For more than 20 years the only battles John Linville had to fight were on the race track. In 1985, he prepared to fight for his life. Linville, a Kernersville, N.C. native, and a BGN regular was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer. Linville’s prognosis was unknown because there were few documented cases in the world. The chemotherapy and radiation treatments took their toll on Linville. He wasn’t strong enough to get out of bed, much less compete regularly on the rigorous Busch circuit. Eventually the treatments began to produce favorable results for Linville,55, allowing him to once again do periodic battle on the race track and also act as crew chief for Berrier who drives the #90 Mean Green Ford in select ARCA races. Berrier, still a regular competitor in the BGN and the regular driver of the Mean Green Ford, found it difficult to compete in both series due to the demands on his time. This left the #90 team without a full-time driver. Will Spencer, team manager and co-owner of Three Star Motorsports, the team that fields ARCA cars for Berrier, approached Linville about the vacancy. So linville will drive the car on Sept 30th at the Charlotte ARCA race. Along with the September event at Charlotte, Linville hopes to run the #90 Mean Green Ford at the season finale in Atlanta.(PR)(9-26-98)
