How old are you and how long have you raced

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A body said:
300 to Acton mt or 340 to Thunder Valley in eastern SD. There was a 1/8th mile track 20 min from our property that didn’t open this year :(

…..and with building costs etc who knows if that’ll happen.
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You have a lot of racing years left in you. You could move anywhere from Michigan/ Ohio South to Ky/ Tenn/ Ala/ NC/ Miss etc and not ever be far from a track.
 
A body said:
Truthfully I’m kind of tired of the effort it takes to get to the track as well as the cost.
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Me too. Even test and tune cost and you get 2 passes. I'm only 40 miles from LVMS.
Still the effort and maybe I'm just lazy anymore.
 
I used to have Bandimere (Morrison, CO) near me, but that track shut down due to growth in the area. It was 35 miles away, so very convenient. There is talk of moving to a new location near the Denver airport, which would be fine with me as it is only 30 miles away. Fingers crossed for a 2025 opening, but I doubt it due to permitting and construction times.
 
I know what it comes down to for me. As the old saying goes if I’d had known I was going to live this long I would have taken better care of myself.
 
Hey A Body, I liked the picture of the Mirada you ran back in the 90's, Here are a few pic's of my Mirada I built and ran in the 90's. You didn't see many of these cars made into race cars.

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67 years young, street raced in the 70s.
Went to a mopar event at an old 1/8 track when I was 64. I made 6 passes that day, I was hooked. I started racing at Wagler Motosports Park. I finished second in points my rookie year. I raced 4 races a month. Now they race 3 in one day, in the middle of the summer. I do test n tune mostly now.
 
A body said:
Started street racing in 87 when I was in the Air Force at Minot ND (huge Mopar country back then). First pass at a track was in 91 at Thunder Valley in SoDak. Picture was from 94 when we went undefeated one weekend. Some trophy class. Sure the time slips were laughable. Funny that short block finally went 9.9 in 2012…. the same year I sold the car after 27 years. Turned 57 last December. Also the last time I raced. Got some chassis issues to sort out on the Duster and I’m not sure what direction we’re going. Truthfully I’m kind of tired of the effort it takes to get to the track as well as the cost.

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What do you figure you ran with the combo back in ND ('87-'89)? Who did you race out there? The Black Falcon? Joren/Jedd Boyce? Corey Flick red Challenger? Bob Fox orange roadrunner? Ed with the blue Corvette? I'm trying to remember all the guys who'd race back then. lol I left in January '90
 
ValiantS said:
What do you figure you ran with the combo back in ND ('87-'89)? Who did you race out there? The Black Falcon? Joren/Jedd Boyce? Corey Flick red Challenger? Bob Fox orange roadrunner? Ed with the blue Corvette? I'm trying to remember all the guys who'd race back then. lol I left in January '90
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I left Dec 90 for my 1 year prison stretch with alcohol privileges…. (Shemya). In the spring of 91 after being released we took the ole Mirada to the track for the first time (minus the 6pak) LD340 and ebrock 750 iirc and ran 13.8 so it’s pretty safe to say I was 14s on the streets up there lol. The memories fade but I mostly remember racing a guy on base with a brown 4dr Malibu with some mild mods. The downtown group I’d tangle with often was “cowboy” driving a sbc brown olds cutlass supreme and an elcamino that a guy that worked at the gas station in Hooterville ran. I’d walk the Malibu and elcamino, but that Olds would kick my azz everywhere. The brothers with the Falcon and the yellow Fairlane as well as Joren were out of my league. There was also Kyle with the silver chevelle who at the time seemed stellar fast. Nothing more cool than Korey’s Chally coming up behind you with those offset carbs sticking through the hood. Another cool ride was Kevin Fetzers blue Demon. Did a few stop light stomps with him…. friends on FB and met up with him in Vegas when he was attending SCSN a few years back…. he still has that Demon. Ken Chase…. interesting story about rolling up to a light on broadway really late at night. Believe he was wheeling that bronze small block Cuda that he purchased from John Lochtowe (John and Joe (rip) we’re pretty good to me). Light turn green and the stomp was on.. and cops. I took a right, he took a left…. believe we both got busted as I seemed to remember him having to face the man at the base. I just remembered being nervous about the whole ordeal but nothing came of it at base and when I went to pay the fine it was like $100 lol. Those Minot days were fun, on a couple occasions I remember being out on Pour Farm road until it started getting light in the east and then we’d all head to Schatz’s for breakfast…. Great times. In the summer of 91 we had a Top Gun kit on the 340…. and I borrowed my dads Suburban and a buddies trailer and we headed to Minot. We off loaded on north hill at John and Joeys shop (Country Automotive Specialists)…. John was actually there getting a modified ready for a race at the fairgrounds that night. Now mind you we just showed up and cruised around. Nothing much was happening so we went it the stock car races. After that we hit broadway…. and our first victim. 80ish Firebird…. met at the by-pass and armed the bottle and never had to hit the switch…. went back to town and ended up at, ahhhhh you know it Sean, the Taco John’s on south broadway. It was well after midnight when cars started pealing off heading south towards pour farm road…… at this point the two guys that travelled with me were beside themselves…it was like real day American Graffiti ****! We got out pass the curves and probably raced for three hours. I met up with the el Camino again and took care of business, and got to race Kyle… squeezed the daylights out of that iron head 340 and took him!! Good times!
 
