Dave Ely - News Archives - September 2000

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Turning Heads by Bruce Ellis Open Wheel Magazine, September 2000 "He runs hard.He runs alot harder than I run," says Don Kreitz, Jr. of his nephew, Dave Ely. Kreitz has been one of the most successful sprint car drivers in Pennsylvania for the past 15 years. His resume includes four consecutive track championships at Williams Grove Speedway, seven World of Outlaws victories, and a Kings Royal triumph. Kreitz didn't hesitate to offer his thoughts on the current status of Ely, a rising star on the Pennsylvania sprint circuit. "At the beginning of this year, I thought he was running a little bit to hard. I thought maybe he was over his head--that he wasn't ready for that yet," Kreitz continues. "But obviously I was wrong, because he looks really strong right now. Other than Fred Rahmer, Dave's been the fastest, most consistent driver in Pennsylvania all year." The rail birds first started to notice Dave Ely (pronounced EELEE) a year ago when he ran sixth , one spot ahead of Steve Kinser, in a World of Outlaws race at Williams Grove. He went on to win an All Star show at Port Royal by holding off Kenny Jacobs in September, then he came back to finish eighth in the WoO-sanctioned National Open at the Grove. He gets especially motivated when the Outlaws are in the area. "I love racing with them," he says. "They'll whip my ass, but I want them here to do it." This season his first win came at Lincoln when he passed Fred Rahmer with one lap left. His second came in the Early Bird Championship at Williams Grove when he put a vicious last-lap slide job on PJ Chesson to steal the victory. Suddenly, at age 22, Dave Ely had everyone's attention. So, where did he come from? "Racing. That's all he ever knew," says Mike Ely , Dave's father and crew chief. "It's all he ever wanted to do. It's all he ever did." What else would he do? Despite being an honor student at West Lawn's Wilson High School where his schedule was filled with gifted classes and accelerated courses, Ely had no thoughts of college. He was born into a racing family and never even considered a career outside the sport. One of his grandfathers, also named Dave Ely, was a successful modified stock car driver in the '50s. His other grandfather, Don Kreitz Sr., was a star in modifieds, midgets, and sprint cars. Dave's father was Don Jr's. crew chief during some of Kreitz's best years and also spent a season with Fred Rahmer. Even Dave's mother, Vicki Kreitz Ely, is involved in the racing business as co-owner, along with her brother Don Jr., of Kreitz Oval Track Parts in Sinking Springs, Pennsylvania. Mike Ely is the proprietor of Ely Fabrications. He builds sprint car components such as bumpers, rub rails, front axles, and wing mounts. His shop is located on Fritztown Road, across the street from the speed shop and in front of the home she shares with Dave, who is an only child, and Vicki. Behind this home is where Dave took his first ride on a home built go-kart at age 3. Donny Kreitz will tell you how Dave crashed the go-kart into his sandbox, scared himself, and wouldn't get back on it for a while. Kids forget quickly, however, and by the time Dave was 8, he was racing quads on a track carved from the family property. The competition was fierce for an 8-year-old and included the likes of Kreitz, Rahmer, and Johnny Mackison, all professional sprint car drivers at the time. Ely's earliest memory of a racing event is not of the race itself. Although he was only 2 or 3, he can remember being at the Hunterdon County Medical Center, across from the Flemington Fairgrounds. His family was there to pick up a modified driver named Red Coffin, whom his father was helping back then. Coffin had crashed and was taken across the street for a checkup. Ely doesn't remember the race --just the hospital. He does remember sitting in the grandstands at Bridgeport, New Jersey, for a World of Outlaws race. The white car with the yellow wing carrying the red #4 caught his eye. The driver was Doug Wolfgang, and he became Ely's hero. "To this day if it was he and I racing, I'd probably be rooting for him," says Ely. By 1989 Donnie Kreitz was on the road with the World of Outlaws. His crew consisted primarily of Mike Ely and Dave then 11. It was during that period when Dave got to meet Wolfgang and other stars of that era. He also learned how to maintain a sprint car. Ely's racing career officially began a year later in go-kart competition. He was well ahead of most kids his age and won 35 features during his four-year stint in karts. He credits those backyard quad battles with Kreitz, Rahmer, and Mackison for giving him a leg up on the kart racers. At 16, he moved from karts to KARS limited sprints. He was leading the fourth race he entered at Penn National and appeared to be headed for a win when the driveline broke with four laps left. He had to wait until his eighth KARS race for his first victory, which came at Delaware's Seacoast Speedway. Two years later, in 1996, he had moved up to 360s and raced with URC, ESS, and the Ohio Sprint Bandits. At the end of that season he made his first 410 start. His plans for the next season were to concentrate on URC and run as many 410 shows as possible. By July of 1997, however, he had tired of the United Racing Club. "It had gotten to the point that when a 410 show would come up, I'd be excited to go to the