Proven Sampey is back where her career began

Tracy Renck, Special to the News

Published July 13, 2006 at midnight

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The year was 1996.

The event was the Mile-High Nationals at Bandimere Speedway's quarter-mile drag strip, and a little-known Pro Stock motorcycle racer named Angelle Seeling was making her debut at a National Hot Rod Association national event.

"That definitely was a special race for me," said Seeling, who now has the married name of Sampey. "I had been doing some testing and tuning with the motorcycle, and we were supposed to have me make my debut at a race in North Carolina, but because of weather in North Carolina at the time, my team owners decided to have me race at Bandimere."

Sampey stunned fellow Pro Stock Motorcycle competitors by advan- cing all the way to the semifinals before losing to world champion Dave Schultz.

"Bandimere was a great place for me to start because the motorcycles go about a half-second slower at Bandimere because of the altitude," Sampey said. "That's a big difference, and it let me concentrate more on racing and not worrying about how fast that I was going, and I was thrilled to get to the semifinals."

That was a sign of things to come.

Sampey won her first national event, at Reading, Pa., in only her fourth race, and she finished seventh in the points standings despite not competing in the first six events of the season.

A decade later, Sampey is returning to the 27th Mile-High Nationals this weekend as a superstar.

She won Pro Stock Motorcycle world championships three consecutive years (2000-02) and has notched 40 career victories, the most ever for a female driver in NHRA history.

Not bad for a woman who had ambitions to be a pro motocross racer when she was growing up in Luling, La.

"I always wanted to race motocross bikes. That was my first passion," the 5-foot, 105-pound Sampey said. "The only problem was that it just wasn't physically feasible for me to compete in motocross. I then got involved with Pro Stock Motorcycles, and this has been a great experience for me."

Sampey comes to Bandimere on top of her game. She leads the points standings with 536 - 28 better than Andrew Hines, who has won the past two world titles on his Harley-Davidson.

Sampey's place atop the standings on her U.S. Army Suzuki has been fueled by her three national event wins, at Gainesville, Fla. (March 19), Houston (April 2) and Columbus, Ohio (May 21). Antron Brown, her Pro Motorcycle teammate at Don Schumacher Racing, also won, at Atlanta (May 7).

"We're really excited about the way things have been going this season," Sampey said. "For me to have three wins already and for Antron to have one is a really big deal for us."

As good as things have gone so far for Sampey, she still isn't making any guarantees for this weekend.

"Bandimere is more of a tuner's race," Sampey said. "I know my crew chief, Steve Tartaglia, is going to have his hands full with the altitude. The altitude changes everything, because we don't have as much power, and we just need to find the fastest way to get the bike down the track. I also just need to focus and do my job."

Although Sampey has had an amazing NHRA career, she still isn't nearly as well-known as second- year Indy Racing League driver Danica Patrick, who has yet to win a race.

"I am not really sure why that is," Sampey said. "I think drag racing just attracts a different fan base than the IRL does, and drag racing doesn't get blown up (in the media) like some other motor sports. I am not jealous of Danica Patrick. I am not in a popularity contest. I just do this because I love to race and I want to win."

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