2020 Racing Reports

Who got out and did some racing this year? Our season was derailed in March by the pandemic, plus my car owner Don and I both were furloughed from our jobs. I decided to retire, and Don eventually found another job. Our local track, Edgewater was being renovated, and our other track, TriState was sold last year and has been totally plowed up as a Christmas tree farm. When National Trails opened up in May, we went up there with my Duster and ran No-box at the Double Dueces. I made 10 passes but never made it out of 2nd round, but it was great to get out of hiding in the house from a questionable media-driven fear. When Edgewater opened up we pulled Don's car out of the trailer where it had been sitting for about 10 months. Last pass in 2019 was a 6.06, first pass this year was a 6.07. We ran at Edge several weekends and I was able to get more comfortable with the delay box, crosstalk, racing 4-second dragsters and so on. I never won anything but made it to 4th and 5th rounds a couple times. Our goal with his car was to get it certified, update all safety equipment, and then offer it up for sale. That mission was accomplished as the car was sold just before the Mopar Southern Nationals at Mountain Parkway. The new owner let me drive it and we had a great time until a severe storm blew up and chased us away. I got the Duster out for a couple more races in Pro at Edge before the season ended. Overall I will say that racing this year was one thing our government allowed us to do, and the tracks had good turnouts of cars and spectators.

Ironically this was a good year racing wise (albeit I had a low threshold for success) After many years in waiting I got the truck out for its first shakedown runs and driver initiation. Didn't set the world on fire or break anything. So it was a success. We should be ready for the 2021 season.

My season, like most everyone else's, got off to a slow start, with a lot of races cancelled. At Bristol, our short season was cut even shorter, to only 6 races.I managed to win one race and finish in the top 5 in points. The race that I won, the final round was the tightest race that I've been in in a long time, with the finish line margin being .0003 sec to my side, (approx. 3/4"). (1/4 mile class, both of us was .030 & broke out by .006).
I only ran at one other track, London, Ky and did well there. No wins, but 4 RU finishes in Modified (no box), including the Mopar show RU. Earned about $2500 for the season, the best season in some time. The Mopar show still stings, that makes 6 runner up finishes at Mopar shows since 2011, with no wins. Maybe, one day, I can win at a Mopar event. Still, I feel very blessed, because I can look through out the pits and see a lot of racers that would LOVE to be where I'm at.
Hopefully, the 2021 season will go better for all of us!

Brian Dunnigan

Snagged a win and 1/4 final At the 1st National Trail N/SS Bash. Ran into a strange scenario where 60 ft would fall off over .10 with no apparent tire spin. Swapped converter, rebuilt the front shocks (Afco doubles) bought new rear shocks (Afco Big Gun), had the carbs completely apart, changed fuel, swapped back the original converter after servicing, moved the ladder bars. Never found the smoking gun. By September ended up having a real good outing at the US 131 NMCA race. Took out the ,#1,2,3, & 4 guys in points and won the event. Its been a pretty good run the last 8 years. Looking forward to 2021. Going to try 4150 style carbs still chasing better consistency.
Doug

I made it a point to go as much as I could, even during lock down. I didnt get any major wins but I went fast and had a blast ! Racing became my drugs and alcohol as my escape. The Daytona went 5.45 at 126 at XRP. Last weekend I took the duster out for tnt at Caprock motorplex It went 9.34 @ 144 mph The DA was 4500'. The quarter mile was a blast. That was the first time the duster has been out since 2018. I'm looking for some where to go after new years. Oh yeah these are both SB cars. Never give up !!

Slow start to the season for us here in UK due to PLandemic, total new combo from mild 440, stock 727 SS/springs to a 589ci street/strip motor with built 727 4200 verter and mono'/caltracs with 10" Hoosier bias, Dana 4.10's and a driver used to 12.5 sec 1/4's. Started off with a getting used to it 11.3's@119 and with some driving practice and chassis tuning to see what the car liked we ended up with a best of 10.3's@130 with 1.43 60's (3800lb car) to date through the mufflers and driving there and home....went a few rounds in brkt wars, broke out a couple of times but all in all quite happy, car went a bit faster than I thought with the known @the line weight and the dyno hp numbers which we were 20hp off prob due to the full exhausts. Hope to be more competitive next year.

Had many many good outings this year. The Chinese flue did not stop our racing here, only the spectators....

The car killed many of my chances at a win this year. Killed another ignition box, killed a starter, and lastly the fuel pump...All of it did come together right over Fathers day weekend and I went a bunch of rounds for the win...

So its rebuild season, and everything is well under way....We are going 5's in the 1/8th mile next year!....I almost made it this year with a 6.002, but that elusive 5s run just never materialized for me...

