I was riding shotgun with my buddy in his 52 ford PU,
we loaded up in my trailer on Sunday(Oct 5th) and headed
out for National Trails... on the way I seen that I
had a low trailer tire at a fuel stop, I checked the
tires before leaving home... come to find out I had
a bad valve stem so they changed it... no biggy...
we stayed in the trailer the first night out front
of the host hotel... made it to the track the next
morning and unloaded... the truck was running fine
with passes in the 11.60 range... we made 1 pass on
the first day to turn in a time slip, got the directions
and headed out to O'Rilley raceway in Indy... all went
well on the drive... we made 2 passes at the track
the next day, we even went on the oval track(I dont
think we were suppose too) but I did a few photos
of the truck, turned in the time slip and headed for
Milan(MI)... the drive was fine... made it to the
track the next morning...the track was green from a
overnight rain.... so Dale(owner of the truck) ended
up making 5 passes to get a pass that fell in line
with what we needed for our average... when we left
the track we knew a rain storm was chasing us....
well near Toledo it caught up with us.... you want to
talk about a rain storm.... we were running a total
speed of 15 mph on the E-way... thank God so was
everyone else(I was concerned about getting ass ended)...
also we DIDNT HAVE WIPER OR DEFROSTERS... I was wiping
the inside of the windshield with a towel to defrost...
well we finally we got through the bulk of that storm....
we stopped to rap our clothes bags in a tarp(a little
late... they were soaked.... anyways we had to go
through a little town called Wooster and when we
got there the storm was no longer a rain storm but
they had a tornado besides the pounding rain and some
guys had hail coming down.... we were running in water
6" deep on their main street.... we came up on a
traffic back up and seen that we needed to go under
a railroad over pass... as we get near where we can
see, we see a car FLOATING down in there with just
semi trucks able to make it through... needless to
say we had to detour... we finally get back on the
way and we were coming to a exit... all of a sudden
on the decell we hear what sounds like a valve train
issue... LOUD clatter, make to the top of the ramp
and shut it down... with a quick check I see its
on the drivers side and pull the valve cover to discover
we broke the top(swaged down area)off the push rod
needless to say we got on the phone looking for a PR
without any luck ... a couple other cars stopped to
help...when low and behold one of the BB chevy guys
makes the exit and slows down to see if we need help,
we ask if he has any PRs and he says he's running
a BB chevy but didnt realize that they are the same
as ford... we needed a 8.750 length and he had 8.800...
he gave us 2 so in a total time of 45 minutes from
stopping to taking off we were back in the game(thanks
to the guys in the chevy which I dont remember their
name)... plus the funny part was.. he pulled a bag
of PRs from behind his seat... we FINALLY made it
to the hotel at 12.30 at night... from there on in
everything went smoothly ... Dale made the 32 car
field for daily driver in the 8th spot and went 3
rounds to finally red light... he also won quickest
street rod for the second year in a row.......
it was a LONG week and I'm GLAD to be home... great
time and some real nice people.. meet a couple of
guys from the board here plus a couple members stopped
in at a few tracks to check out the fun.... Doug
my driver and his dad stopped in at Milan to say hi
Thats all for now... my fingers are worn out from
all this typing

Man you guys get credit, for the win and the endurence.

Raff...That sure must be a test of endurance...Cool story!!

Man, what an experience, Mike! Cool, that things worked out for you, tho. Hope you had some fun anyway.

This was the second year for me and my buddy in his
ford PU.... I am putting my Rampage in my shop today
to start the build to see if I can make it for next year...
I'll tube chassis the car and have the stock interior
with one of my small blocks up front... I'm not sure
weather I'll put my 8-71 blower on it or run N/A... I
sorta like the blower on it for the looks... either way
I'll only be allowed to run 10.0 due to license issues

So how much do you figure it cost you for the whole week?I would love to do this but i dont think i could afford it.The only plus for me would be gas mileage,I have a buick grand national that i would take.Also i dont think they had a 6 cylinder power adder class.

Sounds like you had a great time, Mr. P! That's a pretty cool old truck that your buddy has, it's a real sleeper.

After Missing Drag Week for the first time since 'o5, this was kinda tuff. I didn't think it would be a big deal, but sitting at work checking for updates on the computer, I was wishing I was there.

I'm thinking I'll be in next year, either ridng with Jay or maybe get something of my own ready to go.

Bye for now, Joel

I bought my green truck and thought it would make a good vehicle for that event. Who know's, maybe I could find the time and money to go one of these years. I have to be envious of you guys, although I am not one for changing transmissions on the side of the road in a hurry.

That was a cool truck and it ran as good as it looked It was 60ft'n better than our big pig!!

sounds like it was a good time.

any good story's to share with us.

Bondo

Sounds like a good time Raff....

Rickster