|
Traditional Sprint Car FanSite |
See You At The Races!!! |
| A
Day Into The Past And A Night Into The Future by Norm Bogan |
|
|
|
Back in the days of Howdy Doody, malt shops and rock and roll, when I was a teenager, all of the guys had ducktail haircuts, wore faded Levis and white T-shirts, with a pack of Chesterfields rolled up in the sleeve. For most young men, they obtained their driving licenses when they were sixteen, but many had been behind the wheel already for a number of years. Usually you started out with Dad’s old Nash or Packard, but as soon as you could get on at the PDQ station pumping gas, you would be able to save for your own car. At fifty cents an hour, how long would it take to accumulate seventy-five dollars, that the man down the street wanted for that old “34 Ford in his back yard? It was amazing that in the post war years, many young men were able to go through the ritual of obtaining their first car. These vehicles were in various stages of deterioration, but their owners dreamed of making a few alterations, which would make them more beautiful, plus operate with enhanced performance. After all, you could get just about anything you needed from Honest Charley’s Catalog. As is the nature of young males, competitive juices flow naturally through their bodies and soon the bragging turned to who had the fastest car, who could burn the most rubber, who had the loudest pipes and other important attributes. There was only one way to determine the validity of these braggarts and that was to have a contest. Often this occurred at the Stan’s, Bob’s or Tiny Naylor’s drive-in restaurant, where the ritual of sizing up the competition took place. Rumbling through with your header plugs open and your flaming paint job, it was much like a rooster strutting for the hens. The term “Drag Race” was coined and soon these contests were occurring on a street near you. As the competitors searched for more advantageous locations and local law enforcement stepped up their efforts to scuttle these “shows of speed”, organized venues were established. First, these racers moved to the dry lakes of the Mojave Desert. If you listen to the old-timers, they will recall tales of daring-do at locales such as El Mirage and Muroc. After military expansion closed off some of these areas, speed plants known as drag strips, started to sprout up on the fringes of the southern California population. Better known facilities were Santa Ana Airport, Saugus, Fontana, Colton, Irwindale, San Fernando and of course the famed “Smokers” meets at Famoso. Many of the young competitors chose to continue with the straight line form of racing, while others chose to pursue fame and fortune at many of the local ovals, hoping to go on to collect the brass ring at Indianapolis. A number of brash youngsters, who started out street racing with their hotrods, went on to enjoy national prominence. At this same time, a new industry was evolving to serve those looking for increased performance and also in giving your car its own personality through customizing. Many of the pioneers of the speed age came from this era. Names like Ansen, Ed Iskendarian, Doug Moon, Howard Johanson, Paxton, George Barris and Gaylord were among many who serviced the hungry young men with a zest for more out of their car. In 1955, one of the premier drag-racing facilities was opened. Lion’s Drag Strip became a national icon for top competition, the site of numerous new world records and a place that filled the grandstands each week with ravenous spectators. Its closing, in 1972, was due to that common killer of racing plants, “Urban Sprawl”. On the morning of August 21, a collection of old hot rods and custom cars assembled at the Irwindale Speedway parking lot to pay homage to the long gone Lion’s Drag Strip. The group included a cherry red T bucket, bright yellow ‘56 Ford pickup, purple roadster with yellow flames and a burgundy ’68 Charger. Throw in a ’55 and ’56 Chevy, a ’38 Buick, a bright orange Willys with a supercharger poking through the hood and a stretched roadster with a Jimmy engine and you have a representative idea of the cars that traveled to the NHRA Museum at the Pomona Fairplex. I swear that several of those cars had fuzzy dice on the rear view mirror. The Museum tour afforded an opportunity to view some of the machines that once graced the pavement at Lion’s. Among the displayed racers were the famed Greer-Black-Prudomme Top Fuel dragster, Art Chrisman’s Hustler #1, the Stone-Woods-Cook Willys coupe and Big Daddy Don Garlits Swamp Rat, all which enjoyed the spotlight at the revered Lion’s speed plant. Also on display were cars that plied the dry-lakes and Bonneville, plus some of the old local ovals. There were many pictures of heroes from years gone by, making this a real stroll down memory lane. Returning to the Irwindale Speedway, the cruise cars were lined up for spectators to view and adore. As the festivities began, the near capacity crowd got to see the tribute cars make a parade lap around the track, then we had the National Anthem and the look into the future unfolded. Tonight, three classes of racers competed. The lead event was the Winston West series, with cars similar to the Winston Cup cars, driven by drivers primarily from the western US. A companion event was the American Cities Racing League (ACRL), which had two levels racing together in cars that resembled scaled down Can-Am cars, which race on both road courses and ovals. Mechanix Wear Speed Trucks filled out the program. Winston West ran a 250- lap feature, while the other two events would be fifty laps. Most of the participants in tonight’s show are younger racers on their way up. Viewing them this evening, we may have seen a future winner of the Daytona or Indianapolis 500. These drivers are paying their dues right now, but dream of one day taking on the big boys, seen on national television. The Speed Trucks ran the opening feature in their usual clean style with some dicing throughout the field and only one incident before Ron Peterson claimed victory after being pursued closely by Darren Young throughout the race. ACRL cars ran the next feature with the mixed field of SS2-DOHC Cosworth engines and wings for more down-force and the S2-SOHC Pinto engines with no wings. The dominant SS2 cars finished at the top with Peter Zarcades as the winner. It was my first experience with this organization, which I would look for on a road course, but they did a commendable job in their feature and appear to be a professional operation. Winston West at Irwindale is like watching Winston Cup at Martinsville. It is a lot of circles around this little track. Twenty-seven racers started the feature. It appeared that we may have a long night as four cars had blown tires in the first fifteen laps. It wasn’t just one brand as both Good Year and Hoosier suffered calamity. The cars ran three and four wide in the turns and were right up against the wall on the straight-aways. The weekly racers don’t tend to run this high on the track. At lap 120, the #38 car of Manabu Orido, a driver from Tokyo, Japan made a routine pit stop. Somehow fuel was spilled and ignited into a fireball, setting the rear tire changer and the gasman on fire. The fire was quickly extinguished, but the two crewmen suffered second degree burns, which caused them to be air evacuated to a burn center. With half the field sidelined at the end of the race, Austin Cameron gathered in the spoils. The crowd was treated to some excellent competition and was able to see the pit stops, which are not part of the weekly fare. Racers interviewed afterwards said that the tires were really good, even though there were a number of early race punctures. Some said that they had problems adjusting their tire stagger, which caused the cars to be tight. A nostalgia mode started the day as we celebrated memories of years past with the old cars and the visit to the Museum. Evening brought us to view many young competitors, looking to advance to the major leagues. The past always has that glow of what once was, while the future is bright and shiny with many new faces looking to make their mark on the racing world. For me, I was able to enjoy the best of both worlds on this day. Just think, in another fifty years, these young kids and their cars will be the Museum fodder. |