races. A URC show would come up, and it was like punching a clock. It would be like, "What are they gonna complain about tonight? What's the fight gonna be about payoff? It just got to the point where it wasn't fun, and if I'm not havin' fun, whether it's my profession or not, it's not worth doin." "I commended URC for what it is," he continues. "They're an excellent training ground; they have good rules so you can make good money; they have good racers, and you can pick up a ton of experience racin' with them." "But I didn't like the club racing. I go to the races to race. If I just wanted to make friends, we wouldn't spend that much money-I'd just go to a bar instead. That's not the way I am. I don't go to the racetrack to picnic or anything else. I go there to race. I could not handle the club racing, and I would definitely say I wasn't one of the most popular people there because of that." It was time to move on. "The jump from go-karts to limited sprints was no big deal," Ely explains. "The first day I got in a limited sprint, I felt comfortable, and I pretty much got up to speed. It wasn't that big of a deal. Then I got into a 410 sprint car and ... man, those boys were serious! From the time you get to the racetrack 'till the time you leave, you better have your elbows up. "That's the one thing that I was not prepared for. And that intensity is what I learned in the 410's that I never learned anywhere else. The intensity level is so high because you've got people there that race for a living. How well they do is how well their families are gonna eat this week. Man, that's just a whole 'nother ball game." Intensity has become a word that is almost trite today. People use the word without really thinking of its meaning. Dave Ely offers his own definition followed by examples of intensity: "Never giving up. That's intensity. Fred Rahmer, Steve Kinser, Sammy Swindell. That's intensity. Fred Rahmer gets into an accident on the first lap at Lincoln, goes to the rear, then comes back to win the race. That's intensity. "Intensity means not making excuses for anything. It's taking what you've not when they push you off and making the best of that situation, whether your car's right or whether it's off a little bit. Intensity means raising yourself beyond what you think you can do." Just as Ely was learning about intensity, he also learned about pain when a violent crash at Grandview put a premature end to his '98 season. The wreck left him with a fractured clavicle and a severe concussion. His shoulder healed as quickly as the doctors predicted it would, but the concussion took more time. He couldn't focus, stay awake or eat. His weight dropped to 125 pounds. It took nearly a year until he felt comfortable in the race car, until he got his confidence back, until he could race in traffic again. With the return of his confidence came the return of his strength and endurance, aided by the addition of nearly 30 pound to his 5-foot 6-inch frame. The 2000 season was off to a good start for Ely. He was consistently fast through the first two months. He credits experience and confidence as primary factors in his success. "It was late last year when racing really became fun," Ely says. "It was then that I realized this is what I love to do, and this is what I want to do. I knew I had to pick up the pace." Although Ely feels his uncle, Donald, had a tremendous career and has been a big influence on his own racing, Dave has consciously gotten away from Kreitz's low-riding style. He thinks the days of being a bottom specialist like Kreitz, or in earlier days Bobby Allen, are over. He points to Fred Rahmer and the Outlaws as drivers that go wherever they need to go to pass. "The bottom takes a lot of concentration," Ely says. "You need more finesse on and off the pedals-- that kind of stuff. But the top is a whole 'nother realm of concentration. You're tryin' to hit the mark every lap and not jump over it. You're trying to stay smooth up there as best you can. And it takes a lot of confidence to run close to the wall. I don't think I ever had that confidence until last year. The biggest thing was that I didn't want to tear up a bunch of cars learning to run the cushion because we couldn't afford to do that." He also credits a switch to J&J chassis last year as providing a boost in his confidence and comfort levels. He turned down a solid offer to drive for an established team this season because he wanted to stay with his J&Js. While Ely won't rule out driving for another team, he will be selective. "If the right deal came along where I could better myself, I'd have to do it," he says. "But I'd need control. I like my J&J cars. I like my Davey Brown engines. I like my American Racer tires. I like the people I'm associated with." Meanwhile, Ely's life continues to revolve around racing. That's all he talks about and he likes to talk. Listen to him, and you would think he was beyond his 22 years. He recounts things that happened at the Reading Fairgrounds as if he personally witnessed them, even though the place closed in 1979. He quotes Wolfgang, Rahmer and the late Rich Vogler. But he doesn't talk all the time; he's learned to listen too. He listens when Rahmer talks about feeling the air while racing a sprint car and how to drive by somebody at Williams Grove. He phones Wolfgang a lot and listens when the old master speaks. Although Wolfgang has never seen Ely race, the Sioux Falls veteran