SCORE Journal

SCORE-Journal-January-2022

SCORE Journal - The Official Publication of SCORE Off-Road Racing

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VP PROMOTES BEN DOLAN TO VP OF MARKETING VP Racing Fuels, Inc. announced the promotion of Ben Dolan to Vice President of Marketing. "The VP team takes pride in having star players in every division and at every level," said Alan Cerwick, VP’s President and CEO. "Since joining the VP team as Director of Marketing in September of 2020, Ben has proven his star power, bringing unique and creative marketing ideas and leadership qualities that are being applied across all business units. Ben is a VP team player who has earned this promotion with his skills and strong work ethic." "My first short sixteen months at VP have been exciting, challenging, and fun," added Dolan. " I am humbled by the timing of this recognition and pledge to continue doing my part to bring the very best products to our end-users, and the strongest sales and marketing tools to our distributor and retailer colleagues." SCORE MOURNS PASSING OF RACER KORY HALOPOFF By Dominic Clark The SCORE family joins the racing community in remembering Kory Halopoff, a long-time SCORE racing champion who passed away on Monday (Jan. 10). Part of the great Letner Racing family, Halopoff and his cousin Harley Letner were a super team for many years racing in SCORE Class 10 and the unlimited SCORE Class 1 together. For several years in the early 2000s, they were considered the ‘young guns’ of SCORE. Halopoff, 38, was from Orange, Calif., and graduated from Villa Park High School in Orange County. He would have been 39 on January 30. In 2010, Halopoff and Letner won the SCORE unlimited Class 1 season point championship. Halopoff’s individual race wins included 2003 in Class 10 in both the SCORE Baja 500 and the SCORE Baja 1000. In the old SCORE Laughlin Desert Challenge, Halopoff won Class 10 in 2004 and Class 1 in 2010. In the old SCORE Las Vegas Primm 300, Halopoff won the SCORE Lite class for Letner Racing in both 2001 and 2002. In the last decade, he raced several times with the COPS Racing team, both in Class 1 and then later in Trophy Truck Spec as the second driver for the late John Langley. Posting on Facebook on Jan. 10, Harley Letner commented about his cousin saying, “We spent most of our lives together doing everything we could!! We were more than cousins, we were brothers! Some of the best times from jet skis at the river to quads in the desert! Racing and winning most everything we entered. We had fun when we were together. Race in peace brother. Say hi to Papa for me...(in reference to the family patriarch, the late SCORE racer Danny Letner).” REMEMBERING LONGTIME SCORE PR MAN DEKE HOULGATE By Dominic Clark SCORE is remembering one of its own, former long-time SCORE PR director Deke Houlgate, who passed away at 91 at his home in Carlsbad, Calif., on Dec. 26. Working as a professional consultant for SCORE from its beginning in 1973 until the 1994 season-opening SCORE Parker 400, Deke was a West Coast sports publicist whose clients included the Riverside International Raceway, and such auto racing legends as Mario Andretti, Rick Mears, Richard Petty, and Johnny Rutherford. “Deke was a hard task-master, but he was a consummate professional, and taught me a lot about motorsports as well as working with the media, event promoters, racers, and teams,” commented Dominic Clark, SCORE Media Operations Director who started working with Deke in 1982 and continues in that position today. “Deke and Olga (Deke’s wife) were a solid team in the early days of SCORE, and helped Mickey Thompson and Sal Fish set the course for the World’s Foremost Desert Racing Organization.” Deke began his career in sports after graduating from the University of Southern California in 1954. He started as a copy boy in the sports department at the Los Angeles Times and later worked as a general assignment reporter and assistant director of special events at the newspaper. He also worked as a reporter at the Las Vegas Sun and Los Angeles Herald-Examiner. In 1962, Houlgate opened his own public relations firm, Houlgate and Associates. He handled PR for the old Riverside International Raceway and the early years of the Virginia Slims women’s pro tennis tour in Los Angeles. He also worked for the automotive designer and driver, Carroll Shelby. Houlgate is survived by Olga, his wife of 66 years, and three sons, John, David, and Greg. He was preceded in death by his oldest son, Deke III.

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