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Friday the 13th special: the Corvette Curse and other superstitions
From crash-prone Corvettes to wearing green and eating peanuts in the pits, drag racers are a superstitious bunch
Well, race fans, here it is, the day that’s more taxing to some people than April 15. That’s right, look at the calendar or at the date above. It’s Friday the 13th. Ooooh.
Believe it or not – and have I…
2,470 days later ...
Don Garlits' historic 5.63 pass stood as the quickest of all time for nearly seven years
On Oct. 11, Don Garlits ran 5.63 at the 1975 World Finals in Ontario, Calif., and backed it up the next day for a new NHRA national record, a record that stood until July 1982.
Seeing…
One of Funny Car's original mean, green machines
Saluting the career of Jim and Betty Green and their Green Elephant Funny Cars
(Above) Before he moved out of the cockpit to own and tune, Jim Green was a good driver. He's pictured at the wheel of the B-Boys Auto Supply entry at Pacific Raceways receiving the B/Dragster trophy…
Monday at the movies
So I stumbled across More American Graffiti on HBO the other night and got to watch “Big John” Milner in some faux 1964 footage as he raced at Fremont and kept hoping for that big “factory” ride. Although the film was shot in 1979, they did…
Jeff Courtie: A pair of pretty sound careers
From Funny Car racer to movie sound engineer, Jeff Courtie has led an amazing life
As a kid gawking at the pit ropes at Southern California dragstrips, all we ever wanted was to be acknowledged by our quarter-mile heroes. A “Hey kid, how ya doing?” or even a “Stop staring at me, will ya?” would have been…
Train stories keeps rollin' all week long
Readers share their memories of the famous Freight Train
One great thing about great stories is that they beget others. The story of the fabled Freight Train, as told here last Friday, inspired, as I suspected it might with a topic that memorable, a flood of love for the Train and…
Don't mess with Connie
I hadn’t really planned on writing a column today since the NHRA offices are closed, but somehow I just couldn’t resist.
The drag racing message boards are all a twitter – and my e-mail box overflowing – with word that one of Connie Kalitta’s…
Engineering the Train
The birth and life of the fabulous Freight Train Top Gas dragster
In American, history, few images are more evocative, romantic, or nostalgic than that of a train rumbling down steel tracks, smoke billowing from its stack. The legendary Iron Horse, as much as the six-shooter, helped tame…
The Bristol rainy-day blog
A long Sunday of sitting in the rain, captured in extreme detail. Probably too extreme
Looks like we're going to be in for a long day here, and I'm getting bored. So, here's the play-by-play on the day.
9:30 a.m.: Rain fell until about 9:30 this morning, but finally relented, and the Safety Safari and Bristol crews get to work…
Looking forward to (and back at) Bristol
Bristol Dragway in the '60s and the early years of the NHRA Springnationals
Bristol, yesterday and today
Tomorrow, I’ll be winging my way east to Bristol for the annual O’Reilly NHRA Thunder Valley Nationals presented by Q, and I’m pretty excited…
Show and tell
Drag racing in Vogue magazine; Top Fuel vs. Funny Car tug of war; handheld drag racing games
It’s been a busy week here at NHRA Publications Central, what with back-to-back national events, the production of the souvenir program for the National Hot Rod Reunion, and intense work on a super-secret Publications…
An irrepressible Force
An appreciation of the racing career and personality of John Force
I was never all that good at math in school, but you don’t have to be a quantum physicist to calculate that John Force had to average about two round-wins in each of his 501 starts to reach the 1,000-win plateau he crested…
Friday feedback frenzy
More memories of R. Gaines Markley, Shirley Shahan, and Clive Skilton
Heading into what promises to be a busy weekend of perhaps record-breaking performances at Gateway Int’l Raceway, I think it’s a good time to take it easy. I’m gonna back the feedback machine out of the trailer and fire ‘er up to share some of the…
The Drag-on Lady: Racer, pioneer, mom
The life and times of Shirley Shahan
Shirley Shahan then, in the winner's circle, Pomona, 1966 ...
... and now, at the 2007 NHRA California Hot Rod Reunion
Shahan's…
The loss of Gaines ... and Beck's 'secret'
Remembering Top Fuel racer R. Gaines Markley; Gary Beck is not Canadian
How's this for a cool find in our photo files? Beck, right, Markley, center, and Bob Painton with the Markley-Beck-Rhoades BB/GD in 1968. (John Dutton photo)
R. Gaines Markley --…
'The Big Bang'
The story behind Larry Brown and one of the most amazing Top Fuel explosions ever
Imagine if a photo of a cataclysmic event taken 36 years ago instantly brought your name to people’s lips. Imagine if, despite your other accomplishments in life and racing, this one moment frozen in time on film became your…
Danica who? What about Shirley ... and Shirley? And Judi. And Judy?
