About Our Volunteers
The volunteers who make this web site possible
We welcome your involvement with us. Whether you have a story to tell, a skill you can donate, or just some time or ideas, please contact us.
Karen Salvaggio
Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Karen has had a passion for racing since her youth. She loves her day job as an educator in Southern California, U.S.A., but she lives to race. Her racing career began in the early 1980’s, while she was in the U.S. Air Force. She had spent nine years as an aircraft mechanic, working on B-52’s and KC-135’s in the US, in the Philippines, and in Japan. A friend at Castle Air Force Base in Central California offered to let her drive his stock car at a local 1/4-mile dirt track. It took about 10 seconds for her to get hooked. By the next Saturday night, she had her own car and has been racing ever since. She now owns several Corvettes and races a Factory Five Racing 1965 Coba replica in the FFR Challenge Series under the sanctioning of the National Auto Sport Association (NASA). In 2000, Karen raced with the Women’s Global GT Series in the ALMS, and currently road races her racecar in sprint and endurance racing series on the West Coast.
Tracy Marshall
Executive Editor
Tracy owns a 2004 Mustang Cobra, and drives her car in high performance driving events in Southern California. She is a school teacher by day, and a gearhead girl at night, and truly enjoys all things racing. Tracy garnered the Novice Driver of the Year award from the Sports Car Club of America (SCCA) when she was just 16 years old, and brings a wealth of writing/editing experience to the Thunder Valley Racing team. Tracy serves as the lead HTML editor and product developer for the website.
Thunder Valley Racing wishes to thank those who have contributed in the past to the success of the site:
Bev Randall
HTML Editor
Bev lives on a farm in the North Island of New Zealand. Her involvement in motorsport is through her daughter Sara who is a rally driver/co-driver and holds the title of the youngest ever and first female New Zealand Rally Co-driver Champion.
Past Volunteers
Jennifer Barrett
Writer
Jennifer is from Adelaide, Australia. She is currently saving up for a proper driving school course, since all she has ever wanted to do is race. She is in the process of buying her first home, and has managed to befriend a bunch of guys who run a Harley shop, knowing she will be in need of some hardened mechanics around wouldn’t hurt. She is rebuilding an old Holden just for street racing and she has great of hopes for a racing future.
Amanda Connolly
Writer
Amanda is from Aurora, Ontario, Canada, where she spent every weekend since she was a kid at the race track, where her father and uncle were top late model drivers in Southern, Ontario. Her mom even got behind the wheel for some powder puff events once in a while. Racing was what their family loved to do, and they did it together. In 1999 she bought her own thunder car and has raced in the thunder division for three seasons.
Sharon Constantine
Writer
Sharon, from Victoria, B.C., Canada, has two sons and four grandchildren. Her youngest son is fixing up his father’s old stock car and hopes to be racing in 2003. Sharon had wanted to race since she was 18, and finally got her chance 16 years ago. She currently races a mini stock with the International Mini Stock 4-Cylinders Association. Her twin goals are to break a track record and to win a season championship. In addition to her racing, she is a contributing writer for the Geared For Racing magazine, in Courtenay, B.C.
Betsy Frazier
HTML Editor
Betsy Frazier provides Web Design, Bookkeeping, and Newsletter support through her small business, Frazier Business Services, based in Hood River, Oregon, U.S.A. She is an avid windsurfer, dirt-biker, skier, and loves the outdoors. Betsy has previously autocrossed her 1976 911S Porsche. She frequently placed first in the PCA NW Region and won one international event in Canada, defeating all women and men in class. Betsy is excited to be able to support women in racing by maintaining the Thunder Valley Racing Press Box.
Christine Moy Harmon
HTML Editor
Tamara Hull
Writer
Tammi lives near San Francisco, U.S.A. and started drag racing in high school at the local race track, Sears Point (with a fake ID because her mother wouldn’t let her get her driver’s license for fear of what she might do). Later, she started doing driving schools, autocrossing, rallying, etc. She is very involved in the BMW club and became involved in SCCA as crew because she couldn’t afford to race until the BMW club started a racing series. A car accident (drunk driver ran a red light) delayed her start for two years but she’s been doing as much racing as she can afford ever since. She has been writing articles and editing car related newsletters for many years.
