The rumbling of a 1976 Dodge Dart Sport drag race car owned by Myron Piatek offered hands-on education for students at Daytona State College.
“It’s a great way for students to be introduced to the motor sports industry and its many levels,” said Robert Cothran, once a race car driver, and more recently a manufacturing manager for Crane Cams, a company that made engine camshafts and valve train components in Daytona Beach until it closed in February.
Cothran is teaching performance engine technology at Daytona State’s Advanced Technology College on Williamson Boulevard. The new three-semester certificate program prepares students to become high-performance engine builders.
Roger Rowan, department chairman for Daytona State College’s technology program, said “quite a few companies” came to the college in the last few years wanting this type of program.
“It’s worked out great so far. There will be employment benefits in this area, but it is not just for racers,” Rowan said in a phone interview.
The driver spent time explaining the workings of his engine, speeds and ratios. He answered questions and shared his enthusiasm with the students.
“I’ve made enough money on the circuits to where this all at least pays for itself,” he told Cothran’s class. “But more important, I’ve met a lot of great people and have had a lot of wonderful experiences doing what I love to do.”
In an era when school budgets are dwindling and the need for re-education of a growing unemployed workforce is at a peak, Piatek’s visit was priceless, said Cothran, who grew up in a racing family. “My dad built engines for Greenville-Pickens Speedway in Greenville, S.C. All the local racers would have their engines built by my dad,” Cothran said.
Since age 10, the 58-year-old instructor raced go-karts, motorcycles, drag racers and modified stock cars at Outlaw tracks.
“It was a great feeling sliding through the turns sideways,” Cothran said.
But an ever-more-expensive sport and a crash slowed his racing to a few times a year until recent years. “Now, I think it’s time to just watch,” he said.
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