NASCAR's female star has a long way to go to top NHRA's female pioneers
If you listened really well this weekend, you could hear it from coast to coast and to the far reaches of the planet. It was the sound of a million drag racing fans going “Huh?!”
So, Danica Patrick is the first woman to win a major auto racing…
A life well Dunn, and strapping on the ol' feedback
Mike Dunn career retrospective; more four-wide madness; Warren & Coburn
Mike Dunn’s Final Take column that accompanies National DRAGSTER’s Pro coverage from the NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series national events is one of the most popular weekly features in the magazine, and it’s always…
Monday morning mash-up
Mark Pieri recalls four-lane racing at Byron; memories of Bison Dragway; more on Kalitta's fireball
Explaining the basics of drag racing to your buddies down at the bar is pretty straightforward (pardon the pun), right? Two cars run in a straight line for 1,320 feet, right? Well, it wasn’t always two cars, as you’re about to read.
A lot of back…
Ridge Route Terror tales
Back in December, I published in this column some of my old personal photos from Irwindale, including the one at right, showing my favorite fueler of the time, the James Warren-driven, Roger Coburn-tuned Warren & Coburn (before and later Warren…
My Memory Lane is Riverside Drive
A trip back to NHRA's North Hollywood headquarters, where it all began for me
Journalist H.L. Mencken, one of the most influential American writers of the first half of the 20th century, once said of his time at The Baltimore Sun newspaper, “As I look back over a misspent life, I find myself more and more convinced that I had…
Racing on the cardboard quarter-mile
Remembering (and replaying) the Vallco Drag Racing board game
If kids today want to buckle into John Force’s Castrol GTX Mustang and take on Gary Scelzi, all they have to do is fire up the PlayStation 2 and drop in a copy of ValuSoft’s Countdown to the…
A little bit of this and a little bit of that ...
Connie Kalitta's E-Town boomer; Fremont body snatcher caught in phone booth; and much more
Here we are, at just the 330-foot mark of the year, and already it’s been a sad, sad one. Pat Foster, Al Hofmann, John Shoemaker, Lew Arrington, Dick McClung, Jon and James Herbert, John Buttera, Boyd Coddington, and then in the last week, in quick…
Five Fabulous Favorite Fotos: Steve Reyes
The dean of drag racing action photographers shares a handful of his famous and unforgettable photos
Steve Reyes needs little introduction to most longtime drag fans. His is probably one of the best-known names in the business, and there isn’t a single photographer past or present who doesn’t admire and respect his body of…
NHRA's Euro hero: 'No Jive Clive' Skilton
Recounting the NHRA career of English Top Fuel racer Clive Skilton; reactions to the passing of Pat Foster
Some ado was made about European FIA champ Urs Erbacher’s first-round Top Fuel victory in Houston, which, as best as anyone’s records can tell, was the first round-win by a European Top Fuel racer in more than 30 years. A lot of European racers have…
50 years ago in Texas ....
Ed Mabry recalls Don Garlits' conquering of the Texans and Californians in 1958.
The NHRA is in the great state of Texas for the O’Reilly NHRA Spring Nationals, making this an appropriate column to share some tall Texas tales, which I will shortly.
But first off, of course, is the sad news about Patty Foster taking his last…
Memories of Al
Reactions to the passing of Funny Car racer Al Hofmann, including reader memories
Al Hofmann’s unexpected passing last week took a lot of people by surprise because the last we heard of him, as reported by National DRAGSTER’s John Jodauga in one of his popular Where Are They Now? columns, he had retired…
From the mailbag ...
Steve Swaja talks about the creation of Tony Nancy's Wedge dragsters; Don Roberts on the front- to rear-engined Top Fuel transformation
One of the (many) great things about writing a regular column such as this is that it sometimes becomes self-sustaining. Things you write are responded to by our always enthusiastic and knowledgeable community and become items unto themselves. I’ve…
Five Fabulous Favorite Fotos (From Fischbeck)
Longtime drag racing photographer Mike Fuschbeck shares his favorite images
The Internet constantly evolves. I remember when I thought that upgrading from a 14.4K modem to 28K was like going from riding a wagon to flying in a spaceship. Back when everyone connected to the Internet through AOL or Prodigy or CompuServe, back…
History lessons relearned
The debut of the Garlitsglide and how it led to the first successful rear-engined dragster
Flying home Monday, the battery in ol’ Lappy went dead in mid-sentence of the sixth paragraph of the event-overall story I was writing for this week’s coverage. No warning, no flashing lights, no dropped cylinder or…