Block Party

Inside a small warehouse in downtown Philly, a group of inner-city kids get a taste for racing and a chance to make it a career

So much rides on this little engine. Dontay Mack rattles off the inner workings of a Honda GX390, stopping after each component to show you his big brown eyes and subdued smile. Carburetor. Smile. Cylinder. Eyes. Spark plug. Smile. Intake. Eyes. Each pause is a question: Do you understand the motor? Do you get why it matters?

It's not just the purr of an engine that keeps the high school senior returning down this fractured cobblestone street near the Philadelphia waterfront, past empty warehouses, fortresslike condos and the crackheads under the bridge, to the crusty little building with a For Lease sign over the door. This is where hope lives.

Outside, winter winds sweep the streets. But inside, a NASCAR Oz beckons. Eight-year-old kids take notes on racing theory under giant Speed Racer banners. Tony Stewart grins from an orange Coke machine over a pair of teenagers leaning under the popped shell of a black minicup car draped in lime-green Xbox flames. All around, Dontay sees racing heroes and corporate sponsors.

Anthony Martin didn't set out to become a father figure when he started the Urban Youth Racing School in 1998. But the man who grew up dreaming of being a racer himself now lives and breathes the cause. Here, kids who couldn't tell Kyle Busch from Kyle Petty learn the basics of stock car racing. Advanced students get greasy assembling and maintaining the minicup cars that kids in the development program drive in an East Coast regional series.

While the racing industry talks diversity, the UYRS works on the grassroots level to develop a cadre of minority drivers, technicians and fans. (Of the 100 or so students each year, 90% are African-American; the other 10% are Hispanic.) Money is tight, despite growing corporate support, and the talent pool is small. The odds are long. Still, these kids have a shot, and that's all Dontay needs to trade the street for a socket wrench.

AS HE fights the pack heading into a curve, Kenny Stewart waves to friends leaning against the rail at an indoor go-kart track near Valley Forge. In an instant, the 17-year-old veers into another racer, setting both into a track-jamming spin. "You can't race!" shouts one of his buddies. "You can wreck, but you can't race!" Kenny never stops smiling.

For most UYRS students, five Saturdays at the track are plenty reason to sit through five weeks in the classroom. They learn how brakes brake and they dissect track dynamics, but they also study the corporate culture of racing, memorizing NASCAR sponsors and mocking up team business plans. Racing is a chance for school directors to scout for confidence, patience and control in the corners.

That's how Kenny made it through the filter. He's one of seven students assigned to the program from area vo-tech schools, and it's their first day in the advanced group. In class, they watch from the back row as Danny Kilson, a BMW-certified technician, explains caster, camber and toe. He's warming them up for their next goal: seat time in a 110 mph minicup car. He talks about race day, when they'll have a shot at winning a few hundred bucks. "I need you to be sharp," Kilson says, pointing out scuff marks left along the ribs of a white car from a hard-fought race. "We came home with the trophy, so it's all good. And the check. I like to get the check."

The school's parts closet, stocked with tires and quart bottles of motor oil, is a refuge for Dontay. "The streets is all I knew," he says. He grew up rough in West Philly, shuttling between his mom and dad before moving in as a teenager with an older brother. "I didn't really have no type of guidance. I wasn't into sports much. I needed something that's more intriguing."

A local gang filled that void. After a hallway fight at his high school, Dontay found himself in front of a judge. "The racing school kinda turned that around," he says with typical teen understatement. (He enrolled four years ago, after his father responded to a newspaper ad.) "It's time-consuming. I like that. I don't have time to get into trouble."

Dontay loves to drive, but he has built his reputation as the school's technician. It's more than a hobby; it's a career option. He did an internship in North Carolina with Ron Hornaday's Smith & Wesson Busch Series team last summer. Martin practically had to drag the kid, covered in grease, away from the garage and back to their hotel. The experience transformed Dontay for good.

Between neatly braided cornrows and a wispy mustache, Dontay's eyes glow as he talks about his obsession: "What is the science that makes the car roll? What is the chemistry of it? How does fuel combust to make the engine run?" He looks at you, just hoping you get how cool this is.

Nextel Cup driver Brian Vickers gets it. He believes in hard work, direction, networking and the occasional lucky break. And after several visits to the UYRS, he's pretty sure these kids have a shot. "Not all of them are gonna make it, but they've got as much talent as anybody," he says. "The next thing they need is connections."

The problem is access. Most kids simply don't have the equipment and facilities to learn. Even the son of a shop hand or a weekend racer has an enormous advantage over an outsider. "After all, it's just practice," says Vickers, who started racing at age 7. "It's no different than shooting the basketball in the backyard."

Leon and Jason Simmons look like the school's best hope. The two brothers started racing in 1999, and recently graduated to the Legends series. (Leon is 19, Jason 18.) They've had internships with Joe Gibbs, Darrell Waltrip and NASCAR, but now they run their own show with a car purchased on eBay. They scored a sponsorship from a West Philly auto repair shop, J.E.T.S., to keep their 5/8-scale roadster on track.

"In a lot of ways, they're going to have a better opportunity than most," Vickers says, noting that good, young minority drivers are in demand right now, simply because there are so few of them. "But at the end of the day, if you prevail, that's what matters. You have to win races."

PARIS YOUNG'S helmet sits on a shelf at the Urban Youth Racing School along with piles of signed memorabilia. Just last year, Young was Martin's star pupil, a driver with urban appeal. "He has corn braids, jeans hangin' off his butt, the whole nine," Martin says, a distant look in his eyes. "He'd make NASCAR cool."

Deep down, the 41-year-old Martin is still that stubborn sports marketer who once hawked gold-tipped shoelaces and worked with Joe Hand Productions, Charles Barkley and the Poston brothers. He is dogged in his pursuit of sponsors; his students watch closely, and learn. "If we didn't market ourselves, we wouldn't have Craftsman shirts and GMAC cars," Jason Simmons says. "We wouldn't be able to do the things we do."

It's a constant challenge, despite the program's solid rep and growing support for diversity in racing. In 2005, the nonprofit UYRS took in $409,000 in donations, a 72% increase from 2003. NASCAR was the third-largest supporter, giving $37,500. (General Motors gave $125,000 and GMAC $55,000.) But Martin still had to turn kids away, and there's more than a two-year waiting list. He is convinced that the right driver could give the sport access to a huge, untapped market.

So what happened to Paris Young? "He wants to be a rapper," Martin says, downcast.

And yet for every kid who leaves, there are a thousand more eager to take his place. After Martin closes up for the night, he crosses the street to the same lot where the school's 30-foot trailer was stolen last December. It's not exactly pole position, but you have to start somewhere.

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