Young driver takes spin in England

Published 12:00 am Thursday, October 18, 2012

Mark Draghicescu, a 20-year-old college student, is trying to get his budding career on the fast track.

The 2010 Westview High graduate will be one of many aspiring race car drivers from around the world competing in the 40th annual Formula Ford Festival Oct. 27 and 28 at historic Brands Hatch near London.

Draghicescu, who lives and attends school in Derby, England, has a ride next weekend with 23 Racing, a local team, but he could use a good showing to land sponsorship that would enable him to race in the Formula Ford series next year.

Formula One stars Jenson Button and Mark Webber are among the previous Festival winners.

Draghicescu wants to be an F-1 driver someday. The festival is one of many early steps that will have to be made by a Portlander who got hooked on the sport with his first rental kart seven years ago.

“The sensation of pushing yourself and a car to the edge is difficult to explain,” he says.

At Westview, the 6-foot, 155-pound Draghicescu swam and ran track. He also played piano and guitar for several years. But they all take a back seat now to driving a race car.

“I can’t think of (all the) reasons why I enjoy it — it’s the noise, the speed, the adrenaline, the nerves, competing not only with others but yourself, the continuous challenge, even in practice.”

The Formula Fords go more than 140 mph on the straightaways, “and it’s quite fun when you’re only a few inches away from your competitors,” he says.

At Derby University, he shares a student hall flat with five other students. This is his second year of college there, and he is studying for a degree in motorsport engineering. “It’s a unique course, as much of the learning is done within the technical facility,” he says. “There’s a lot of hands-on and practical experience.”

n If there is one place where most golfers generally don’t want to hurry through a round, where they want to take some time to smell the flowers and take in the scenery, it’s Bandon Dunes.

Christopher Smith has a different point of view.

A teaching pro at Pumpkin Ridge Golf Club in North Plains, Smith is in the Guinness Book of World Records for the best round of speed golf. In 2005, at Jackson Park in Chicago, he shot a 65 in 44 minutes (a speed golf score of 109). Yes, he played all 18 holes.

Smith is now 49 and battling arthritic hips, but he is one of top contenders to win the first Speed Golf World Championships Saturday and Sunday at Bandon Dunes.

He and 13 others will tee it up — quickly — in the 36-hole elite division (total purse $50,000, with $18,000 to the winner and $10,000 to the runner-up). Forty-five golfers are in the amateur division.

CBS plans to air a 30-minute show on the tournament next April in a coveted TV time slot — right before the third round of The Masters.

Smith is excited about the publicity speed golf is getting.

“It’s easier from a mental standpoint and even from a golf swing standpoint than traditional, or slow golf, where people tend to over-analyze and over-think,” he says.

Smith is considered one of the top teaching pros in the country; he was the 2004 Pacific Northwest section PGA Teacher of the Year. The former UC Santa Barbara player has written for Golf Digest and authored a book, “I’ve Got 99 Swing Thoughts But ‘Hit The Ball’ Ain’t One,” subtitled, “Pick Up The Pace To Pick Up Your Game.”

He says even tour pros — including friend and fellow Portland-area pro Ben Crane, notorious for his deliberate style — probably would play better if they played faster. “Ben would be a great speed golfer. He’s really fit,” Smith says.

According to Smith, science and performance experts have shown that we don’t need to take our own sweet time in order to play well.

“It’s been shown that we receive about 11 million bits of information per second through all our senses — and a large majority of that for humans is visual,” Smith says. “If we’re receiving that much information, why do we need to take so long to read a putt?”

In speed golf, Smith carries a light bag with only six clubs (driver, 5-wood, 5-iron, 8-iron, gap wedge and putter), wears running shoes (“golf shoes are way too heavy”), takes no practice swings, uses no yardage book or distance finder, sprints between shots and reads greens only as he is approaching them and his ball.

“It’s two-thirds golf, one-third running,” he says, adding that “the good golfer will always beat the fast player.”

Predicting what score it will take to win at Bandon Dunes isn’t easy.

“The weather is a crapshoot — it could be perfect or it could be a hurricane,” Smith says. “We’ve got several mini-tour players, PGA professionals and guys who used to play on different tours, so we’re really eager to see what they all do. If somebody could shoot around par, or a little better, and do it in 55 to 60 minutes each day, I think that would be up there.”

n Adam Bean of Puget Sound, a sophomore from Lincoln High, won the 11-team Pacific Lutheran Invitational by four shots this week. He shot 73-70—143, 1-under-par, at Chambers Bay Golf Course, site of the 2015 U.S. Open.

n Wilson High’s Mike Clopton, whose Trojans won the 5A title in 2012, has been named national high school Division II baseball coach of the year by the American Baseball Coaches Association and Diamond Sports Company. Clopton will receive his award Jan. 4 at the ABCA national convention in Chicago.

Greg Lord, coach of 6A champion Oregon City, also will be honored with the Division III regional coach of the year award.

n Winterhawks coach-GM Mike Johnston says one thing that’s difficult about taking a junior hockey team by bus to Manitoba and Saskatchewan for six games in nine nights — as Portland did this month — might surprise you.

“Believe it or not, the challenge is to keep the players busy,” he says. “If they’re sitting in a hotel room, they lose energy. It gets boring when you sit around.”

So the Hawks kept their players as engaged as possible on their recent trip, and the team finished with a solid four wins, sweeping the last three despite having to play four times in five nights. One of the wins was 5-2 over previously unbeaten, untied Prince Albert.

Highlight of the idle-time activities had to be the team curling tournament on Thanksgiving Day in Canada. One of the curling “captains,” defenseman Troy Rutkowski guided his team (which included Tyler Wotherspoon, Derrick Pouliot and Dominic Turgeon) to first place in the bonspiel for the second year in a row.

n Johnston says the biggest pleasant surprise through 11 games is defenseman Josh Hanson: “He’s taken a huge step at (age) 18.” The entire defense has played well, Johnston adds.

Happy birthday

Oct. 23, 1972 — Tiffeny Milbrett (age 40)

Oct. 21, 1978 — Joey Harrington (age 34)

Oct. 22, 1989 — LaMichael James (age 23)

Oregon sports history

Oct. 22, 1910 — Charles Taylor sets University of Oregon football records that still stand, with 10 touchdowns and 14 PATs in a 115-0 victory over Puget Sound. The Ducks later finish the season with a 4-1 record, losing their finale 5-0 to MAAC (Multnomah Amateur Athletic Club, now Multnomah Athletic Club).

Oct. 22, 1994 — Kenny Wheaton returns an interception 97 yards for a touchdown in the final minute as Oregon beats ninth-ranked Washington 31-20 at Autzen Stadium and gives Duck fans the highlight video and audio that have been replayed, oh, maybe 1,248,487 times, and counting.

Oct. 22, 2003 — Dee Andros, “The Great Pumpkin” who coached Oregon State football from 1965-75, dies at 79 in Corvallis. Andros, an ex-Marine who was athletic director at OSU from 1975-84, was known for his Power-T offense, his 1967 “Giant Killers” team, his colorful speeches and pep talks, his 9-2 record in the Civil War, and more.

Oct. 22, 2009 — LaMarcus Aldridge signs a five-year contract extension with the Trail Blazers.

Tweets of the week

Great TEAM win today! How bout them beavers!

Cody Vaz “@c_vaz14

(posted shortly after Vaz’s quarterback play helped OSU win 42-24 at BYU)

Too blessed to be stressed

Too anointed to be disappointed

Too devout to pout

I’m too redeemed to be steamed

Damian Lillard “@Dame_Lillard

stevebrandon@portlandtribune.com, Twitter: @sbrandonsports