I did some improvements to the car this year after years of electrical problems I had the whole car totally rewired by HP Motors in Morristown N.J. he is somewhat of an expert on Mopars and has done a lot of the F.A.S.T. cars he did a great job now the car starts easily and charges. We also added a one wire alternator. I upgraded my wheels from Weld Draglites to Weld Magnum 2.0s on the front and Holeshot R3s in the rear. I added a DD throttle controller late in the year so I can stage with out looking at the tach so far it works well. I was forced into retirement in March after almost ten years at the place because of my age and they worried I would get Covid they called it " furloughed " I was one of the top wage earners they felt they could do the three jobs I performed with cheaper help. Which turned out to be a blessing in disguise as I had just started collecting SS and am financially better off not working right now. As far as racing our season was shortened also not starting until May, I injured my knee right before the first points day so i missed it after that I went a few rounds here and there nothing great, I didn`t go to Carlisle this year so I didn't race at the Friday night Mopar race at South Mountain with my pickup as I usually do pretty well. Since I still couldn't drive yet my friend drove my pickup at Island Dragways annual " Mopars at the Patch " and came away with the M3 Win again for the third year in a row. I did a little 11.50 index racing also and didn't do to great but did end up #1 Qualifier out of 53 cars at Atcos annual Halloween race Won some $ for that and got down to 8 cars so I Won a few $ for that also. In early November I made the 2 1/2 hour trip to Cecil County Dragway in Maryland to run 11.50 index at their last Strange Street Car Shootout of the year I lost second round but liked the track after never being there before and I will definitely go back for a few more of their shootouts. I was able to enter my D150 in a few shows and did Win a trophy at one. I am hoping for a better 2021, more racing and better results as well as a return to Chryslers at Carlisle / South Mountain Raceway Mopar race, I already made my hotel reservation

I did a few big bucks races this year. Unfortunately, my luck was horrible. I made some good runs, but the other guy was usually gooder. The Twin 10's at 41 was the low point when the trans broke the front pump while pulling into staging for my 1 time run.

Hoping for better things next year.

I didn't race at all in 2019 and only raced about a month at the end of 2020. I fought some issues, and didn't get a new best but the car gained some weight(added the folding back seat back to the car) and I fought some 60ft problems. Overall I am happy with the performance, ran higher MPH consistently so I am happy it is making more power and I got 25 passes in and the motor didn't skip a beat. I just took it down yesterday to rewire some EFI stuff and then it's time for a cam swap.

I wanted to add some RPM range so I looked into a new cam from Comp and my Dad ended up getting me that for Christmas(Thanks Dad!). It is from Comp's new "low shock" line of lobes and the tech said it will run to whatever RPM my cylinder heads will allow. Should be interesting!

I didn't make a single race this year. My local track was shut down part of the time due to covid and the few street car shoot outs they had were on the weekends I had to work. I did get to T&T a few times to try the new converter out and got a new best et, mph and 60'. The car has went faster than I ever thought it should so I'm pleased with it.

I hope 2021 is a better year for everyone.

Decided that 20 was going to be the year I finally did an ET Finals so I decided to points race at Wild Horse Pass 4hrs away. This afforded me to pick up my dad so we could hang out. I had the bracket mill in place so we were running quite consistently in the 10.8 range. Dismal start but we ran 3 double race weekends and had gotten to 9th place when the Kung flu put a stop to things. We got up to Vegas one time before they closed. Soon the only track open was 7hrs away. The only good this brought was enough downtime to swap SLO KID, our W8 mill, back in the car. Fuel was cheap, and South Dakota didn’t shutdown so race-cation planning was put into place. Now we didn’t really want to travel that far untested, so we found that Famoso 5hrs away was open again (crazy a CA track would open and not AZ or NV). Now we’re talking August here.... the Central Valley can be a nasty hot place, but the event was a dusk till dawn deal. Now I’m not sure if you’ve ever gone out 2nd round and cracked a beer open at 3:30 am.... head hit the pillow at 5am then 6am Sunday where we grabbed 4hrs sleep before the drive home. Car worked ok and we turned some new bests in the 9.2 range. A couple weeks later we hit the road and raced 2-3 days at Oahe Speedway for Memorial Day weekend, but got an early start home due to the R word, which turned into the S word in western Wyo and it took 14 hours to go 416 miles. Quite the adventure as one does not plan for snow, ice and multiple road closures that time of year... especially a desert rat. Our last hoorah was another race in Bakersfield where we refined the art of breaking out in r2 and r4, but did run a nice 9.16 in some 1800ft DA. Our plan was to hit Vegas in December, but alas they went into shutdown again... game over. Car runs, prob going to order a Digital Delay wiring panel and switch kit in the next day or two and hopefully redo the late 90’s job. Watching the schedules to see what’s happening. Will probably pick and choose a few fun races to attend and do the SoDak loop again.

I hadn't made a pass in 18 years and when everything was getting postponed/cancelled, I thought it might be 19 years.

I finally got out for the first time in May.