Tom Moore
Public Relations Consultant
Tom Moore is the founder and president of Darkhorse Communications, founded in 1998 as an effort to provide PR services to smaller race teams and drivers. Since, clients have grown to include race series and manufacturers. Darkhorse services have also increased to include driver consultation. Currently, Tom has several clients both in auto racing and outside of the sport. In addition to Thunder Valley, Blueprint Racing Enterprises, LLC in the Indy Racing Northern Light Series with driver Jimmy Kite uses the services of Darkhorse Communications. Driver, Terri Hundertmark, who is currently competing in the Women’s Global GT Series, is a Darkhorse client as well. Finish Line Racing Art, an art company that specializes in the creation and sale of one-of-a-kind pieces of art from racing and automotive parts is also represented by the Georgia media relations firm. Other recent clients have included Cigarette Racing Team, Inc., manufacturers of high-end, off-shore powerboats for racing and customer use and the American Le Mans Series.
Lee Parent
Writer
Lee, from Regina, SK Canada, was 19 when her future husband taught her to drag race his 1955 Chevy. Since then, they’ve had about 160 cars between the two of them and in 1990 he bought her a yellow 1981 Corvette coupe for her fortieth birthday. In 1995 they joined the local Corvette Club. After about a year, she was hooked and was First in her Class for Western Canada in 1999. She has been published in Vette Vues and Shark Quarterly, had a story included in an anthology produced by MidAmerica Designs, and is a regular contributor to a couple of national Corvetting newsletters.
Rhonda Rogers
Writer
Rhonda is a mother of two teenage boys’s in Kannapolis, NC, U.S.A. She currently homeschools her youngest son and, when he goes back to school next year, she will fulfill her dream to race car’s. She currently works nights as a bus driver.
T.W. Theodore
Founder
T.W. is a thirty-five year veteran of marketing, fund-raising, and not for profit management and currently heads Thunder Valley Associates, a firm specializing in strategic planning, organizational development, and fund raising consultation for mid-size not for profit organizations. T.W. has created, built and directed innovative arts groups, consulted in fund raising, headed a major development and marketing department, and managed a broad range of media projects. He founded and simultaneously directed two arts organizations in the 1970’s and 1980’s. For five years in the 1980’s, T.W. worked with a nationally known fund raising firm on major capital campaigns across the Midwest. In 1988, he joined Chicago’s public television station, first as its Director of Development and later as Vice President for Marketing and Development. While there, T.W. was responsible for the creation and funding of major national broadcast productions.
Laurel Viera
Editor-In-Chief
Laurel lives in south central Minnesota, U.S.A., and has three kids. She has worked in newspaper and television and has spent 20 years working in the food service industry either part time or full time. Her family has been racing since the 1960’s. In 1991 she began racing dirt oval track enduros in
Minnesota and Iowa, then moved on to hobby stock, stock car and, in 2001, some oval track asphalt.
Kerry Watson
Executive Producer
Kerry’s company, Pithy Productions, developed the web strategy for the Thunder Valley Racing site. She designed a site that is lively and fresh and easy to use, and then managed the volunteers who carried out the plan and filled in for volunteers who came and went along the way. A certified track junkie with her own Porsche 944 track car, Kerry is a high performance driving instructor with local clubs including several regions of the Porsche Club of America (PCA), National Auto Sport Association (NASA), and a private club, the Driver’s Edge. She resides in Central Texas.
Juliana Williamson-Page
Writer
Juliana is an ardent race fan, especially of open-wheel road racing. Her boyfriend (now husband) turned her on to F1 and Indy Cars and they attended their first CART race together at Laguna Seca in 1995. In 1996, her boyfriend arranged for driver Robby Gordon to offer his marriage proposal to her in front of about 150 fans at the Grand Prix of Long Beach. They returned to Laguna Seca for their honeymoon and vowed to someday move closer to the track, which they did in 1998. They live in Monterey, California, U.S.A., now, where she works as an administrative assistant for the Public Defender’s Office.
Susan Zoch
Writer
Susan is from Belton, Texas, is married and has a son. She got started in motorsports in the 1970’s. At her first drivers school, she was the only woman. Her instructor told her he didn’t believe women should be on the track, but, as the day progressed, she changed his mind and received high marks on her performance. She began autocrossing and then moved on to race a GT1 Mustang with SCCA. She currently helps run the RSM Motorsports race team in Texas and is an officer in a local Corvette Club. She still participates in autocrossing, car shows, and racing.