is a steady source of knowledge and motivation to the kid from Pennsylvania's Dutch Country. Dave Ely dreams too. He dreams about being a professional sprint car driver, either with the World of Outlaws or in Pennsylvania. He dreams of a Stevie Smith deal where a major sponsor provides the capital while Dave and his father call all the shots. But they are just dreams. In reality he's got a good team, which took years to assemble. He's got a competitive race car and enough resources to keep it going. But more importantly, he's racing. "I love it," he says. "There are only about a million better ways to make a living. There is no guaranteed income. You can get hurt. You can get killed. It's more addictive than drugs. There are a lot of negatives to it, but there are a lot of positives, too. There are friendships I've made over the years. Even at only 22, I consider myself very lucky because I've got friends in just about every state in the country, and I've met them all through racing." Racing is an outlet for his competitive spirit as well. He is so competitive he hates to get passed even while driving his new Mustang down the highway, and he feels he probably would have lost his driver's license by now if he didn't have the opportunity to speed on the racetrack. But racing offers even more. It's Ely's time to get away from the world around him. It's his time to get away from the speed shop, the customers, the sponsors, and everyone else. "It's the one time in my week, when I get in my race car, that I'm not thinking of anything else," he says. "I focus myself and I get away. I don't think of anything but doing the best I can that night." With the improvement he's shown in the past year, we'll likely see a lot more of Ely. And considering his background, he will surely be around sprint car racing for a long time. "It's in my blood." he says of racing. I've been going to the races since I was 3 or 4 months old. It's all around me. I couldn't get away from racing if I wanted to. It's there; it's what I've always done. It's been the one constant in my life. Everything I have or don't have is because of racing. It's given me a lot more than I could ever give in return. Inserts within the article: A DAY IN THE LIFE..... Dave Ely's days and nights are consumed by racing. He is in his father's shop every morning by 8:30 and has started his own business dynoing shocks for sprint, micro and modified racers. This, along with ordering parts for his race team and communicating with sponsors, takes up his mornings. After lunch, he goes across the street to the speed shop, where he works in sales. His nights are spent working on his race car. Ely usually quits about 10:00 p.m. and returns home to call his girlfriend, Breckett Ziehl, who lives in Atlanta. She was working for a company that made a sold racing apparel when Dave called to order a custom firesuit. They kept in contact and became best friends, but it was within the past six months that their relationship evolved into something more. Now she flies to Pennsylvania every few weeks, and sometimes they drive to a meeting place in Virginia, a midway point for the couple. But primarily they chat on the phone-- at least for now. They will be married in November. ELY-GILBERT RACING "Very country. Laid-back. Just hard working people" is how Dave Ely describes his team. He emphasizes that no one earns a living from the race team, which is comprised of working class people that have proven the can field a competitive sprint car without unlimited capital or a major sponsor. Dave makes it clear that he has no money in the car and takes a small percentage for driving it. All the bills are paid by his parents, Mike and Vicki Ely, and some family friends Larry and Jan Gilbert. The Gilberts own two of the team's three Davey Brown engines and also pay the tire bill. Larry is a fleet mechanic for a well driller who, like the Elys pours much of what he has into the race car. Ely's team also has plenty of small sponsors, which are for the most part just friends that have been there since Dave began racing. One of the team's major resources is Kreitz Oval Track Parts, where pieces can be purchased at cost, as Dave's mother, Vicki, is part owner of the speed shop. Mike Ely, a fabricator by trade, also makes many of the car's components. Dave has spent years cultivating relationships with manufacturers, some of whom serve as product sponsors. The race car itself is a light as any, but the motors are not. They do not have machined blocks or lightweight assemblies because the team cannot afford that luxury. Although his engines are giving away about 20 pounds to the lightweight motors, Dave does not see it as a significant disadvantage and is not in favor of a weight rule. "If a guy has the money, why should we hold him back?" he says. "Look at Al Hamilton. He's still up at 5 in the morning every day. He worked hard for everything he's ever earned, so why should we penalize him for what he's done?" While acknowledging that Ely-Gilbert Racing is far ahead of many teams in Pennsylvania in terms of resources, Dave credits his team's success to organization and the dedication of a volunteer crew. THE RAT "He was so small he looked like a little rat," Don Kreitz Jr. recalls. "That was his nickname for a long, long time. I know he didn't like it. He didn't want it to stick with him, but we still call him Rat sometimes." Back to Home \| Go to News Archives

