Despite the fact that it was nearly midnight, the Quality Inn parking lot was full of drag weekers, and most of them appeared to still be up wrenching or bench racing. We had to park on the grass out front, and carry our stuff to the room. Jim Forbes (Squirrel, Bangshift) was leaning on the railing of the landing to the stairs leading to the the second floor, and he hollered down at me as I walked by.
"Hey, I want to run your brother's Truck tomorrow!"
"Sure, that would be fun", I grinned up at him.
Jim is a fellow Arizonan, and he was competing in the Gasser class with Boone. His orange and white 55 Bel Air features a 454 with a 6-71 blower that sees a ton of street miles every year. Boone had him by a hundredth on day one, but he had firmly taken control of 3rd place the last two days, and had a tenth on the Barnyard in three day average. Although this is only the third year for the Gasser class it already has two traditions, tightknit comradery off the track, and competition on the track, grudge races are expected and encouraged with this group!
"Did you hear we lost Mike Cox and the Henry J today?" he continued.
"No, I saw he ran slow at Gateway, what happened?"
"Ate a roller lifter in the BBC, we could have patched it together and kept him going, but he has a warranty on that engine, and didn't want to screw it up before he returned it to the builder."
"That's a bummer, wasn't he leading the class?"
"Yeah, so that moves me up to second, and your brother to third, and we can settle it on the track tomorrow!"
"I'm sure he'll be up for it. Why aren't you in bed already?"
He smiled wryly, "I'm just too jacked up to go to bed after the drive, I have to relax for a while!"

"You've been called out!" I greeted Boone when I made it to the room.
"What do you mean?"
"Just saw Jim on the stairs, and he says he wants to race you in the morning!"
"Did you tell him we're not in the habit of watching the Barnyard work against a two bit piece of junk?"
"Ha...no, you can try all the Two Lane Blacktop lines on him you want once we get to the track. He also said Mike lost a lifter in the Henry J..."
"Yeah, John Gatliff (The Outsider, BangShift) told me that at checkpoint #2, I guess he had been there taking pictures for quite a while".
"We're going to have to spin some wrenches on the old girl, put a tune on her!" Dale added as he pulled the covers up to his ears, "We may have something for that fifty-five!"

I remember taking a shower, and I remember that the alarm clock had 1:15 on it when I sat on the edge of the bed, now it was squawking at me with 7:15 on it. Life on the road was a whole bunch easier twenty years ago, I swear! Once again, we wiped out the continental breakfast, and watched the car show as everyone pulled out and headed for the track. Memphis International Raceway was our host for day 4 in 2012, we had a fun, exciting day at the track then and I expected nothing short of that today, there's some magic in that place, I can't explain it, but I can feel it.

I say it again, I had an absolute blast hanging with you guys, even if it almost cost me a speeding ticket. I was pretty beat too and just sub-conscientiously kept mashing the Charger's gas pedal down as the motel bed was calling me, lol.

Your Dad had some great stories too. We rag-chewed and bench raced for quite a few hours before you got in the car. Good times!

Great story telling! Carry on!

Robert, with Dad and James as passengers, followed Boone and Dale in the Barnyard out to the track. Darren and I made a quick stop at the station for some 91 octane to compliment our nitrous at the track. I sent Rachael in to buy some ice, but most of the guys had beat us to it, so we only managed to get three bags.

The first three days, the one and done, we want to be first in line guys had clogged the lanes early, and made it tough to get a quick hit at the track. Many of those guys in the class cars must've slept in on Thursday, or decided to do some wrenching when they arrived at the track, because a couple of the early birds were actually hot lapping in the first 30 or 40 minutes the track was open. The biggest offender was Ray and his "Black Pearl Barracuda", he was really working the G3 hemi over going 10.65,10.62 and 10.62 in the first 25 minutes of track time. I swear he must've had his own staging lane!

Last year, by necessity, we ended up pitted towards the far end of the pit, past the grandstands, but it made it really nice, because you could simply walk over to the fence to watch the cars go down the track, so the guys naturally headed for that area again. We actually scored a nice spot between a couple of motorhomes, right next to the fence, so we were literally 10 steps away from view of the entire track, and we could see the scoreboards from our pit at any time!
Darryl and Tony wasted no time getting their single passes in within the first twenty or so minutes posting an 11.25-119.25, and a 10.88-124.46 respectively.

