Speaking of whacking the throttle on a top fueler I saw a women pass out at the old Mickey Thompson Drag City in Fontana after a top fueler driver whack his throttle when he was driving it down the push down road and she as standing by the fence where he whack it about 8 ft away from her face
She was probably in here mid 20s and woke up in a few minutes, I'm pretty sure she didn't stand that close to the fence after that. This was when they had to drive by her to get onto the track to stage
That was back in 1965, I think, long before starters where use to start the motors, they would push start all of them back then.