13 replies to this topic

[racinggeek]

My god. As a more or less lifelong Wisconsinite, I don't even know what to say about one of my heroes, given the apparent circumstances:

http://aol.sportingn...reer-sprint-cup

Yes, the name may not mean much to those of you outside the US. But here, he probably was the greatest weekly short-track stock car racer of his time, arguably the best ever. RIP and Godspeed.

Edited by racinggeek, 17 May 2013 - 00:00.

[Garagiste]

Very sad.

[JacnGille]

Sad news.

[Tim Murray]

He was nominated as one of the drivers with the most race wins in this earlier thread:

The driver with the highest number of race wins?

RIP

[john aston]

I never saw him race but as he had such an outstanding name I did some research on him and referred to him in my last book(not even about motor sport either). How very sad...

[E1pix]

Oh My God, he was the stock car driver from Wisconsin all through my childhood living there.

That's terrible news, crushing for so many.


RIP Mr. Trickle, and Thanks.

[GMiranda]

RIP

[Tom Glowacki]

I never saw him race but as he had such an outstanding name I did some research on him and referred to him in my last book(not even about motor sport either). How very sad...

I live about 40 miles south of the Wisconsin Dells track he raced at so often and people in the local restaurant were talking about him this morning.

[Magoo]

Lovely man, always an easy and pleasant interview. Solid journeyman in NASCAR, which was not really his forte. On the midwestern short tracks he was a legend, a giant, said to have over 1200 feature wins. A hale and robust man, nearly ageless until very recently, drove NASCAR past age 60. The means of departure is very sad, suggests a person in crisis. Rest in Peace, Dick Trickle.

Edited by Magoo, 17 May 2013 - 15:14.

[wildman]

Trickle in his short-track days, from the early '70s:

[Bob Riebe]

It has been too many years now but there were the three Knights in Wisc. racing.
If I remember he was the Blue Knight and Tom Reffner was the Red Knight, can not remember the third.

Very sad thing.

[arttidesco]

It has been too many years now but there were the three Knights in Wisc. racing.
If I remember he was the Blue Knight and Tom Reffner was the Red Knight, can not remember the third.

Very sad thing.

According to Wiki Dick (RIP) was the White Night

[racinggeek]

It has been too many years now but there were the three Knights in Wisc. racing.
If I remember he was the Blue Knight and Tom Reffner was the Red Knight, can not remember the third.

Very sad thing.

The three Knights were all sponsored by SuperAmerica, a regional chain of gas stations/convenience stores. Reffner was the Blue Knight in his AMCs, Trickle painted his purple car white and became the White Knight and John Boegeman of Minnesota was the Black Knight, No. 61 Camaro, although I don't know if he carried the sponsorship (and the knighthood) as long as Trickle and Reffner did.

(Edited to revise earlier mistaken identity of the Black Knight)

Edited by racinggeek, 18 May 2013 - 04:43.

[racinggeek]

Lovely man, always an easy and pleasant interview ... On the midwestern short tracks he was a legend, a giant, said to have over 1200 feature wins.

Agreed. Got to interview him for a newspaper story in the late 1990s, when he was fulltime on the NASCAR Busch circuit, and he was genial, open, gracious and funny in that droll Wisconsin sort-of way.

Driving to work this morning, it occurred to me that, normally, dominant race winners tend to become an "enemy of the people" who want to see anyone else win for a change (and Trickle certainly fit). But as far as I can recall, Dick Trickle was cheered, beloved, even a hero to racing fans in Wisconsin and the Midwest U.S. I think it's because he was seen as "one of us," if one of us could win 67 races in a single season.