Paralegals & Legal Secretaries

Paralegal by Day - Motor Head by Night

By ParalegalGateway.com

By day, he's a paralegal with the Spokane County Public Defender's office.

By night, his idea of fun is going fast and turning left. Yep, motor head.

"It's what I do," said Post Falls driver Allen Tuckness, who started racing at the Spokane Interstate Fairgrounds in 1972.

"My hero has always been Richard Petty and I've just had this passion for racing. My wife (Michelle) knew going in, this is my hobby, it's what I love to do."

Tuckness got out of racing entirely three years ago when his son Jonathan moved back to Virginia in 2005.

"I had two cars at that time, one that I drove and one that he and his brothers worked on," Tuckness said. "When he moved to Virginia, I just sold everything and I quit.

"I also had a total knee replacement done, but one day I was sitting at home and I said, 'I just can't sit here. I race, that's my hobby.' "

Jonathan moved back from Virginia to Spokane and it was time for the Tucknesses to get back into racing.

So Allen bought a 1933 Chevrolet Coup last year, which he runs, and a 1987 Volkswagon Jetta, which Jonathan races in the Road Runner class at Stateline Speedway.

"I raced the same type of car back in the '70s," Tuckness said. "I had a 1932 Ford Vicky and we'd race Wednesday nights at the Spokane Fairgrounds and Friday nights here."

The Roadrunner class is a training ground and they found a hundred-dollar car out of the junkyard and let Jonathan put it in motion in his first season since returning from back east.

"It's a (bleeping) wienerschnitzel," Allen said. "I can say whatever I want, I built the damn thing."

Jonathan, a Post Falls High School graduate, just smiled as if he'd heard that line before.

"The biggest difference is that I'm used to rear-wheel drive and this is a front-wheel drive," said Jonathan, 21, who started racing in 2003 at the Spokane Raceway Park. "It doesn't slide at all. It pushes more than it's loose.

"With the front-wheel drive, I have an advantage because I can get through the corners better and then it's a matter of working up the speed to stay with them on the straightaway."

Racing in the corners is everything on the quarter-mile track at Stateline Speedway.

"Knowing where other cars are on the track is vital because you come up on something so fast because it's so small compared to a half-mile track," Jonathan said. "This year has been a struggle because neither one of us has ever had a front-wheel drive.

"It's a huge learning experience every week, for me five years and for (dad) 40-some years."

In a game where sponsorship is everything, Allen Tuckness does it all out of pocket.

"The most expensive thing I own is my Early Stock and this trailer," Allen said as he and Jonathan sat in a couple lounge chairs eating carryout from Zip's. "I've always had just a conventional trailer, but when I got back into it three years ago I got this to make it easier.

"I work on a limited budget. I don't have sponsors. The money going into either one of the cars comes out of my wallet from of my paycheck. I live within my budget. I guess I would rather have a guy beat me because he outdrives me, than he outspends me, but that's my choice." (Source)

Full post as published by ParalegalGateway Blawg on July 09, 2008 (boomark / email).