Erin Crocker: A Senior in Engineering With the Heart of a Racer

by Robert W. Messler Jr.'65*

On a late-April afternoon in 2001, I looked up to see a petite, pony-tailed, reddish-haired, 18-ish female sophomore standing before my desk asking if I could help her work out arrangements to complete some course work while having to be away from campus toward the end of the remaining weeks of class to fulfill a contract to race pick-up trucks and sprint cars on professional circuits. On a Friday night in late-August of 2002, I looked down from a grandstand seat at Albany-Saratoga Speedway (just 20 miles up Route 9 from Troy) to see this same, now 20-ish woman, soon to begin her senior year in Industrial and Management Engineering, posing proudly in front of a sparkling red open-wheeled, high-winged, alcohol-burning machine in her red-and-black white-trimmed driving suit and with the checkered flag she had just earned by winning the 25-lap Super Sprint Car Feature. Erin Mary Crocker, out of Wilbraham, Mass., had driven a textbook race to charge to the lead ahead of 21 hard-driving men (aged 20 to 50) in just three laps, never to be challenged no less caught.

Within automobile racing, ignoring drag racing, there's oval racing and road racing. Oval racing has cars race around a closed course of lengths from as short as ½ mile to as long as 2½ miles, making left turns at the end of front and back straights, either on asphalt, where cars tend to drive along a fairly clear path through the turns, or on dirt, where the cars are thrown into the entry to the turn and control-drift through the turn to exit the turn hopefully pointing down the straight. Short tracks make driving in traffic a premium skill, with cars running over 100 MPH within inches of one another in all directions. Within short-track dirt racing, the top-of-the-line is the sprint car. With its short wheelbase, high center-of-gravity, open wheels, and awesome acceleration obtained from bored-up 350 cubic inch supercharged, alcohol-burning 550+ HP engines, these 1,300-pound machines are at once exciting and fearsome to watch and drive. They take cool nerves, intense concentration, and brute strength to make them go where you want them to go as fast as possible; at least faster than everyone else who's trying to get to the finish line first.

Erin Crocker is not only surviving, she's succeeding in one of the toughest games there is in short-track racing. The junior member of the two-car Woodring Racing Team, Erin has been finishing well in most of her races this season, and winning several of her most recent races, including the race at Albany-Saratoga Speedway when her Empire Super Sprint fellow drivers made their easternmost swing from western New York, Pennsylvania, and Ontario. In her "heat" of 10 cars, Erin immediately charged to the front and stayed there; winning easily. By winning, she grabbed the 3rd spot on the inside of the 2nd row of two cars each in the 22-car "feature" comprised of the top six finishers from the three "heats" and the top four finishers from a consolation race. In the "feature," Erin immediately surged to the front of the pack, strategically picking her opportunities to pass her two opponents by running deeper into the entry to the turns by "out braking" them, and running as high in the "groove" as possible. She used her car's "set-up" and the tenuous "cushion" provided by the loosened clay sprayed outward in the turns to cause her speeding race car to "hook up" to the track. Once in front, she never looked back, but she also never stopped racing as hard as she could but still minimize her chances of making an error that would take her out of the race.

Erin brought Rensselaer great pride that Friday night, by being not only the best on that night, but by doing it, as the track announcer repeated several times over the deafening roar of the cars, in the "backyard of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, her sponsor, and the school where she is studying engineering." Her glistening cherry red race car clearly exhibited "Rensselaer" in white letters on its sides, and her driving suit carried the Rensselaer name on each leg. Just hours before, Erin had spent the day at the 1st Annual Celebration of Faculty & Staff held on the softball field adjacent to the Robison Pool, standing by her race car and amiably and humbly answering questions from students and faculty and staff. Now here she was in the "winner's circle" at a speedway in Rensselaer's backyard.

When I met Erin in 2001, I was impressed by her determination as a student having a demanding outside obligation to succeed at both. When I saw her at the Celebration, I was pleased that she remembered our meeting, impressed by her poise as she spoke with curious on-lookers, and touched when she encouraged me to "Stop up at the track and see me race." When I saw her practice in a half-dozen "hot laps," I immediately knew I was looking at a seriously competitive driver; so I went to the concession stand and bought a T-shirt with her name and number on it. When I watched her race, I knew I was looking at someone with incredible talent and great potential in a really tough business. Erin Mary Crocker is a racer, with a racer's heart. She races to win, and wins by being smart and calculating beyond courageous. She relishes every aspect of racing; chasing, waiting for her opportunity, passing, leading, and protecting her lead. Fans of many of her competitors sitting around me in the grandstands called her "The Crocker-doll" for the obvious reason of a young woman in a tough, male-dominated sport, but also because, as they rued, "She eats people up on the track!"

When I convinced the security guard at the entry to the "pits" to let me in to say "Hi" to Erin because I was "from the Dean's Office of Engineering at RPI" (as evidenced by the cherry red School of Engineering polo shirt I wore under my newly acquired "Erin Crocker, #16" T-shirt), she beamed at my congratulations and heartfelt compliments. She proudly autographed my red-clay-dust covered new and once-white T-shirt. And, she said, "Are you going to let people at RPI know that I won?"

Yes, Erin, I let them know you won - and that you did it with great skill and poise in which we at Rensselaer can take real pride.

Watch for Erin's name in the racing columns of newspapers; I know she'll be there for all the right reasons. And, give yourself a treat. Go see her race!