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Jerry Coons Jr. to Make Pro Series Debut at Nashville |
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July 10. We were delighted, but not totally surprised, to hear
that Jerry Coons Jr. will be driving the 91 car for Hemelgarn Johnson Motorsports at the Cleanevent 100 at the Nashville
Superspeedway on July 16. Some of our readers will recall that fromthetrack.com’s first feature story of the year was about Jerry [“Jerry Coons, Jr. – The Best Show of the Day”,
see USA Race Park, News] and his remarkable sprint car drive at the
first ever USAC New Years Day race. That event was held as part
of the first Roger McCluskey Classic at the grand opening of Tucson
AZ’s new USA Race Park 3/8 mile dirt track. 
You will note in the photo of Jerry, taken on New Years Day, the IRL
red, white and blue logo on his uniform. This is the patch he
earned by passing his IRL rookie test back in 2000. It must have
been a sign of things to come because Nashville will be Jerry’s first
IRL race.
In between that rookie test and now Jerry has been making a pretty big
name for himself driving USAC midgets, sprints and Silver Crown
cars. He currently stands 8th in the national series points
standings in both midgets and sprints. Having seen fellow USAC
competitor, Jay Drake, who is also running all three of the USAC series
[see our recent story, "Jay Drake: Pro Series Iron Man"] working
his way up the Pro Series points standing, Jerry would like to join
him. For his first race, Nashville is one of Jerry’s
favorites. In 2001 he ran the record fastest lap there in a
Silver Crown car. We hope to see more of him at the Pro
tracks.
Jerry is running the USAC Silver Crown Series this year for the R. E.
Technologies Racing team, which is based in Memphis, Tenn. To
brush up a bit more on Jerry, check in on his official web site: www.jerrycoonsjr.com.
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