Crowds gathered in the rain to watch the fan-favourite Bob Willson Memorial Crash to Pass Race at the Gold Pan Speedway today, July 19.

Between the revving engines and the thick smell of exhaust in the air, drivers took to the track to race – and crash – their way to first place.

Spencer O’Flynn won the main event, crashing his red, white, and maple leaf covered car to the top. O’Flynn drove car number 155.

Time trials began at 5 p.m., while the crashing started at 6 p.m.

Colin Trask drove in the Crash to Pass Race for his fifth or sixth year today. Trask says he drives for the crowd. “You spend a lot of time to build these cars, right? And it’s never for you, sometimes you only last ten minutes at the most!”

He says he wouldn’t want to pay more than $150 for a crash car, but he’s willing to go as high as $300 if it’s really nice.

He adds that takes a lot of work to fix up a car enough to use it as a crash car. “You have to gut ’em out, you have to put in fuel cells … build all your bars, front and back and rear, cement the doors. It takes time.”

The van he drove in the race has been used in several Crash to Pass races, driven in the past by his brother and members of his pit crew, as well as himself. “This van has been around. It’s about to have a hard day.”

Another crash car driver got into the race because of his son.

Tim Patchett has driven in the Crash to Pass for the last two years. His son, Sam, also races and has been participating in the Crash to Pass for the last six years. Patchett says his sons truck cost $500 ready to race, while the car he drives also took about $500 to get ready to race.

When asked why he races, he laughs. “I don’t know, insane insanity.”

The Crash to Pass is an annual event held during Billy Barker Days in Quesnel. First, the drivers are divided up into heats to race each other. In the heats, the drivers tend to keep crashing to a minimum.

Drivers want their cars to last until the main event, when every car in the pit heads on to the track – and the last car standing wins.

The race brings out massive crowds each year, with many even bringing by their chairs hours before the start of the race to claim a spot with a good view.

The race itself featured several wrecks – much to the delight of the onlookers – and kept drivers and pit crews alert as they changed tires and welded together parts to fix the cars and keep them alive for the main race.

More photos to come in the Quesnel Cariboo Observer paper on Wednesday, July 25.

heather.norman@quesnelobserver.comLike us on Facebook