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Turning Heads
by Bruce Ellis
Open Wheel Magazine, September 2000

"He runs hard.He runs alot harder than I run," says Don Kreitz, Jr. of his nephew, Dave Ely.

Kreitz has been one of the most successful sprint car drivers in Pennsylvania for the past 15 years. His resume includes four consecutive track championships at Williams Grove Speedway, seven World of Outlaws victories, and a Kings Royal triumph. Kreitz didn't hesitate to offer his thoughts on the current status of Ely, a rising star on the Pennsylvania sprint circuit.

"At the beginning of this year, I thought he was running a little bit to hard. I thought maybe he was over his head--that he wasn't ready for that yet," Kreitz continues. "But obviously I was wrong, because he looks really strong right now. Other than Fred Rahmer, Dave's been the fastest, most consistent driver in Pennsylvania all year."

The rail birds first started to notice Dave Ely (pronounced EELEE) a year ago when he ran sixth , one spot ahead of Steve Kinser, in a World of Outlaws race at Williams Grove. He went on to win an All Star show at Port Royal by holding off Kenny Jacobs in September, then he came back to finish eighth in the WoO-sanctioned National Open at the Grove.

He gets especially motivated when the Outlaws are in the area. "I love racing with them," he says. "They'll whip my ass, but I want them here to do it."

This season his first win came at Lincoln when he passed Fred Rahmer with one lap left. His second came in the Early Bird Championship at Williams Grove when he put a vicious last-lap slide job on PJ Chesson to steal the victory. Suddenly, at age 22, Dave Ely had everyone's attention.

So, where did he come from?

"Racing. That's all he ever knew," says Mike Ely , Dave's father and crew chief. "It's all he ever wanted to do. It's all he ever did."

What else would he do? Despite being an honor student at West Lawn's Wilson High School where his schedule was filled with gifted classes and accelerated courses, Ely had no thoughts of college. He was born into a racing family and never even considered a career outside the sport.

