Why would I share the bad times due to ignorance or incomptence on my part Not me, I'm smarter than that, now BTW, I've done them all plus some you haven't heard of ,yet If you race long enough you will break parts, make mistakes and have some bad times If your a good enough racer the good times will outweigh the bad times, if your goals aren't set to high

I have had a ton. The bigget one that sticks out in my mine was a specific weekend. I was racing the cuda. I had a gorgeous gf at the time. one night we were "gettin it" in the trailer. first pass next day my whole one piece front end flew off at the shut down. Mind you this had nothing to do with her I told her where to put her hands but earlier in the year a front engine dragster backed into the nose weakening the structure. apparently body guy never fixed that. but back to my epic weekend of fail. I decided to race it without a front end and scoop so I borrowed a friends 340 air cleaner. make a hit and its fine. well rd 1 im doing my burnout and my starting line controller rotated just enough to catch the air cleaned coming out of the burnout box and hangs it wide open. I use the toe hook and im on the brakes but by this time there was a kid sweeping the starting line in front of me. of course i hit him and he goes up on the front of the car. the only thing stopping him was the air filter stud!!! oh and in the process of hitting him I also took out Mark Lyle which is now the NHRA starter. he tried pushing the kid out of the way and my passenger side tire got him. I like to forget about that weekend except the night before!

Back in the early 80's I was changing the engine one night, thrashing to get it together so I could race the next day. I mounted but forgot to bolt down the grill of my 67' GTX. Made a few passes until it fell off at the starting line. I felt like a total tool and went home.

I'm gonna have to remember all you guys so I can avoid an incident


Never had one of those

Back in the early 90's, I used to run my 69 Charger with a 440 at Carlsbad raceway.
Last time I went with the old engine, it was really running great...launched like always, shifted into second and BOOM!
I was in such shock that I just coasted allllll the way to the end of the track. Got out, and recieved a huge a$$ chewing by the guy on the tow quad.
I was like, WTF dude...then I saw my 1/4 mile trail of Coolant!! Ohhhhhh $hit...my bad. I must have looked really sick, because after he reamed me, he looked at my car, and said "now next time you blow your $hit up, pull over and stop...and I'm sorry about your loss".
I was so stunned, even after he towed me back, and almost everyone in the pits helped to push the car back on the trailer I remember telling my dad the jerk that towed me back just chewed my butt left and right and I was really mad at him for being so inconsiderate because I just lost my prized possession!
Then my Dad told me that the whole time I was in the pits the track was shut down because of my neglegance to pull over and stop.
As I looked around in the pits, I could see lost of glaring eyes looking my way...so we left promptly!
Was really embarrasing for me, and I'm sure for my Dad...love you dad!! Ha ha

First time down the track with my car, forgot to latch the trunk. It comes up fast when you hit the brakes hard.

Then next time at the track, I decide to remove the air cleaner, hoping to go quicker. What I forgot was the gasket under the air cleaner. Burn out sucks the gasket into carb, and jams in the throttle blades. 3500+ rpm idle,shut it down and got pushed out, DUH!

Suprised I stuck with it after those two first outings

Ah, I've posted this before on this forum. I don't drag race, I truck pull a 4x4 truck. I hooked to the sled one night and left the line, thought it was odd the shift light came on, but it was running great. I spun out at the big end with the shift light on. The crowd looked a little puzzled and was told that only the back tires spun.......I forgot to shift it into 4wd.....I was disgusted, I can't remember if I got 2nd or 3rd place. I would have won if I was in 4wd.......

Michael

one time i'm racing my daytona, (stock turbo nothing fast) i'm racing this white mustang, I am spotted a lot.
take off, get going, look around dont see him, look in the mirror and i see a white mustang sitting on the starting line. I lift so i dont break out just in time to see the white mustang in my blind spot zip past me for the win.

I went to Frank Haleys drag school back in the early nintys.

It helped me a ton and I didn't have any embarassing moments at the track...until I wrecked my dragster on national TV during round one on Sun morning at the NHRA nats in June in Columbus Ohio. That sucked.

There are just too many of those Mustangs.... they all look alike.

On my very first pass at L.A.C.R.,I pulled right up to tree and was wondering why they didn`t start back farther so your neck wouldn`t get all cramped up.............. I`m sure some creative things were being said about me in the stands.............

Forgot the hood pins twice, timed out once, fogot about the extra 6 gallons of fuel and tool bag in the trunk once, but the worst was in the final's at Monster Mopar Weekend when my partner opened up the door and said "Whatever you do don't red light" After nailing the tree round after round to get there I cut like a .400 light on a sportsmans tree in the final round....We had words afterwards. lol

I'm embarrased bout every 3rd light, but one time at pacemakers, did a burnout a made a hard stop just before the line then a missing and melted flashlight went sliding up the track about 15ft. I was wondering where that flashlight had gone

When you have raced for 35+ years there are lots of these embarrassing moments so I'll go with my last one that happened this year in the box class. I was on a roll hitting the tree pretty good all night and made it to the final. The other driver asked if I wanted to split the money in the final with an extra 50 dollars going to the winner. I didn't really want to but finally agreed. Rule number one when using a box. REMOVE all numbers from the round before. In the semi's I raced a car 2 seconds slower than me and in the final I had a car 1 second faster. He got one heck of a head start and needless to say took the win. I still made out pretty good but he was standing in the winners circle with the trophy.

My best happened when I was about 19....my car is a 4-speed and I didn't have a rev limiter so I bought a Mallory tach with built in rev limiter (had a knob you twist to set the rpm at which it cuts out the motor)...I installed it and drove it on the street for a few weeks and one day as I'm cruising down the highway I look at the tach and it's reading double what it should be ....after about 1 mile it goes back to reading normal and doesn't act up again....

So, about a month later I decide to take my car to the track and run it for the first time with my fairly new 438" 383....On my first pass I stage, bring the motor up to about 3K, dump the clutch and it goes about 5 feet and the engine starts cutting out and the whole car starts shaking like crazy!!! Rearview mirror is bouncing around....glovebox opens...I look at the tach and it shows 6K but I know the motor isn't that high....I remember that day when it read double and so I reach up and crank the knob all the way to the right to raise the rpm limit so it'll stop cutting out and I finish the run with a mid 13 second pass....

Imagine being WOT with a stick car, clutch pedal out and against the chip at 3,000rpm....I was freaked out!!!!!

When I got home I pulled the tach off the car and threw it in the trash and haven't had a tach in a car ever since....

about 10 years ago, i had just got my 383 barracuda running. took it to the track a few times to tune out the bugs. Finally got my slicks, had been running street tires. Get them mounted and get to the track enter the water box and get in it. Car revs to the moon but does not move. I start playing with my shifter, nothing. I get it in reverse and back out of the box. I take it back to the pits thinking i had destroyed my trans... My friends come over and ask what happened. I told them it just free revved, and i think my trans is messed up.
My buddy said my tires sure were spinning a lot for my tranny to be bad. first time i had a set of slicks in the water, they sure are slippery. LOL, no trans issues just driver issues.

One day (several years ago) I raced my way into the semifinals and was nervous as hell. For some reason I was concerned my water temp was a little high and that I need to cool the engine down just a little. The decision was made to run the electric fan until the burn out was complete. Pulled up to the starting line and lit the 1st bulb, reached over to shut off the fan but shut off the electric fuel pump instead. I learned that day that my car could Launch and pull through 1st gear with just the fuel in the carb.