Motorsports stars and fans come together this weekend at Stateline Speedway to honor Edsol Sneva with the second annual memorial race in his name. Don’t let the fact it is a ceremonial dash fool you.

“It’s a race and we go to win them,” said Blaine Sneva, one of Edsol’s three sons in the race. “Every time we get together to run the car our team goes out there to win. It’ll be a lot of fun to race my brothers and (grandson) Trevor sure showed everybody last year he can get it done. All in all the weekend to honor my dad will be a good time.”

Stateline Speedway has scheduled three divisions of open-wheel action and many of Sneva’s family will be on hand to be part of the celebration. Sons Jerry and Jan will also race in the cermonial trophy dash. Tom Sneva, the 1983 Indy 500 Champion who took part in last year’s inaugural event, has a prior engagement.

The racing program also features the methanol-burning NSRA Winged Sprint Cars, Northwest Modifieds and the West Coast Vintage Racers. Each class will run heat races and main events as part of the night’s action.

While Blaine continues to race with West Coast Vintage Racers, he has his eyes on the next generation of Sneva’s to get behind the wheel when the time is right. With the Sneva Memorial race building into a yearly event, the potential to see a younger Sneva racing in the Sprint Car or Northwest Modified ranks is not to far off.

“My granddaughter Candice, who’s only three years old, is really excited about watching her grandpa race,” Blaine said. “She loves the racing and someday soon she’ll get going in go-karts or something and then you just never know where it will take her. Racing is fun for our family and I’ve raced so many different type of cars including late models that there really isn’t a preference as long as we can have fun doing it. When she tells me she wants to get in the car and you see that twinkle in her eye it sure gets me excited.”

Summer Showdown

Evergreen Speedway gets the run of big-purse late models races underway with the Summer Showdown, the region’s biggest winner payday at $25,000. The 200-lap main event on the Monroe, Washington track is scheduled for Saturday at 7 p.m.

For the first time in the race’s history, Spokane Valley’s Blake Williams will be the only Inland Northwest racer in the field. The Summer Showdown is both prestigious and frustrating for the driver of the McClintock and Turk Ford Fusion.

“I’m proud to be representing Spokane in the Summer Showdown,” said Williams, just one of three Spokane-area drivers representing the area on the NASCAR K&N events last year . “We’re focusing on our super late model program this year and trying to get through the challenges of the Summer Showdown (before looking at other races). I’d like to finish one of these races and that’d be a goal accomplished after all we’ve been through.”

He has lost a motor in practice prior to one start and on another occassion lost a motor as the result of a piece of the track’s asphalt coming through his Ford’s radiator.