I am 53 years old and sadly tried to street race my 1956 chevy truck when I was 16. Never took it to the track but it was lucky if it ran 16 in the 1/4. Had a stock 350 with a 3 speed stick. My 11 grade of high school I got this wild ideal and traded it for a 1964 mustang 289 4 speed car. Had it a month then blew up the engine. My friends Dad gave me a 351 Windsor, which was fun trying to get to fit wear the 289 was. Finally got it in and running, just had to mount the radiator and the car was ready to test drive. We'll stoped to eat because mom made home maid pizza. Didn't even get to take one bite, when I looked out the window and saw that the gerage was on fire. Ended up losing everything . Mustang was burnt to a crisp. Maybe that's the reason I dislike ford's so much. Lol anyway went to basic training for the army reserves 2 days after passing the 12th grade. When I got home from AIT I bought a 1965 plymouth valiant off my uncle. It was a 318/ 4 speed car. Man that car was a blast and out ran a bunch of cars it shouldn't have
After that I was hooked on mopars. I even conceived my son in that car.lol latter on I built a mid 10 second 1/4 mile 1965 plymouth Belvedere and a big block 73 dart. Sold them didn't do anything for a few years. Then tried to get back in it, by then Abodys were selling for crazy priced. So I decided to build the dodge dakota I have now. I have more in the heads I think ( trickflow 190CC) than I do in the whole truck. Loll raced it for a year before I fell off a porch 5 years ago and broke a part of the disc in my spine at my L5 . Had sugrey to remove it. Which didn't help much. So really haven't done much racing in the last 3 years. Think I havent raced more than 10 times in the years. I planed on making this year the year to come back racing and it's July the 3rd and haven't made one pass yet. Seems like it's rained every Saturday for the last few months. Lol any way I am going to make some races this year no matter what. Also got tired of going slow so I bought a 650 HP stroked gen3 hemi for the dakota. This engine ran 9.73 at I think 138 in the guys 3100 pound Olds cutless. So it ought to be a lot if fun in the projunk yard dakota. Damn didn't mean to make this post so damn long. Lol
 
Clean F,M,J cars are hard to come by.
Not that they aren't out there, you just don't see many.
 
I'm 62 and my racing was limited to test and tune events and Alamo Dragstrip (Closed) and more recently San Antonio Raceway (Recently closed). Here in central Texas we don't have any more dragstrips to my knowledge, so building a race-only car is pointless. San Antonio Raceway was a great track! Not sure why it ultimately closed, bad management?
 
In SoCal in the 1970's the issues were land value, mostly, and noise. People moved next to a dragstrip knowing it was there and then complained about what you did at the strip, make noise. Go Figure. Just like building housing next to an airport. People want low cost housing but that will always be built on low-cost land, which is near things that make noise or smells like industrial complexes and refineries. Drag Strips are just the low hanging fruit and are first to suffer the slings and arrows of development.
 
A little back story on my Mirada, The car had a 372 inch W-2
engine 11.3 compression, 590 MP solid cam, Victor W-2 intake, 830 Holley, the W-2 heads were ported with the MP templet kit, 1 7/8 Hedman headers.
Transmission was a standard gear 999 Turbo Action and a TA 4400 series 5500 stall converter back to a 8 3/4 with 4.89 gears and 11.5 29.5 slicks
Chasse was ladder bar coilover, 8 point roll bar, and way to much work on the stock transverse torsion bar front suspension to get a quicker rise and 6 inches of upward travel. It would 60' in the 1.50 and run in the 10.8 to 10.9 zone at 124 mph. The car was extremely comfortable driving it on the street.
 
