The Reutimanns: A
history of racing
It is not as known as the
Pettys or Waltrips, but the
family that came to Zephyrhills
in the '20s from Switzerland
doesn't mind. It just keeps
racing.
By BRANT JAMES
Published February 18, 2005
ZEPHYRHILLS - David Reutimann
thought he was in a safe place,
leaning back hard in a chair behind
the counter of his father's backyard
race shop. He thought he was free to
enjoy the simple pleasure of a Dairy
Queen sundae in the last few days
before his life as a driver in the
NASCAR Truck series got complicated
again.
Of course, he was wrong.
"They weigh those trucks with the
driver in there," prodded his uncle,
Wayne.
"Yes, yes they do," Reutimann
responded, dabbing another plastic
spoonful of the soft-serve in his
mouth.
"Watch out," Wayne said, leaning
on the counter. "Maybe you're
putting on some weight there."
Reutimann, of course, wasn't. And
if he had added a few pounds in the
sedentary few weeks since he was
named the Truck series rookie of the
year, they were spread over his
lanky frame to avoid detection. But
three generations of Reutimann men
were gathered among the car parts
and gray old-framed photographs of
their brothers and fathers and
uncles racing on long-gone tracks.
When the Reutimanns collect over the
open hood of a race car in the
Reutimann garage or a cup of ice
cream, they talk racing, and they
needle each other.
It doesn't matter how old you are
or what you race. It just
matters that you race, that
you've dirtied hands wrenching on
engines on countless Friday nights,
had your hopes raised and dashed by
a sponsor who never came through,
felt both sides of racing luck. It's
love of family, a respect for a
craft and a common passion that has
permeated the family for more than
80 years.
"I think it's really kind of
special," David Reutimann said.
"Whether you're winning a modified
race at East Bay or a truck race or
a sprint car race or whatever, you
get a lot of respect because
everybody's doing it with very
little sponsorship in a lot of cases
out of hard work and dedication. I
think there's that mutual respect
that we've all raced that way and we
know how hard it is to win. Kind of
a neat deal."
* * *
No one really knows how the deal
began, Emil F. Reutimann and family
decided to immigrate to Tampa from
Switzerland in 1920, but the story
picks up when they moved to
Zephyrhills and opened the
Zephyrhills Auto Shop that in 1925
became the town's first Chevrolet
dealership.
"They came up, supposedly because
they needed someone to work on
automobiles - Model A's," Wayne
Reutimann said.
Emil developed from a mechanic
into a racer, and the desire to make
cars go fast became a curiosity for
his son, Emil Jr. On Sunday
afternoons as far back as 1938, Emil
Jr. and boys from the local filling
stations would find an empty field
outside of Zephyrhills and race
until sundown.
Eighty years later, racing has
taken the family far beyond those
dusty fields. David begins his
second season in the NASCAR Truck
series tonight, starting 14th at
Daytona International Speedway. His
cousin, Wayne Jr., 27, races
professionally in the USAC Silver
Crown series. Cousin Greg, 36,
drives open-wheel modifieds at local
short tracks. Wayne, 60, who drove
professionally for five years in the
early 1970s, competes on the same
circuit. Buzzie Reutimann, David's
father, is a legendary short-tracker
who at 63 still gets that twinkle in
his eye at a good story, a good car
or a joke - often at one of the
boys' expense.
The die-hard
Emil L. Reutimann was born on May
7, 1941, and by all accounts, he
came out racing. At least his mouth
was.
"The nurse came over with me to
my parents and said, "We've got a
little buzz box here,"' Buzzie
Reutimann said, smiling.
Agnes initially protested Buzzie
racing in local circuits as a teen,
but tolerated him working on cars as
a 13-year-old. Gradually, Buzzie
began sliding behind the wheel.
"After Buzzie got started, she
didn't say much about me getting
going into it," Wayne said. "She
really accepted it by then.
One afternoon, Buzzie was working
in a modified family car he was
hoping to race, when his father
strode by and snipped that it "was
the nearest to nothing he had seen.
