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Formula for Fun
One might take a look at clinical psychologist Joseph L. Riley, III, Ph.D., an associate professor of community dentistry and behavioral science in the College of Dentistry, and think he’d be a sedate, quiet sort of fellow with a sedate, quiet sort of hobby … like clipping Bonsai to the lilting sounds of classical music.
Think again. Riley’s hobby is all about speed, the smell of hot asphalt, and the roar of 117 horses chomping at the bit to burn rubber on a fast course. We’re talking Formula Ford car racing, baby, and at speeds up to 140 mph, it’s not for the faint of heart.
For 56-year-old Riley, who owned a chain of foreign auto part stores in the Orlando area for 20 years before entering academia, Formula Ford auto racing seemed the perfect hobby to occupy his spare time.
“Cars are kind of my thing,” Riley said. “In my youth, I wanted to be a professional race car driver and started racing when I was 21. But I blew up the engine in my car after about a year, started a business and put racing on the back burner. So in some ways, this is unfinished business.”
Formula Ford cars are open wheel, single-seaters slung low and without the aerodynamic wings seen on the Formula One cars. The newer car chassis have springs and shocks that are covered by the car body to reduce drag, but Riley’s car is a classic 1975 Titan chassis with outboard suspension that places him at a 5 mph disadvantage at higher speeds — a disadvantage that disappears below 100 mph. So his competitive edge at lower speeds is driving skill and the mechanical preparation that went into the car before the race.
“My car is in my garage and I do all the work on it,” Riley said. “I don’t actually build the engine itself, I send it off to a professional engine builder, but I put it in my car and do all the maintenance, all the setup work on the chassis, put the car on my trailer and drive it to the race.”
Riley must be doing something right. He won the 2006 championship for the Southeastern Division of the Sports Car Club of America, competing against drivers with newer, more aerodynamic cars, called Swifts. The Swifts car bodies have covered springs and shocks, and are the car to beat at Formula Ford races.
“The good news is that the guys who have Swifts didn’t run enough races and they were unreliable,” Riley said with a laugh. “The young guys are crazier, they go off track … So they had won some races, but I had won six races before I went to the championship race, and I only had to finish fourth to be series champion.”
Riley placed third, his Titan kept pace with the newer Swifts to take home the SCCA Southeastern Division Formula Ford Championship.
Although he’s modest about his achievement, Riley is accustomed to being at the top of his game. In what he calls “another life,” Riley was a nationally ranked triathlete. Now, he’s the recipient of dentistry’s University Research Foundation Professorship Award, which consists of a one-time $3,000 grant to support his ongoing research and $5,000 each year over the next three years as a salary supplement.
Riley and his wife, Denise, a nurse practitioner in the department of neurology, are delighted with the recognition, and Riley plans to use the award to support his research on cultural differences in pain management behaviors, a subject he finds even more exciting than car racing.
“Research is just as thrilling as an auto race,” Riley said. “If you put in the preparation time and pay attention to details the payoff is exciting — your paper is published, your grant is funded or you win a race."
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