The heat was already coming on, as we concentrated on getting the Barnyard Viper ready for her Gasser grudge race. Jim came by to check on us and make sure we were prepared to follow through, "I was ready about 5 minutes after I drove through the gate, but I understand that with a Dodge, there's a little more maintenance involved!"
He had a big smile on his face, and I decided to take the high road, "You wouldn't want anything less than our best effort would you?"
"No, I'm just kiddin'. Have Boone wave at me when he heads to the lanes, and I'll just follow him up".

Finally, Boone was ready to head up to the lanes and I left him with one instruction, "We need the tree!" He nodded in affirmation. Robert had mounted his Go Pro camera on board, and showed Boone about 3 times how to turn it on, but I wasn't holding out hope that he would get it!
Jim would tell us later that he was interviewing with Hot Rod Magazine's Elana Scherr when Boone drove by, and he told her he had to go because he had a grudge race with the gasser pick-up. He said she immediatey started texting someone, and when the two of them rolled into the lanes, they were practically ushered to the burnout box.

Boone fogged the tree with road soot out of the pipes, but he also put two hundredths in the bank as well...this was going to be fun!

Boone had to work the wheel a little to correct for torque steer, but the Barnyard's ET Street's were stuck to the groove and she was showing the fiver her tailgate at the 1/8th mile. Then that aluminum lung started making up for the cubes, and Jim started reeling back the lost ground as they charged on towards the stripe!

We were jumping around like the Glidden boys in our pit when Boone's win light lit up on top of his score board. The Barnyard's 11.409-116.05 was a little short of the Bel Air's 11.405-120.01, but the advantage at the tree swung the results in our favor. After two weeks of thrashing around on this stuff, and wearing ourselves out on the road, this was starting to get fun!

Jim was gracious in defeat, and stopped by to compare slips with Boone after the race.

Dale and I discussed our strategy for putting the Satellite back into Daily Driver quick 32 contention. We were currently at a 12.35 average, and the bump was around 11.95, so essentially we needed to get as close to 11.50 as possible, to pull the average down that much. I had iced the top of the motor down, for quite a while and sent him to the lanes shortly after Boone's run. He pulled into the water box, barely smoked the drag radials, and quickly staged up. He grabbed the bottle right at the hit, and the ole girl rolled over on the springs, but remained hooked up, laying down a 1.625 in 60'. Short shifting to second kept the power rolling on with a 4.618 330', but it popped back hard at the top of second and he had to lift for a tick to get third gear. He recovered quickly and streaked for the finish line clearly under full power, apparently the ice had kept our fuel supply intact all the way down....11.495-117.66 DANG IT!! That's the WRONG side of 11.50!!

In a clear case of whatever you can do, I can do better, Darren pulled the Charger to the line two minutes later and laid down an equally useless 11.451-120.23!

As expected, Boone had failed to turn on Robert's Go Pro, and decided to make another pass with it. They agreed to just leave it on all the way from the pits, and Dale decided that a match against the Truck was just what he needed to get the Satellite on the plus side of 11.50.
The Satellite gave the Barnyard a run for it's money, just four hundredths back at the 330', but this time he floated the valves so hard at the top of second that he had the breather in flames with the ensuing nitrous backfire. He coasted to a 13.06-82.47, while the Barnyard Viper went 11.426-114.91.

Robert's Go Pro in Barnyard

Darren was complaining that the 440 was making some noise in the Charger, so we pulled the valve covers for a look, and ended up tightening up a couple of rockers.
"I need another 11.50 car to run with, so I can pace myself", Dale lamented.
"Well, you got one right here!" I exclaimed.
"What do you mean?" he looked up from the Charger's fender.
"You two need to run each other, and hopefully we can end up with a couple of 11.50's or 60's".

They rolled into the water box at 11:30 am and cleaned off the tires. Dale strapped 5 hundredths on Darren at the tree, and the Satellite put another 13 hundredths on the Charger in the first 60ft. At the 1/8th mile the Satellite had 33 feet on the Charger, and as they came by our vantage point, I saw Dale hang his right arm over the seat and motion to Darren to come get him!
"Dang it Dale, you're on a killer pass, back into him", I exhorted, knowing full well this was more about showing Darren up than it was about getting us the number we needed.
Just past the 1000' I saw the nose drop on the Charger as Darren gave up the chase, the Satellite leveled out shortly after that, but he was still more than a two cars ahead. Then, thirty feet from the finish line, Dale decided to give it a victory romp and laid back into the Satellite, lighting the board with another wasted 11.499-105.72 to Darren's 11.76-108.60! I threw my hat on the ground in disgust and let loose a few curse words, "I have no idea how many mid 11 second passes that poor car has in it, and that idiot is determined to break it before we get this thing done!"
Dad was laughing at me, "Get out there and do it yourself, you're the one that put him behind the wheel!"

