Who is Richard Schmidt

[reddevilsix]

Who is Richard Schmidt

Born and raised on a farm in Minnesota, after graduating from high school, I joined the US Navy for a 4 year tour.

While at a Navy training school in Pensacola, FL, I was introduced to the racing of sports cars on the old, unused airport. After that I was hooked.

While serving duty in Germany, I attended many Grand Prix races in European countries as a spectator.

After being honorably discharged from the Navy, I used my GI bill to take electronics training and soon moved into jobs as a electronic Tech, then on to being promoted to Electrical Design Engineer. At the last company I worked for, I was awarded two patents with my name on them.

While early in my career in electronics, I was not in a position to purchase a race car, so i did what I could to get close to race cars. Over a time period of 15 years, I was a crew member for several FF drivers.

Finally got enough resources to purchase my own F440 car in 1998. It was a 1985 Red Devil with the Kawasaki 440 engine, kind of a barn find. Steve Jondal helped me locate that car. The Red Devil needed the roll bars updated to meet the SCCA rules. That was done for me at a local race car shop.

In the spring of 1999, I attended my two drivers school and got my SCCA road racing license. I raced that old Red Devil for five years with the underpowered 440 engine. I then replaced it with the Rotax 494. I raced that car/engine combo for one year. In the year 2000, I was the SCCA Central Region F500 champion.

After selling the Red Devil, I took a year off of racing. Then I purchased a 1997 KBS, and raced that car for only one year. In 2008, I qualified for the Runoffs in Topeka, KS and raced the KBS there. Unfortunately, I did not do well there,

In 2009 I sold the KBS as I retired and figured that I could not afford to race with just my Social Security income.

During all this time, I was a member of Dix's F500 website (https://f500.us/). When he closed up the site, I did try to take over the site, but he refused, so I started this site, and here were are.

[reddevilsix]

Come on guys and gals, let us know what got you interested in racing. I told my story, lets hear yours.

Richard