One of his grandfathers, also named Dave Ely, was a successful modified stock car driver in the '50s. His other grandfather, Don Kreitz Sr., was a star in modifieds, midgets, and sprint cars. Dave's father was Don Jr's. crew chief during some of Kreitz's best years and also spent a season with Fred Rahmer. Even Dave's mother, Vicki Kreitz Ely, is involved in the racing business as co-owner, along with her brother Don Jr., of Kreitz Oval Track Parts in Sinking Springs, Pennsylvania.

Mike Ely is the proprietor of Ely Fabrications. He builds sprint car components such as bumpers, rub rails, front axles, and wing mounts. His shop is located on Fritztown Road, across the street from the speed shop and in front of the home she shares with Dave, who is an only child, and Vicki. Behind this home is where Dave took his first ride on a home built go-kart at age 3.

Donny Kreitz will tell you how Dave crashed the go-kart into his sandbox, scared himself, and wouldn't get back on it for a while. Kids forget quickly, however, and by the time Dave was 8, he was racing quads on a track carved from the family property. The competition was fierce for an 8-year-old and included the likes of Kreitz, Rahmer, and Johnny Mackison, all professional sprint car drivers at the time.

Ely's earliest memory of a racing event is not of the race itself. Although he was only 2 or 3, he can remember being at the Hunterdon County Medical Center, across from the Flemington Fairgrounds. His family was there to pick up a modified driver named Red Coffin, whom his father was helping back then. Coffin had crashed and was taken across the street for a checkup. Ely doesn't remember the race --just the hospital.

He does remember sitting in the grandstands at Bridgeport, New Jersey, for a World of Outlaws race. The white car with the yellow wing carrying the red #4 caught his eye. The driver was Doug Wolfgang, and he became Ely's hero.

"To this day if it was he and I racing, I'd probably be rooting for him," says Ely.

By 1989 Donnie Kreitz was on the road with the World of Outlaws. His crew consisted primarily of Mike Ely and Dave then 11. It was during that period when Dave got to meet Wolfgang and other stars of that era. He also learned how to maintain a sprint car.

Ely's racing career officially began a year later in go-kart competition. He was well ahead of most kids his age and won 35 features during his four-year stint in karts. He credits those backyard quad battles with Kreitz, Rahmer, and Mackison for giving him a leg up on the kart racers.

At 16, he moved from karts to KARS limited sprints. He was leading the fourth race he entered at Penn National and appeared to be headed for a win when the driveline broke with four laps left. He had to wait until his eighth KARS race for his first victory, which came at Delaware's Seacoast Speedway.

Two years later, in 1996, he had moved up to 360s and raced with URC, ESS, and the Ohio Sprint Bandits. At the end of that season he made his first 410 start. His plans for the next season were to concentrate on URC and run as many 410 shows as possible.

By July of 1997, however, he had tired of the United Racing Club.

"It had gotten to the point that when a 410 show would come up, I'd be excited to go to the races. A URC show would come up, and it was like punching a clock. It would be like, "What are they gonna complain about tonight? What's the fight gonna be about payoff? It just got to the point where it wasn't fun, and if I'm not havin' fun, whether it's my profession or not, it's not worth doin."

"I commended URC for what it is," he continues. "They're an excellent training ground; they have good rules so you can make good money; they have good racers, and you can pick up a ton of experience racin' with them."

"But I didn't like the club racing. I go to the races to race. If I just wanted to make friends, we wouldn't spend that much money-I'd just go to a bar instead. That's not the way I am. I don't go to the racetrack to picnic or anything else. I go there to race. I could not handle the club racing, and I would definitely say I wasn't one of the most popular people there because of that."

It was time to move on.

"The jump from go-karts to limited sprints was no big deal," Ely explains. "The first day I got in a limited sprint, I felt comfortable, and I pretty much got up to speed. It wasn't that big of a deal. Then I got into a 410 sprint car and ... man, those boys were serious! From the time you get to the racetrack 'till the time you leave, you better have your elbows up.