By the end of the season, I had been out 14 times to 6 different tracks racing my slow, stock Magnum SRT.

I won some money at ChallengerFest and at MoParty and after the last outing my car drove into the garage under its own power,

My wife and I had a lot of fun and are looking forward to next year. Hopefully the car will be a little faster come April.

Dennis

well no wins again this year. got a couple quarters and finally made it to the dave duell classic race. i am thankful that i got to race as much as i did. thanks to ryan goodin/ national trails for putting on the n/ss bash races and my local track kile-kare for staying open so we could race. i hope 2021 will get back normal and i can race more. good luck to everyone in 2021.

2010 to 2016, I had zero disposable income. One outing in 2017, car slowed down.5. Then, I needed 2 knee surgeries within 18 months. I pulled the engine, had new springs and dyno (630 @6800 - 535 @5200). Freshened the 727, found a crack in rear case. Finally found a good core, cleaned deburred and machined all the recipe items. Finally got it finished late September, including a freshened up Lenny converter with new diode, stator and turbine combination. My stuff is scattered in 3 locations. Drug it all to my tiny townhome garage...... then it snowed 7”. No heat, can’t use the engine hoist with the door open. Finally got it finished with a new alternator, crank trigger, 70 and up water pump complete with new aluminum radiator and all new pulleys. Also, new fuel pump, prefilter and fuel lines. Back into the trailer and started. Sounds as good as usual. Next is new front coil overs, revalve the rear coil overs and 4 new trailer tires. 2021 here I come!

I ran a somewhat abbreviated season. A couple of the races I normally run were cancelled and the points series at my track was shortened slightly. Ended up finishing in a decent position and qualified for ETFinals and ROC, but at the last minute the D6 ET Finals were moved to Boise (500+ miles away), and with world finals cancelled I opted to not make the trip.

Plenty of changes for me currently under way on LemonWedge. Looking forward to ‘21.

Like everyone else we got a late start due to the shut down, but did open up thanks to the hard work of our home track .

We did have a good season making it to 5 finals but could not sealing the deal on any of them, it was still one of our best money years. Ended up finishing 4th in our local points and runner up at the bracket finals, was only .008 behind
and cost me a trip to the world finals ugh..

Al

A lot of stuff got canceled this year, but we did get in some good passes and chased e.t. at the end of the season.

I did win the 11.50 index at our local nostalgia race.

The high point was running a 10.01 @ 133 mph the same way I drive it on the street save for a splash of race gas in the tank just to be safe. I usually run 91 octane.

New tires for next season are already on the car and hopefully we can get that 9.xx in 2021.

Some nice early B bodies on here, I really like the 64 Belvidere, and the 63 and 65 Dodges !!! Some of you guys did really well !!! Congrats !!!

I broke stuff. Raced the first divisional of the year and sucked. I ran a couple Q16 races and ended up in a couple finals. I moved to Ohio. The Vette sat all year due to covid and travel restrictions with Canada. That was all

No competition, but even with a late season start at Byron, I was able to get more runs in the the last several years combined. Moved personal best to 11.02.

John

62, 63 and 64's are my absolute favorites !

In 2019 my wife and I cut back on our racing to get some home projects done. Was hoping to get back to a semi normal schedule in 2020, but with the home project taking long than expected and than alot of events being cancelled, only made it out once. Hoping 2021 is a better year.

Made it to the track with the Road Runner 4 times, broke it 4 times. Never made 1st round once. Take the good, with the bad. Still had a ton of fun, and lots of laughs with my racing buddies.

We had a real good season this year.
We started off in Bradenton Florida for the NMCA opener in March. I went .005 red in the final.
Got back home and the shutdowns started. We got back to racing at the start of May.
I won the Points opener at Atlanta Dragway in pro et.
We got back to regular bracket events and back to the NMCA season in June.
I was fortunate to go three or four rounds at least everywhere we went.
In September at the NMCA finals and Dave Duell classic, I was able to win FX class eliminations.
Sunday was the NMCA points final. I went out early, but it helped me in the end. ( you have to drop your worst race. That became my drop race and my points lead stretched out further ) I won the NMCA NSS championship.
I did well enough in the points at Atlanta to go to the bracket finals in Rockingham. I turned it red in round two up there.
We closed out the year with the wally race at Atlanta. I won the wally in Pro et.

That's what it's all about!

A neighbor got his '70 Chevelle together. I took him and the car to the track for the first time. He was very nervous at first but now he's hooked and having a blast.

We had an excellent year we won a West Coast hot rod ultra street. Race And 1 WCN/A..10.5 race

I have nothing to brag about other than getting a new best 60 Ft. time of 1.24 on a not so good day in Yakima, WA.
Nothing bad to complain about either so that means I broke even and will be able to try racing again as soon as the weather allows, hopefully

That is indeed a good season. Congrats!!