We spent very little time on I-45 before they shuttled us off on the picturesque little two lane featured in the picture above that Boone shot of the cars following me. I was enjoying the drive when suddenly I went by a big sign that said "Welcome to Cedar Creek DragWay", we were 600 feet past it before it sunk in.
"Dang it Boone, bet that was a cool little 1/8 mile track back on that road!"
"Yeah, but we better keep moving..."
Boone had a Seafood Restruant on his itenerary in Shreveport, and he wasn't about to let me screw it up traipsin' around some little hole in the wall dragstrip.
The tempature guage had me concerned, and as we entered a larger town complete with stop lights it began to climb. That was when I realized I'd apparently turned the fans off at our last gas stop, and left them off, brilliant. The next stop light we were joined by the Orange Chevelle we had ignored on the side of the road the night before. We actually shared a supper stop with these guys on last years Drag Week, cool guys for Chevy racers. This year they had added a junior crew member, apparently 3 isn't a crowd!

We made the first Checkpoint at 66 miles without a hint of trouble and everyone seemed to be in good spirits. The HotRod film crew was on hand to get shots of all the festivities, so we gave them the "All Mopars all the time version"!

All this hustling to make the restruant in time put us in the heart of Tyler Texas, in rush hour traffic, during the hottest part of the day, that was workout for both man and machine!
Checkpoint #2 came in WhiteHouse Texas, just outside Tyler, and we fueled there too. Since we had all filled up at the last stop together, this was our first chance to play another Drag Week Game...called WHO IS GETTING THE BEST MILEAGE! Darryl's Dart took on 9.0 gallons, while the Valiant topped off with 9.3, and the Belvedere, AKA the pack mule needed 10.2!

The suspense is killing me!

And then?

We worked our way through a few more little Texas towns and great scenery, and eventually popped out on I-20 just south of Longview (Mom's birthplace), and started the stretch run to Shreveport. 15 miles up the road, I noticed we were gaining ground on an Orange 70 RoadRunner being closely tailed by a Fuschia and Black 73 or 4 Dodge Colt...not your typical Interstate fodder to be sure. 72 year old George Browning was behind the wheel of the Colt, which up until he purchased it had been an ancient and eclectic race car. George is a Drag Week Veteren having brought a 26 T hardtop Ford with a 5.0, and also a Fox Body Mustang in years past.

Since he was in a Mopar this year, and an old racecar at that, Scott and Kim Abbott (Scott58, Moparts) felt compelled to take him under thier wing and keep tabs on him. Scott's Orange 'Runner, like the restruant of the same color, revels in being "Delightfully tacky, and unrefined", but make no mistake, it carries a thundering stroker, and is deadly reliable...

Click on the attachments of George's Colt and look closely at the hastily drawn up concessions to put it on the street!
Channel Bumpers with LED's, single very small wiper, and in this pic taken on Sunday, you will see a very ancient set of Pro-Tracs that Scott had to talk him into exchanging for a new set of Drag Radials. Scott can correct me but the build date I think he told me was '89 on those tires!
The massive Winters rear-end was freaking awesome with a bolt pattern of like 5 on 12.5!! Looked almost like an old dayton style wheel setup.

As we eased up closer, I thought for sure we would pass them within a couple miles, but they began to pull away again, then come back 5 or 6 miles later, then pull away again.
I asked Scott about it later, and he admitted, "It's hard to keep George up to speed on the big roads, he's more comfortable at 50 or so, and I'm afraid some Semi is going to run over him!"

Pic below is with the new M/T Drag Radials...

We met Scott and Kim last year on Drag Week. Scott jumped out of his RR at our pit area and introduced himself, with "You fellows have some nice Mopars here!" Then 2 minutes later, after looking at plate systems under all 3 hoods came back with , "What's with all the nitrous guys! Geez, all motor, ALL MOTOR!" That's the way with Scott, He's going to tell you exactly what he thinks...with a delivery and demeanor that is in no way confrontational, just a great guy to be around and a true gearhead in every sense of the word.

We ran with them all the way into Shreveport, and then split from them when the prescribed course left I-20, because our restruant stop and Motel was just 10 miles up the road, right off the Interstate. Except for the fact that I-20 is extremely rough in Louisiana it was a very easy, smooth, dramaless trip, we hit Boone's chosen feeding hole with an hour and a half to spare before closing time.