"That's the one thing that I was not prepared for. And that intensity is what I learned in the 410's that I never learned anywhere else. The intensity level is so high because you've got people there that race for a living. How well they do is how well their families are gonna eat this week. Man, that's just a whole 'nother ball game."

Intensity has become a word that is almost trite today. People use the word without really thinking of its meaning. Dave Ely offers his own definition followed by examples of intensity:

"Never giving up. That's intensity. Fred Rahmer, Steve Kinser, Sammy Swindell. That's intensity. Fred Rahmer gets into an accident on the first lap at Lincoln, goes to the rear, then comes back to win the race. That's intensity.

"Intensity means not making excuses for anything. It's taking what you've not when they push you off and making the best of that situation, whether your car's right or whether it's off a little bit. Intensity means raising yourself beyond what you think you can do."

Just as Ely was learning about intensity, he also learned about pain when a violent crash at Grandview put a premature end to his '98 season. The wreck left him with a fractured clavicle and a severe concussion. His shoulder healed as quickly as the doctors predicted it would, but the concussion took more time. He couldn't focus, stay awake or eat. His weight dropped to 125 pounds. It took nearly a year until he felt comfortable in the race car, until he got his confidence back, until he could race in traffic again. With the return of his confidence came the return of his strength and endurance, aided by the addition of nearly 30 pound to his 5-foot 6-inch frame.

The 2000 season was off to a good start for Ely. He was consistently fast through the first two months. He credits experience and confidence as primary factors in his success.

"It was late last year when racing really became fun," Ely says. "It was then that I realized this is what I love to do, and this is what I want to do. I knew I had to pick up the pace."

Although Ely feels his uncle, Donald, had a tremendous career and has been a big influence on his own racing, Dave has consciously gotten away from Kreitz's low-riding style. He thinks the days of being a bottom specialist like Kreitz, or in earlier days Bobby Allen, are over. He points to Fred Rahmer and the Outlaws as drivers that go wherever they need to go to pass.

"The bottom takes a lot of concentration," Ely says. "You need more finesse on and off the pedals-- that kind of stuff. But the top is a whole 'nother realm of concentration. You're tryin' to hit the mark every lap and not jump over it. You're trying to stay smooth up there as best you can. And it takes a lot of confidence to run close to the wall. I don't think I ever had that confidence until last year. The biggest thing was that I didn't want to tear up a bunch of cars learning to run the cushion because we couldn't afford to do that."

He also credits a switch to J&J chassis last year as providing a boost in his confidence and comfort levels. He turned down a solid offer to drive for an established team this season because he wanted to stay with his J&Js. While Ely won't rule out driving for another team, he will be selective.

"If the right deal came along where I could better myself, I'd have to do it," he says. "But I'd need control. I like my J&J cars. I like my Davey Brown engines. I like my American Racer tires. I like the people I'm associated with."

Meanwhile, Ely's life continues to revolve around racing. That's all he talks about and he likes to talk. Listen to him, and you would think he was beyond his 22 years. He recounts things that happened at the Reading Fairgrounds as if he personally witnessed them, even though the place closed in 1979. He quotes Wolfgang, Rahmer and the late Rich Vogler. But he doesn't talk all the time; he's learned to listen too.

He listens when Rahmer talks about feeling the air while racing a sprint car and how to drive by somebody at Williams Grove. He phones Wolfgang a lot and listens when the old master speaks. Although Wolfgang has never seen Ely race, the Sioux Falls veteran is a steady source of knowledge and motivation to the kid from Pennsylvania's Dutch Country.

Dave Ely dreams too. He dreams about being a professional sprint car driver, either with the World of Outlaws or in Pennsylvania. He dreams of a Stevie Smith deal where a major sponsor provides the capital while Dave and his father call all the shots. But they are just dreams. In reality he's got a good team, which took years to assemble. He's got a competitive race car and enough resources to keep it going. But more importantly, he's racing.