In fact, it was double nothing,"
Reutimann said.
The Reutimanns have raced under
the OO number ever since.
Much of Buzzie's statistical
prowess is hard to quantify because
of incomplete record-keeping.
Records do show he raced in one
Winston Cup event, Nov. 11, 1962, in
the only race ever run at Tampa's
Golden Gate Speedway. He started
18th and finished 10th. Richard
Petty won. Reutimann's trophy case
and introduction into the Dirt
Motorsports Hall of Fame in 1997
support his legacy, but not nearly
as well as the testimonials of
friends and fellow competitors.
"Buzzie Reutimann is a racer's
racer," said Darrell Waltrip, who
owns David's truck team. "That was
one of the reasons I liked David so
much. He comes from racing
bloodlines."
The other brother
The state fair just doesn't do it
for Wayne Reutimann anymore.
Tilt-a-whirl, Ferris wheel. Not so
much as a gasp.
At age 60, he still tows his
sprint to East Bay, to Citrus County
Speedway numerous times a week,
running hard and sometimes beating
son Wayne Jr. and talking the talk
all the way back.
"People do different things for
an adrenaline rush," said Reutimann,
who teaches shop at Zephyrhills
High. "It's just a high. People do
crazy things to get that high and I
guess mine is driving a race car.
It's one of the most exciting things
in the world, I think. You can go
out and drive a race car 160 mph
wheel to wheel with somebody, and
when you do that, I can go to the
Florida State Fair down there and
get on any ride and have it not be
exciting."
Wayne earned a living driving
stock cars with Buzzie in the early
1970s, spending five summers
traveling to tracks such as Nazareth
and Reading, Pa., and East Windsor,
N.J.
"When it got warm, they would
have qualifying races in New York
state for the big Syracuse race,
100-lap races," Wayne said. "We
ended up racing five nights a week,
and this way you could sort of make
a living out of it.
"Leave in April, go to New
Jersey. We stayed on a dairy farm.
Farmer was a fan and had a garage,
raced all summer, last part of
October they have big races. We'd
come back to Florida in winter and
build new cars."
Though wife Anne, he said, would
probably have him quit right now, he
plans to compete until his sponsors
or his reflexes say "no more."
The one
Dale Reutimann was going to be
the one. He was building cars and
winning races in his teens as older
brothers Buzzie and Wayne raced
short tracks in the northeast. Dale
and Emil raced all over Central
Florida, returned to the family
garage to tweak and hone for the
next race.
"If anybody would have made it,
he would of," Wayne said. "It's
unbelievable how quickly he adapted
and he was doing it all himself."
On the late afternoon of Sept.4,
1973, it all came to end. Dale and
Emil were towing a car down U.S. 301
south of Zephyrhills when a drunk
driver crossed the center line and
struck their truck head-on. Emil,
Dale and friend Gordon Stone were
killed instantly.
"My mother died a month later of
an aneurysm," Wayne said. "We say
she died of a broken heart. She just
didn't want to live after that. He
was her baby and he was still living
at home, and dad, of course; it was
more than she could take."
Everything might have been
different had Dale lived, David
Reutimann said. No one within the
family's racing circle seems to
begrudge their lot in life, but they
all might have made it had Dale
broken through.
"My Uncle Dale was on track to
being a NASCAR star," he said. "They
were kind of on the ground floor of
that deal with Richard Petty and all
those guys. I really, really think
if his life would have continued, I
really think it would have been
different for a lot of us. I think
it would have opened a lot of doors,
just like it did for the Pettys and
the Waltrips."
The family man
Greg Reutimann wouldn't have
minded pursuing the same path as his
cousins, father and uncle. But the
circumstances were never quite
right. The opportunity was not quite
there, and neither was the
all-encompassing drive.
So Reutimann owns a collision
repair shop in Zephyrhills and has
the coolest hobby, he said, on the
block.
