Racing to the top
Shannon LeClair
Time Reporter
Many great stock car drivers start young, learning the skills of driving and gaining experience at early ages. Jayde, and Jaycob Masciangelo have each been racing for a few years now. Jaycob, 11, will be heading into his fourth year and Jayde, 13, into her third.
When Jaycob was in Tyke hockey in Chestermere, Jay, their dad, had heard from another father about the Minicup car racing and that kids can start it when they are eight-years-old.
Minicup is a car that is approximately half of the scale of a stock car, built just like the Sprint Cup cars found on TV. The goal is to help entry-level stock car racers gain experience. The Cupcar focuses on kid’s ages 8 to 16.
“As soon as Jaycob was close to eight or turning eight he investigated, found out where to get these mini cup cars which is through Evolution Racing Products out of Cochrane, they run this club for the Minicup cars,” said mom Carla Masciangelo.
Jay got in touch with Evolution Racing Products to get Jaycob his first car and out onto the track.
The home track is in Edmonton and the family of four can be found at the Edmonton International Raceway (EIR) every other weekend from May until September. The EIR track is a quarter mile oval track and the cars go as fast as 95 km. It is set up just like NASCAR with the points and rules.
When Jaycob first started racing there were five to six cars registered. At the end of this past season were 15 other cars registered. The kids can race in the Minicup until they are 16 and then they can move up to Baby Grands or Late Models which are actually full-sized vehicles.
Watching Jaycob race and having a need to fill some time were motivations for Jayde to want to begin racing.
“I thought that it was cool to see Jaycob racing so I wanted to start racing,” said Jayde.
Jayde’s forte is cheerleading, but it is only available from September until June, so they needed something during the other months where she is off. The brother and sister racing duo both also take part in extreme cheerleading. Previously Jaycob had played hockey, and next season he plans to go back to the ice.
Jayde is a little too tall to get into her car right now and so she is hoping to move into the full-sized vehicle and keep racing.
Jayde right now only competes against one racer who is her age, but if she were to move up she would have a few other people her age to race with, and some of them would be older. If she goes into Baby Grands she won’t race at the EIR. If she were to race in Feature Future Stock she could race at the EIR.
“I’m a social butterfly so I love to be around my friends, I also like to race. I like that I’m faster this year because last year I came in second last and this year I’m sixth,” said Jayde.
For Jaycob everything about racing is awesome, and he enjoys it all.
If asked two years ago if watching her kids racing scared her Carla would have said yes, but Jaycob was in a really bad crash at the beginning of last season. He went over another Minicup car in the air and into a cement wall going 60 miles per hour.
“My heart stopped. He was taken off the track in an ambulance but he came out virtually unscathed, he has two little bruises where the five-point harness system was on,” said Carla.
“The cars are so safe, you are totally in a roll cage, you have that five-point harness system, your arms are strapped into your suit so they can’t go flying out of the vehicle and plus there’s nets on the windows too. That showed me that it’s totally, totally safe, those kids are like in a metal cocoon I guess you could say.”
Each child gets to race in two heat races. At the end of the night is the feature race where all of the cars race together on the quarter mile track. The kids are talked to through the headsets and kind of warned if there might be a possibly dangerous situation and to try to avoid crashes.
Out of the 15 racers Jayde came in sixth place, a feat her parents are proud of. Her favourite saying is ‘Girls go fast too’ which is written on the back of her car.
Last year Jaycob was the 2011 EUR Champion. This year he walked away from the season as both the 2012 EIR Champ, and the 2012 Evolution Racing Products Champ. The motto on the back of Jaycob’s hot pink car is ‘Go fast, go hard or go home’.