19DART66 said:
A little back story on my Mirada, The car had a 372 inch W-2
engine 11.3 compression, 590 MP solid cam, Victor W-2 intake, 830 Holley, the W-2 heads were ported with the MP templet kit, 1 7/8 Hedman headers.
Transmission was a standard gear 999 Turbo Action and a TA 4400 series 5500 stall converter back to a 8 3/4 with 4.89 gears and 11.5 29.5 slicks
Chasse was ladder bar coilover, 8 point roll bar, and way to much work on the stock transverse torsion bar front suspension to get a quicker rise and 6 inches of upward travel. It would 60' in the 1.50 and run in the 10.8 to 10.9 zone at 124 mph. The car was extremely comfortable driving it on the street.
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Yeah those “X” torsion bars…. if I’d a kept the car I’m sure that set up would have been long gone in favor of rack steering and coil overs. In the 27 years it went from 318,340 4bbl Carter AVS, 340 6pak (only has to trim one support under hood to fit the air cleaner), back to 4bbl with Ebrock 750 and Top Gun nitrous, and it’s grand finale’ was a RB 498 with iron 452 heads and then the tried and true Ultradyne NF 69 cam and some Stage VI heads. Finally broke into the high nines at near sea level. Ladder bar, D60 4.10 gear with big block. As with any J bod the plastic was starting to deteriorate, I’d pretty much gutted it when the “race car” bug bit. Sold it turn key for $7500. It’s there when I got my Duster back from my dad as he retired from racing and my true love has always been small block dusters.
 
A body said:
Yeah those “X” torsion bars…. if I’d a kept the car I’m sure that set up would have been long gone in favor of rack steering and coil overs. In the 27 years it went from 318,340 4bbl Carter AVS, 340 6pak (only has to trim one support under hood to fit the air cleaner), back to 4bbl with Ebrock 750 and Top Gun nitrous, and it’s grand finale’ was a RB 498 with iron 452 heads and then the tried and true Ultradyne NF 69 cam and some Stage VI heads. Finally broke into the high nines at near sea level. Ladder bar, D60 4.10 gear with big block. As with any J bod the plastic was starting to deteriorate, I’d pretty much gutted it when the “race car” bug bit. Sold it turn key for $7500. It’s there when I got my Duster back from my dad as he retired from racing and my true love has always been small block dusters.
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Hey @A body i tried to talk you into keeping that car. Lol
 
@pittsburghracer
@Darter6

I went to PID and Heidelberg as a kid, I couldn’t wait to drive. They were only 5 miles from home. I got my 74 Cuda when I was 19, still have it. By the time I got my license PID had already closed. I used to go to Keystone every chance I got. I always raced Trophy class, Street ET only paid like $25 to win. I even set a track record at Keystone.

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Dfr360cuda said:
@pittsburghracer
@Darter6

I went to PID and Heidelberg as a kid, I couldn’t wait to drive. They were only 5 miles from home. I got my 74 Cuda when I was 19, still have it. By the time I got my license PID had already closed. I used to go to Keystone every chance I got. I always raced Trophy class, Street ET only paid like $25 to win. I even set a track record at Keystone.

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Cool stuff thanks for sharing. Steve Roth mentioned in the picture passed away recently. And Jerry Temple is still racing and still a good friend. I spent quite a bit of time with home at Keystone this past weekend.
 
Dfr360cuda said:
@pittsburghracer
@Darter6

I went to PID and Heidelberg as a kid, I couldn’t wait to drive. They were only 5 miles from home. I got my 74 Cuda when I was 19, still have it. By the time I got my license PID had already closed. I used to go to Keystone every chance I got. I always raced Trophy class, Street ET only paid like $25 to win. I even set a track record at Keystone.

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Very cool article. Like John said a few of them still race, some are dead. Aside from who he mentioned, Paul Vinkler is a great racer/ Mopar guy. He will help anyone if you need it.
 
Cool thread @pittsburghracer thanks! I simply do not have any idea when I started as I grew up in the race shop and at the track, I don’t ever remember racing not being a part of my life? I am mid sixties and chose to stop making passes a couple years back. I did not feel my mind and my hands were keeping up with the input data! So technically I guess I did not burn out I just chose to stop out of safety concerns. I could not warrant continuing, with the potential of hurting the guy in the other lane due to my slowed reflexes. Getting old suks. I am at Carlisle this week and as always I drift towards the race cars and turn a blind eye to the 100 point cars!
 
Sublime one said:
always I drift towards the race cars and turn a blind eye to the 100 point cars!
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Same here. Always been a Hot Rodder.
DFR Thanks for the clipping.I enjoyed reading those times. 11-12 second times were fast cars back then.
 
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