Dirt
TRIBUTE
Tim Slavens 1969 – 2022
By Wes Buck
Tim Slavens , a beloved Missouri-based smalltire racing veteran , passed away Friday , January 7 after a lengthy and hard-fought COVID-19 battle . Slavens was an accomplished wheelman in Radial vs . the World , where he set records in his twin-turbocharged , steel-bodied Camaro known as the “ No Mod .” Slavens and his team , which includes longtime friend and crew chief Mark “ Tydo ” Werdehausen and tuner Joe Oplawski , recently debuted a brand-new ’ 69 Camaro Pro Mod entry , which they planned to run in numerous outlaw Pro Mod races in 2022 .
In this tribute , DI Founder and Editorial Director Wes Buck looks back on his first memories of Slavens , who supported Buck at the first racetrack he managed , Eddyville Raceway Park .
Tim Slavens called me for the very first time in the first couple months of 2005 – right about 16 years ago . Mark Werdehausen ( aka “ Tydo ”) had given him my cell phone number and he reached out to me about the Pro Outlaw Drag Racing Series that I was putting together at Eddyville Raceway Park when I took over as General Manager .
Tim was a regular in the Outlaw 10.5 division
at Ozark International Raceway in Rogersville , Missouri , and was excited to hear about a new heads-up doorslammer series in the Midwest – even though our track was over 300 miles north of him in Marshfield , Missouri .
Even though he was a five-plus-hour tow away , Tim and a whole slew of racers from his neck of the woods came up to ERP and supported me at every single heads-up race I had . He came to them all . He brought his friends . He did big burnouts . He seemingly purged entire bottles of nitrous trying to help put on a show for our fans .
Funny story : Early in 2005 , we had a scheduled preseason test session . A few days before the test , we had a bad frost , some crazy cold temperatures and decided to cancel . I put a message on the machine in the office , called the handful of people
I knew were planning on coming and considered it a done deal . This was before everyone was on Facebook , social media , etc . Honestly , we were lucky to have a freaking website that we could figure out how to update at this point in time .
Anyway , Tim and a handful of other racers from south Missouri had already headed north to come test as they wanted to get some laps down on our eighth-mile before we actually started racing . My phone rings that Saturday morning , it ’ s cold as hell , and it ’ s “ Tydo ”... “ Hey , man , we ’ re almost there ! Can ’ t wait !! Where do you want us to park ?!”
My heart sank . They didn ’ t know we ’ d canceled . But these were my guys ! These are legit heads-up outlaw racers coming to support me . I knew I couldn ’ t tell them to turn around , and I didn ’ t want to start off my 2005 season and this
26 | Drag Illustrated | DragIllustrated . com Issue 174