive. On pavement, I feel at home in a midget. It’s like a go-kart with suspension and you can adjust them in the cockpit.
“Our team is enjoying great success because of our professional approach that combines hard work, teamwork, dedication and attention to detail.”
That organized approach comes from a young man who also serves as a coach for a Dale Carnegie “Effective Communications and Human Relations” course.
And in true driver form, he doesn’t leave out his sponsors, who have been with him for a couple of years. They include Maxima Products, Vitalyte, Oakley Inc. and Nomad Slot Car Racing.
Eric Gunderson has raced competitively for more than five years. He's won dozens of races and placed in the top tier in dozens more. But Eric is not yet old enough to legally hold a California driver's license.
In fact, Eric, 15, says he has little time to pursue a learner's permit.
He just finished his freshman year at La Jolla High School, where he is an honor student. He has a racing schedule that requires him to travel approximately 30 weeks a year to races sometimes hundreds of miles away. This year, Eric is racing three cars prepared at three shops, in three racing series.
Eric began racing at 11, shortly after his family attended a race sponsored by the San Diego Karting Association at the now-closed El Cajon Speedway.
'Fun, challenging' "It was something that looked fun and challenging," Eric said. "I saw something that kids my age were doing, and I wanted to do it, too."
From the beginning, Eric's parents were encouraging. In fact, they are very involved in their son's racing career. His parents help coordinate and schedule his races. His father is also his crew chief, and his mother videotapes all his races.
Eric raced karts for three years before moving on to Legends car racing. Karting is often a steppingstone to higher and more expensive ranks of motorsports.
Legends cars are a style of race car designed to encourage exciting racing and keep costs low. Yamaha motorcycle engines power the cars, designed after American automobiles from the 1930s and 1940s.
Changing cars This year, Eric has had limited races in Legends cars and began United States Auto Club (USAC) Ford Focus midget racing on pavement and dirt tracks. The midgets use the core engine from the Ford Focus passenger car.
"Racing has built a lot of confidence in me and made a lot of other experiences easier on me," Eric said.
Despite his success and hectic schedule, Eric remains humble and grounded, according to those who know him.
Jim Essex, Eric's English teacher at La Jolla High School, describes him as very understated and an excellent student with a dry wit.
Modesty a rare trait "He came in at the beginning of the year beyond his age," Essex said. "He's modest about his accomplishments. None of it has gone to his head, which is rare in a high school student."
Eric has ambitions of racing professionally in NASCAR Sprint Cup Series and being top tier someday. He was named Rookie of the Year in the Legends Division last year, finishing second among 62 drivers in the season points standings.
"I've been fortunate to win a lot and have a lot of success, thanks to a team that has been built around me."
A few weeks after watching a San Diego Karting Association race, Eric Gunderson's parents bought him his own kart. He started racing when he was 11.
“I tried other sports like baseball and football and such, and wasn't a big fan of them,” he said.
At 15, he's moved on to a Ford Focus midget, a race car that typically weighs 1,100 pounds, has 180 horsepower and is powered by the same engine as a Ford Focus. He's got an extensive racing schedule and spends most weekends traveling to places such as Las Vegas, Madera or Ventura. He's got his sights set on turning pro.
“I can honestly see him becoming a professional race car driver,” said Jerry Tellers, Eric's advanced world history teacher at La Jolla High School.
Eric has such a passion for the sport that he sends his teacher weekly updates on how he's doing in his races. His team is the Eric Gunderson Racing Team, at ericgundersonracing.com. He's the driver, his dad is the crew chief and his mom does just about everything else. He also has a racing coach, a mechanic and locally based sponsors, including Vitalyte, Maxima Racing Oils and Nomad Slot Racing.
“I like the competition, as well as the challenges of racing,” Eric said. “There's a technical aspect, and it's also a team sport as well as a solo sport.”
When it comes to racing, he seems all business. Tellers sees that same hard-working Eric in class, but he also sees a funny, outgoing Eric.
“He always gets along with the other students in the class and jokes around in a positive way,” said Tellers.
If he's interested in something in class, say, World War II, he won't rest with the textbook or the class lectures. Tellers says Eric goes beyond what's required of him – in the classroom and on the track.
– Lisa Deaderick
National Speed Sport News
April 8, 2009
Gunderson Tops Las Vegas Field
by editor — last modified 2009-04-07 08:09
USAC Ford Focus
LAS VEGAS — Eric Gunderson topped an 18-car field to win Saturday’s USAC California Ford Focus Pavement feature at The Bullring @ Las Vegas Motor Speedway. Gunderson, the series point-leader, grabbed the lead on lap 11 of the three-eighths-mile asphalt oval and raced to the checkered flag ahead of Cody Swanson, with Cody Gerhardt, fast-qualifier Jim Waters and Michael Lewis filling the top five. The finish: Eric Gunderson, Cody Swanson, Cody Gerhardt, Jim Waters, Michael J. Lewis, Kipp Posey, Nick Romano, Jeff Oleen, Zach Stout, Bob Brewer, Chuck Groat, Luis Ramos III, Connor Kassik, J.R. Williams, Ron Duncombe, Gregg Fuette, Jeff Kelley, Michael Daniels.
