PINELLAS PARK, Fla. A Hurricane is confirmed to hit Showtime Speedway Saturday night during the winged portion of the Dave Steele World Sprint Car Championship.

Jeff The Hurricane Montgomery will be competing for the first time in the state of Florida.

Montgomery comes to the state of Florida to compete in next weekends Childrens Dream Fund event at Citrus County Speedway all the way from Langford Station, B.C. That is approximately 3,300 miles each way or 51 hours of drive time each way.

We decided last fall we were gonna do the Childrens Dream Fund event this year, explained Montgomery. I sat down with my car owners Rob and Lee Leighton and we talked about it. The money at the Childrens Dream Fund is pretty good since theyre paying $10,000 to win each night. We decided to go a week early so we could also run the Showtime wing races and use that race to do some testing.

Montgomery has never been to Showtime Speedway.

The tracks down there are pretty much what we run on back home. They are mostly smaller quarter mile tracks. Ive been watching a lot of online videos of sprint car races from Showtime and Citrus County. Thank God for YouTube, said Montgomery with a laugh.

Montgomery may not be a name familiar to Florida fans, but hes very accomplished in his neck of the woods. He is a six-time winner of the Daffodil Cup, the biggest winged pavement sprint car race on the Canadian West Coast.

The Hurricane is a nickname he picked up nearly 25 years ago.

When I started racing about 2001, the Western Speedway announcer started calling me The Hurricane, and it just stuck. The same announcer nicknamed my brother The Tornado. Theyve called me that ever since.

Montgomery is highly confident he can make some noise at Showtime Speedway and Citrus County Speedway the next two weekends.

If I didnt feel like I had a chance to win, I wouldnt go, added Montgomery.

The sixth annual Dave Steele World Sprint Car Championship kicks off this Friday night with a 100-lap non-wing sprint car race that will pay $7,500 to win.

The following night will see the wings return with twin 35-lap feature events paying $2,500 to win each feature.