"I love it," he says. "There are only about a million better ways to make a living. There is no guaranteed income. You can get hurt. You can get killed. It's more addictive than drugs. There are a lot of negatives to it, but there are a lot of positives, too. There are friendships I've made over the years. Even at only 22, I consider myself very lucky because I've got friends in just about every state in the country, and I've met them all through racing."

Racing is an outlet for his competitive spirit as well. He is so competitive he hates to get passed even while driving his new Mustang down the highway, and he feels he probably would have lost his driver's license by now if he didn't have the opportunity to speed on the racetrack. But racing offers even more. It's Ely's time to get away from the world around him. It's his time to get away from the speed shop, the customers, the sponsors, and everyone else.

"It's the one time in my week, when I get in my race car, that I'm not thinking of anything else," he says. "I focus myself and I get away. I don't think of anything but doing the best I can that night."

With the improvement he's shown in the past year, we'll likely see a lot more of Ely. And considering his background, he will surely be around sprint car racing for a long time.

"It's in my blood." he says of racing. I've been going to the races since I was 3 or 4 months old. It's all around me. I couldn't get away from racing if I wanted to. It's there; it's what I've always done. It's been the one constant in my life. Everything I have or don't have is because of racing. It's given me a lot more than I could ever give in return.

Inserts within the article:

A DAY IN THE LIFE.....

Dave Ely's days and nights are consumed by racing. He is in his father's shop every morning by 8:30 and has started his own business dynoing shocks for sprint, micro and modified racers. This, along with ordering parts for his race team and communicating with sponsors, takes up his mornings. After lunch, he goes across the street to the speed shop, where he works in sales. His nights are spent working on his race car.

Ely usually quits about 10:00 p.m. and returns home to call his girlfriend, Breckett Ziehl, who lives in Atlanta. She was working for a company that made a sold racing apparel when Dave called to order a custom firesuit. They kept in contact and became best friends, but it was within the past six months that their relationship evolved into something more. Now she flies to Pennsylvania every few weeks, and sometimes they drive to a meeting place in Virginia, a midway point for the couple. But primarily they chat on the phone-- at least for now. They will be married in November.

ELY-GILBERT RACING

"Very country. Laid-back. Just hard working people" is how Dave Ely describes his team.

He emphasizes that no one earns a living from the race team, which is comprised of working class people that have proven the can field a competitive sprint car without unlimited capital or a major sponsor.

Dave makes it clear that he has no money in the car and takes a small percentage for driving it. All the bills are paid by his parents, Mike and Vicki Ely, and some family friends Larry and Jan Gilbert.

The Gilberts own two of the team's three Davey Brown engines and also pay the tire bill. Larry is a fleet mechanic for a well driller who, like the Elys pours much of what he has into the race car.

Ely's team also has plenty of small sponsors, which are for the most part just friends that have been there since Dave began racing. One of the team's major resources is Kreitz Oval Track Parts, where pieces can be purchased at cost, as Dave's mother, Vicki, is part owner of the speed shop. Mike Ely, a fabricator by trade, also makes many of the car's components. Dave has spent years cultivating relationships with manufacturers, some of whom serve as product sponsors.

The race car itself is a light as any, but the motors are not. They do not have machined blocks or lightweight assemblies because the team cannot afford that luxury. Although his engines are giving away about 20 pounds to the lightweight motors, Dave does not see it as a significant disadvantage and is not in favor of a weight rule.

"If a guy has the money, why should we hold him back?" he says. "Look at Al Hamilton. He's still up at 5 in the morning every day. He worked hard for everything he's ever earned, so why should we penalize him for what he's done?"

While acknowledging that Ely-Gilbert Racing is far ahead of many teams in Pennsylvania in terms of resources, Dave credits his team's success to organization and the dedication of a volunteer crew.

THE RAT

"He was so small he looked like a little rat," Don Kreitz Jr. recalls. "That was his nickname for a long, long time. I know he didn't like it. He didn't want it to stick with him, but we still call him Rat sometimes."

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