Damn you have a great memory

Bad340fish,
Hopefully the Valiant will be ready next year, and I can move it back to the top of your list.

Just-a-dart,
Darryl's sanity is something I question on a regular basis, but he never questions mine... he already knows the answer.

1967DartGt,
Boone keeps reminding of when I've finished the story in years past and prodding me to get moving on it. Hopefully everyone hasn't given up on it yet...

J Body,
Still trying to decide if I want to tackle the small block assembly myself, or farm it out.

tsanchez,
My memory is like a bunch of zip folders, lying there dormant. I use the pictures, route instructions, time slips, reviewing the live feed and such as an outline, and to help open each folder, and put me back into that moment. Once I start reliving that moment in time, it's really photographic memory, and I can pull huge chunks of time out of it, but sometimes it's more about what I was feeling at that time or how it was affecting me more than just straight facts. One thing, it's terribly time consuming and any kind of interruptions drive me crazy! Like my cars, I enjoy the finished product more than the process!

As far as Drag Week dreams, mine usually center around breaking down somewhere like US-30 through south Chicago, or some back road in Arkansas and hearing Dueling Banjos fire up!

6pak2go,
Enjoyed sharing the experience with you, and so glad you were there to bail us out!

cudadon,
Not aluminum heads, aluminum lung, as in 6-71 roots blower on the 55. The Barnyard Viper really has to do it's work in the first 1/8th because after the that it has the frontal area of a 4x8 sheet of plywood, and steers like a boat so it's never going to be a big Mph vehicle!

Ksj,
Who did all the dragstrip driving in the Challenger, you or your brother?

Great stories! I said it before and I`ll say it again " Man that truck is cool " a guy that lives a few blocks away from me is big into drag week and has been to a few with his gold/bronze Grand Prix i know he went this year but don`t know how he did as i haven`t seen him in awhile, after all its not a Mopar so I not really that interested

Mostly him.I had one pass the 1st day and made a pass at Indy.I owed Indy since that is where Jeff McConnell and I were 10 minutes late in 2010 and were Dq'd. Next year my brother wont be going as its his 40th Wedding anniversary.Plus he needs more seat time. LOL.Next year hopefully I will bring my 69 Dart.

When they pulled back in and parked, I took the time slip, and then immediately grilled Dale about why he jumped back in it before the stripe, and he flatly denied doing any such thing!
"Darren, why'd you get off the gas so early?" I questioned.
"The 440 is still not happy, that sound got a little worse this pass, so I was trying not to kill it!"

I took the 11.495 and 11.499 slips and showed them to Scott Abbott (Scott58, Moparts) figuring as often as his Road Runner goes under 11.50 without a bar, he might have a plan.
"I'd try to turn one in", He shrugged, "The rule is, we are teched to 11.49 and slower, and those are slower than 11.49, at least you can try."
I decided it was worth a walk, as I approached the tower I saw Keith Turk in a conversation with Monte Smith, and Monte was hammering him on the nuances of some of the Drag Week rules. Keith actually looked relieved for the interruption, but that didn't prevent him from shooting me down, "Nope 11.50 with a zero or slower!"
"It's 11.499! Can't we round up!"
"Always pushing the grey areas aren't you?" He looked at Monte, "Another Mopar guy!"
"Trust me", Monte sighed and shook his head, "I know."

I went back to our pit, and Lane Sporrong, who drives the Baja Chase Truck with it's Duttweiler supercharged LS motor, was hanging out, talking to the brothers. When the conversation came around to what we were going to do with the Satellite, Dale turned to Lane, "What have you guys been running today?"
"11.60s and 70's."
"Would you mind running us, so I can pace this thing to a good number?"
"No problem, I'd love to!" Lane smiled, along with his Dad Michael, they are the energizer bunnies of Drag Week, always helping people out, always working on something, and they LOVE putting laps down the track on their truck.

Dale got through 1st and 2nd clean, and had a lead on the truck, then he let Lane drive around him on the top end. We had an 11.63-114.76 for our troubles!
When Dale got back, I again jumped him, "Why the heck did you give up the stripe?"
"You said to make sure I didn't go under 11.50!"
"I didn't say anything about letting the chevy win!!"

Thats him, I`ll call him that the next time I see him. he came to Raceway Park a few times earlier this year to run a class called " Top Street " and he does a lot of test and tuning. He said he really does`t like bracket racing and prefers Drag week and heads up racing.