Once inside the restruant, I was feelng the last 100 mile beating in my hips and lower back, so when the waiter asked how we were doing I told him!
"We'll see if we can take of that", he said with a comforting tone. He had our drink order quickly, and then Rachael asked for a Long Island Iced Tea, "You have ID?"
She headed out to get it and I explained to him that this was her 23rd birthday. Eddie was a tall black man, in his early 50's if I had to guess, and he was easily the most engaging, efficient waiter I've ever been around. He seemed to anticipate our needs without being intrusive, and made the meal an absolute delight. We all refused dessert as we loaded up our leftovers, but he brought out an excellent bread pudding, with 5 spoons and set it in front of Rachael, "Compliments of the house, for your Birthday". It was the perfect ending to a perfect meal, a perfect day actually.
Rachael's B-day, being the second weekend of Sept. when the Monster Mopar Weekend was traditionally held...was spent sans Dad quite often in her childhood, I hoped in some small way, this day made up for that.
We drove to the motel, and decided to put Dale and Darryl in the same room, figuring Mr. lets get there 30 minutes before the gates open, and Mr. lets get there 30 minutes before they cut off the back of the lanes, would be a perfect foil against each other! It felt good to actually get in bed before midnight for a change.

The Birthday girl trying to do the exact pose on the sheet at checkpoint #1

George Browning and Mike Sporrong are heroes to me, both are 72 years old (Mike is a couple months older than George) and both are avid Drag Week competitors. I hope I can be that active at that age!

About those old tires...George told me at the hotel Sunday night that another racer (Rick Callahan with the maroon 68 RoadRunner) had checked and the date code was 1978 on the Pro-Tracs. Later Rick told me that George got it wrong, they were actually 1975 date codes! The tires were quite hard from age but didn't actually look too bad. George had made over 10 passes on them on Sunday! They were mounted on "Wide-5" circle track wheels (5 on 10.25" bolt circle). I asked him.."So I suppose you have a spare wheel and tire?"..you can guess the answer and my reaction...I could see rub marks on the fender lip... I was emphatic that we absolutely HAD to replace the tires, so we made a run to Grand Prix in Tulsa, got the tires (a bit smaller to fit without rubbing), and then found a shop to mount them, all Monday morning while the track was down. I'm really glad we replaced them. George did mention that the car drove a lot better with the drag radials. I also asked sarcastically..."couldn't you find a smaller windshield wiper?"...in reference to what looked like a single 4" blade on the drivers cowl, and prayed that we wouldn't run into any rain.

George is an estate attorney, not a mechanic. He stated that he had a mechanic in Virginia check the car completely out and update it before Drag Week. I told him to get a new mechanic!

Scott

George didnt make as many passes as he usually does.Always good to see him.72 years young.Its the people that make the event.Bob Lash(gray hair and pony tail) with the canary yellow Nova in DD is 78.Do not think for a minute that man cant drive.Multu time HPT E.T Finals competitor.In Shreveport he and the nova got in the 11s.At the Hotel in Memphis I congratulated him.Bobs reply " I havent been in the 11s since the 60s" Old guys rule.

So George wasnt running his T this year.... it was
funny back in 2010... I think he made 68 passes that
year... he would hot lap it till time to go... seeing
that Winters rear end reminded me, I have one of
those in the pole barn.... Scott.... you ever gonna
paint that RR.... LOL

It was 68. Made me tired.Think Scott has something "planned" for next year.

The next morning found me checking results on Rachael's laptop, and that was the first time I realized that Tony Sanchez's Javelin was out. We had arrived at the Motorplex so late that I just figured he had ran and already left.
That meant I was now 2nd behind Ray and his Barracuda, "Boone, Ray has a pair of 10.0's, one at 135, one at 131! He's having a hard time keeping that thing out of the nines."
"Yeah, he's got plenty left...how 'bout that mystery Camaro that moved into the class?"
"Only went .64 at Texas, so I have just short of two tenths on him right now."
We went down to a large meeting area, where they had breakfast put out, and filled up, while Rachael found us an alternate route to the track so we wouldn't have to backtrack 10 miles.

George's Colt has a Magnum 318 with a carb on it I believe.

We got trapped behind them on one leg of the trip. I couldn't figure out why we were going so dang slow. They finally pulled over for gas and I realized who we were following.