Thanks for the kind words and support guys..I know this is moving slower than a plot in a soap opera, but stick with me!

When we had turned onto 136, there had been a 4th Gen Firebird, and a Fox Body Stang in front of us, but they had dissapeared down the road pretty quickly. I was figuring we'd hit Amarillo about 1AM, so now I was certain we were the caboose in this deal. The rain started to let up, as well as the wind, but 136 lived up to it's billing, I was slowing to 25 around most of the turns.
We drove through 3 small towns in Texas, in one of those we saw the infamous Green Nova...you know the one, with the beater look, and the poverty caps, and Faux whitewall tires, that runs really quick. He was under it, with the back on jack stands, working on something. I saw a local in a rat rod 50's chevy p/u there helping him, and embarrassingly we drove on through. This is the one and only time in 2 Dragweeks, I haven't pulled over unless I was given a thumbs up to go on...not proud, just tired.
We got to the final checkpoint a little before midnight, a large cowsign in Panhandle TX. A car was in the parking lot, running, with it's light shining on the cow, so we could find it, and take our pictures...at midnight, bizarre..I have no idea if it was an organizer, or a local, or what. The next 40 miles went by pretty quick, I was prodding the old girl along pretty good, for the short while we spent on I-40 to the motel, I let her stretch out a bit, passing Semi's (with approving thumbs up, light flashes, and horn blasts) at 3500rpm. The 2 b-bodies behind me with thier 2.76 gears were not duly impressed. We parked at the end of the motel parking lot, in front of us was a large field with abandoned old barns flanking a small dirt path. We decided against that arrangement, and found 3 separate parking spots in between other patrons Suv's and trucks... Probably not a problem, but a little camoflauge would help me sleep easier. Yeah right, My head hit the pillow at 1:30 AM, and the alarm went off at 6:00AM, those 2 events felt like they occurred simultaneously.

Amarillo; small Texas track, big fun!
Finally, we seemed to be getting our sea legs...we got our bags to the cars, and into the continental b-fast in record time, the best spread so far, so we were loading up. I saw a guy at the next table, by himself, with a Drag Week shirt on so I started a conversation.
"Are we having fun yet"?
"Yeah, I guess", he looked really wore out. "Long night last night".
"Yeah, we didn't get in 'til 1"
"Later than that for us...broke a brake line out on 136, lucky you don't need brakes out in the middle of nowhere. We nursed it into a little town, then some local in a rat rod came to our rescue...took us to his place and welded up the fitting to make a cap so we could cap off the back brakes.
With a pang of guilt, I realized this was the guy in the green Nova. "Bummer!, glad you could make it in".
"This was supposed to be the time of my life", he reflected, "This is a tough event".

Plan the work, work the plan. Boone headed off to Wal-Mart to grab a few things, the rest of us were headed to the track. We had drove 134 miles on our last leg, I was sitting at a light 2 miles from the motel when the big Volumax fuel pump started changing it's tune. "We're running out of gas"!
"Over there", Darren pointed
We cut across 2 lanes, and pulled into a gas station, Dale pulled alongside. I put in 1.5 gallons, knowing I was going to race gas when we got to the track.
"I need some 91 to race on", Dale commented. He had been fueling with Boone on his card, so I was on the hook this time, Dale doesn't believe in credit cards, or saving money; it's a religious conviction, or something like that.
"Just put in 5 gallons", I implored. "You'll be going back to 87 when we leave the track.
We headed off to the track, with Darren navigating, since he had asked directions to get us back on course. 6 miles later I gave him a concerned look, "How much further"?
"The clerk said it's 15 miles to the track"
"And you chose to tell me this after I only get a gallon and half of fuel"?
"Haha, drive easy big brother, drive easy"!
We fell into the convoy about 2 miles later...this was cool, we were actually arriving at a track when everyone else was! The entry was a small gravel road, we stopped at the back of a single line of about 15 cars on the right side. Apparently at Amarillo Dragway, both lanes lead in at the beginning of the event, about 15 more cars drove by us and formed a line on the left side...Oh well, it's Wednesday morning, and I'm driving into a drag strip I've never been to before...no complaints!!