Napa’s Krider Racing headed to Sacramento over Labor Day weekend to compete in the Dutch Holland Racing Promotions Destruction Derby California State Championships.

The team won its heat, picking up a trophy and some prize money.

Krider Racing, no stranger to winning road racing events, had very limited destruction derby experience as the team headed to the State Championships.

“Actually, our derby experience was limited to about 30 seconds,” Rob Krider said.

In Krider’s rookie event at the Napa Town and Country Fair in August, after smashing into the first car, the drive shaft fell out of the bottom of the Krider Racing Chrysler Cordoba, prematurely ending the team’s initial destruction derby.

“Having the car fail like that in front of a hometown crowd was a pretty big disappointment to us,” Rob Krider said.

“From our racing experience we understand that in motorsports, there are going to be things that happen outside of your control. We looked at it as a learning experience. We decided to take that newfound knowledge and head to the State Championships.”

Krider Racing went to Sacramento with its derby partners, Third Street Auto Repair. Third Street brought one of its own cars, a pink Chevrolet Monte Carlo driven by Gloria Peralta.

On the side of her car, she had painted, “Silly Boys, Derbies are for Chicks.”

During the final days of preparing the derby cars and at the event at Cal Expo, Peralta was followed around by documentary film makers who were shooting a human interest story about drivers of the destruction derby.

“Laying underneath a car, banging away with a hammer while a guy has a $3,000 camera six inches from my face was a new experience for me,” Rob Krider said.

“It made me realize that I probably use a little too much foul language when I’m working on cars.”

After some getting used to the camera crew, everyone around the garage eventually got back to business, building strong enough machines to do well at the State Championship.

Once the demolition derby began at Cal Expo in front of a packed stadium during the last weekend of the State Fair, the camera crews were soon put aside.

It was all about crashing cars. The derby at the State Championships was fast paced and hard hitting.

Peralta was in the first heat and had some steering problems, which put her into the consolation round where she ran into more of the same issues ending her weekend.

Rob Krider was in the third heat, where he went head-to-head with seven other seasoned competitors.

“Right before the heat, my brother, Randy, told me not to worry about the car, just go out there and get the job done,” Rob Krider said.

“I was hitting people with that car like it was somebody else’s body inside it.”

Rob drove like a man possessed, using the front of his car to inflict heavy damage to his competitors.

When the smoke cleared and the points were tallied, Rob Krider had won the third heat at the State Championships in his second-ever destruction derby.

After getting out of the car — out of breath and elated — Rob said, “I have to thank HP 234, Bay Ex, C.J. Fix Co., Bottlers Unlimited, ST Suspensions, B&G Tires, Napa Valley Muffler, Andrews and Thornley Construction, T.E.M. Machine Shop, Figstone Graphics, Third Street Auto Repair, my brother, and my crew.

“There is just so much that went into this event and into this car, there is no way to do it alone. Winning that heat was from everyone’s hard work and sweat. I had the easiest job. All I had to do was point my car at another car and then run into it. How hard is that?”

Winning the heat with such gusto did take a heavy toll on the Cordoba, and the crew was unable to repair the car enough to get it into the main event.

“Even though I would like to have continued on and seen what would have happened in the main event, I don’t mind finishing the State Championships on a high note,” Rob said.

“We got a trophy, we got a check, we got to represent Napa at the capital. We couldn’t have scripted it any better.”

Krider Racing will stop crashing cars (hopefully in this case) as the team will get back to its roots, road racing the #38 Nissan SE-R in the National Auto Sport Associate Performance Touring Series at Infineon Raceway on Nov. 8-9.