SCCA

RACE: Huffaker seeks sixth Valvoline Runoff win

LEXINGTON, Ohio (Sept. 20, 2001) -- Joe Huffaker owns five Gold Medals, emblematic SCCA Valvoline Runoff class championships, and is the defending champion in the GT5 category. Every one of those championships has come on Goodyear tires. The ...

Edited: Dec 21, 2009, 5:33 AM

Copy link

Share on Viber

Add as a preferred source

LEXINGTON, Ohio (Sept. 20, 2001) -- Joe Huffaker owns five Gold Medals, emblematic SCCA Valvoline Runoff class championships, and is the defending champion in the GT5 category. Every one of those championships has come on Goodyear tires.

The 45-year-old Huffaker is a second-generation racer from Petaluma, Calif. His father also spent his career on Goodyear tires.

"My record is pretty clear," Huffaker said during a break from preparations for his title defense. "My Dad and I have been Goodyear people all our lives. I just think that you work with a company like Goodyear and, over the years, you progress with them."

While Huffaker was growing up, he was sometimes called Little Joe, as his father's name is also named Joe. But the younger Huffaker didn't stop growing until he reached 6-foot-5. That doesn't mean much until you realize he drives a Mini Cooper in the GT5 class and an MG Midget in the F Production class. Small cars for a big guy, but the combination has worked.

Huffaker, 45, uses the same Goodyear tire, the D-0805, on both cars. The cars have several things in common, including the fact that neither generates much downforce on the suspension. That makes the tires tremendously important.

"We get together with Goodyear prior to the event," Huffaker said. "Then we go scrub a set of tires in, start leaning on them in sessions. By the time you do that, you've probably gotten the best time out of that set, but you've also scrubbed them for a race set. Occasionally we've been caught out and I've had to race on a brand-new set and I've had pretty good luck with that as well."

You can't argue with Huffaker's success. He won the F Production titles in 1992 and 1997-1999 and won the GT-5 title in 2000. He is one of only 26 drivers with five or more Runoff titles. That puts him ahead of such notables as Roger Penske, Paul Newman and Elliott Forbes-Robinson.

Huffaker and his wife Leslie have three children, Joe, Rebecca and Holly.

-Goodyear Racing

We want your opinion!

What would you like to see on Motorsport.com?

Take our 5 minute survey.

- The Motorsport.com Team

Read and post comments

Share Or Save This Story

Copy link

Share on Viber

Previous article SCC: Hoosier renews Street Stock Series agreement

Next article CHAMPCAR/CART: #66 se neobjev? p?i startu Rockingham 500

Top Comments

There are no comments at the moment. Would you like to write one?

View More & Comment

Latest news

NASCAR explains why they penalized Zane Smith after latest clash with Carson Hocevar

NASCAR Cup

NAS NASCAR Cup

Phoenix II

11 h

NASCAR explains why they penalized Zane Smith after latest clash with Carson Hocevar

Porsche boss Laudenbach says he is "not happy" with how things were handled by IMSA in 2026

IMSA

IMSA IMSA 11 h

Porsche boss Laudenbach says he is "not happy" with how things were handled by IMSA in 2026

Five things to watch out for at the F1 United States GP

Formula 1

F1 Formula 1

United States GP

12 h

Five things to watch out for at the F1 United States GP

KTM sees MotoGP 2027 as a fresh start: “We never had the chance to build a new bike”

MotoGP

MGP MotoGP 13 h

KTM sees MotoGP 2027 as a fresh start: “We never had the chance to build a new bike”

Subscribe and access Motorsport.com with your ad-blocker.

From Formula 1 to MotoGP we report straight from the paddock because we love our sport, just like you. In order to keep delivering our expert journalism, our website uses advertising. Still, we want to give you the opportunity to enjoy an ad-free and tracker-free website and to continue using your adblocker.

You have 2 options:

Become a subscriber.
Disable your adblocker.

Subscribe now Already subscribed? Sign in here

Already disabled your adblocker?
Reload page

Manage Alerts