"I started out racing with David
in ministocks at the same time but
it just never did work out for me to
make it a career," he said. "He had
a little bit different situation
because he lived at the race shop
and he was there all the time and it
was his dad's workshop.
"My dad, he would race for other
people so we didn't really have a
race shop and a place to work in."
Buzzie made sure Greg had an
opportunity to learn, however,
sometimes at the expense of his own
preparations.
"My Uncle Buzz was great to me,"
he said. "I know we had to get under
his skin because we'd be in there
working on our ministocks and we'd
be asking him questions as he was
trying to work on his own stuff. He
was really great. I don't think he
ever yelled at us and I'm surprised,
too, because I have kids now and I
know what it's like."
Envy could come easy for Greg
Reutimann. He's the only member of
the clan now racing who did not get
to do so professionally. But he's
helping to raise a fourth-generation
of drivers and he has never
considered quitting racing as he
does so. It just didn't occur to
him.
"I don't know if I'm selfish or
not," he said, "but my dad's always
raced and my uncle always raced. We
didn't think of the danger of it,
and we know our kids will one day
race."
Greg's sons Garrett, 12, and
Connor, 9, race with Greg and Wayne
Jr.'s brother Jeff's son Chance, 9,
in karts. Jeff's son, Reese, 7, will
begin racing this summer.
Rookie of the year
David Reutimann can stride
through the truck garage at Daytona
International Speedway unnoticed
except to friends and the most
fervent of fans. Unassuming to the
point of self-deprecation, Reutimann
gives no inclination he considers
his position more important than
that of his family.
"I worked hard, but so does every
other member of my family," he said.
"So I was just in the right place at
the right time. They all have the
ability to do it. I just happened to
be the one that got noticed. It's
not that I did anything
extraordinary, I just feel like I
paid my dues and that's kind of how
it shook out."
Of course, it's hard to get too
heady when Wayne Jr. is in the
garage.
"He's representing our family to
the fullest. He's taking advantage
if his opportunity and a lot of
people don't take advantage of it,"
he said. "All of us are completely
happy and completely satisfied with
the job he is doing. By no means
would I tell him that to his face.
He's a chump and I tell him he needs
to step up and win some races."
Of course, David's not going to
let that one go. He and friend Brian
Pattie, a Busch series crew chief,
took the opportunity this week to
harass Wayne Jr. as he was racing at
New Smyrna Speedway.
"He gives me a lot of heat,"
Reutimann laughed. "We have a lot of
respect for each other, but that
doesn't stop us from giving each
other a hard time. I ask him what he
wants to be when he grows up because
he's so short and it goes on and
on."
The next one
Wayne Reutimann Jr., "Pookie" to
his family, has a reputation to
protect and a career to build. At
27, he's the latest Reutimann to
compete as a full-time professional.
The USAC Silver Crown series is
growing in prominence, but it's by
no means glamorous out in the dirt
and the 30-lap shootouts. But it
pays the bills if you win. And he
does. And it destroys the
alternative.
"I'm blessed to be able to drive
a race car for a living," he said.
"I worked a real job. Getting up
every morning and going to a real
job is not me. I can't do that
anymore. I tried that and I'm not
any good at it."
He's especially proud that hard
work pays to put the parts in the
car.
"The main misconception of our
family is we have a lot of money -
we don't," he said. "My father is a
school teacher for God's sake. How
much money do we have? We traded a
go-kart for a ministock. I pulled
the vines out of an orange grove in
order to buy a cam shaft so I could
go race. By no means are we loaded."
Back home
David is hanging out by the front
door of his father's garage, signing
for a COD delivery of a car part,
when the roar of an engine
interrupts the still of the back
yard. Reutimann gazes over shaking
his head.
"He's showing off," he said.
"He's going to spin the tires and
dirty that thing all up and he just
washed it.
"I hope I have the same good love
for the sport my dad has. He just
has a love for it, that's what keeps
him driving."
That keeps them all driving.
[Last modified February 18, 2005,
00:15:15]
