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Barnstormin’: The Big Gone – Lots Of Words, Lots of Fun, and Lots of Hours At The 60th US Nationals


Barnstormin’: The Big Gone – Lots Of Words, Lots of Fun, and Lots of Hours At The 60th US Nationals

I literally walked into my house about 15 minutes before sitting down to write this Barnstormin’ column and I am still expecting to see an NHRA Division Director tap me on the shoulder and have me call the next round of stock eliminator to the lanes. That was the routine at the US Nationals where I was screaming and yelling about drag racing from Wednesday of last week until yesterday. I do have an admission to make before we get too dar into this, though. I fell into a hole as a drag racing fan, writer, etc and over the years have griped that the US Nationals is “just another race on the tour” and that is completely and utterly false. I’m not kidding. This thing is unlike any other national event for a multitude of actual tangible reasons, not just the esoteric stuff. For starters, the fields are massive and they still fit the original idea of the nationals because competitors flood in from everywhere.  Think of it this way. If you race an alcohol funny car in NHRA division one, you typically see the same guys at each race. When you run funny car at the nationals and there are like 30 of them from California, Canada, the south, and all points across the nation, you get the sense that this race is a real monster and winning it does carry some huge weight. That idea or consideration is largely lost on the pro categories because they all race together anyway but I can tell you that there were plenty of actual tears shed by professional drivers when talking about the place or actually succeeding there. So the US Nationals should be placed on whatever list of have of “stuff to do” because it is THAT good.

Being that this was the 60th anniversary race, NHRA pulled out all the stops and had a pretty incredible array of old timers, old cars, and historical events set up for people to check out. There were panel discussions with the likes of Kenny Bernstein, Shirley Muldowney, Snake, Garlits and host of others, daily Cacklefests, daily showing of drag racing films, tons of historic cars on display, and a general feeling of awe when walking around and seeing all of the people who built the sport reveling in the history that they created. Over the course of the six days at the nationals a few big moments jump out for me and will hang in my brain forever. Having my first go at announcing there happen on this anniversary event is really special personally because you all know how big a dork I am for this stuff.

So, in no particular order here’s my personal highlight list from the 2014 60th annual Chevrolet Performance US Nationals –

  • The early days of the event are filled with qualifying and practice runs along with class eliminations in Stock and Super Stock and calling a 200 car (roughly) stock eliminator session is something I had never done before and I loved it. The cool stuff just kept coming and coming. The number one qualifier in stock was a V/S Chevy pickup that had a six cylinder engine and a stick shift. It was a weirdo combo that no one had done much with and the driver was able to put it some 2 seconds under the index. Amazingly, that guy was the number one qualifier at the 40th, 50th, and 60th versions of the race! He did this on purpose, obviously.
  • The Mopar Hemi Challenge is one of the great specialty events and it has a history nearing 15 years now. This is the event where the best SS/AH 1968 Barracudas and Darts get together and slug it out heads-up. When I was tapped for that one, my little heart was fluttering. I had prepared during the week leading up to the event so I had some good stuff cued up. I was also informed that I’d be working with Mr. Herb McCandless the legendary super stock and pro stock racer of the 1960s and 1970s. Herb is a great dude and I soon learned that he was a fantastic story teller.
  • The Hemi Challenge begins with a parade of all the competitors driving up the return road past the stands so all the cars can be seen. When I announced that they were coming, the pageantry and coolness of the whole thing actually hit me pretty hard and it was all I could do to keep myself from being physically emotional. It hit me at that moment where I was and what I was doing.
  • Intermittent rain was present all week but we trooped through and got the event done on Monday as scheduled. On Friday the weather came in right before round one of the Hemi Challenge which gave us a ton of time to fill. Herb McCandless grabbed the microphone and for an hour answered all the questions I peppered him with and told some incredible stories of the early days of pro stock. I got a lot of positive feedback on that from people whom I respect very much and that was flipping awesome all the way around.
  • Because of the intermittent days, we had some long ones. Namely Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Those three days were 17-18 hours in length but they had to be because of the downtime we lost while the Safety Safari dried the track, etc.
  • Shaking hands with Bob Glidden on the starting line of the drag strip NHRA literally named after him was all time.
  • Interviewing Don Garlits after the Monday Cacklefest only to find out that the Swamp Rat 11 he was in was an unrestored original car that he used to win the race in 1967 and it also had the original block, crank, and pistons in it made me love that guy even more.
  • Horsing around in the tower was taken to new levels at this race between race control officials and the announcers. We created a scoring system to tally errors and mistakes we each made. For every mistake that those guys made, we got a point, and for one we made they got one. Announcers came out +1 (or 2?) at the end of the event….just like we knew we would. Understand that the people running the race are working in a high pressure, fast paced environment so there has to be some way to blow off a little steam behind the scenes. Having announced dozens of “big” events now, I have an incredible respect for the staff that ran the US Nationals because it really was done in an amazingly creative and tight way when we did have issues.
  • The announcement and unveiling of the new Drag Pack Challenger, especially the supercharged engine option was awesome. Would have liked a factory Hellcat engine to lead off with but the Whipple blown, Apache headed monster that the cars are getting will be big time fun to watch and hear.
  • I could go on for days and frankly a follow up Barnstormin’ will be needed.

HERE’S A FEW QUICK PHOTO HIGHLIGHTS –

tractors

I got to the track at about 6:15 each morning because I am mentally ill and because one of the older announcers that I first worked with taught me that it was the right way to be.

wally

This is how a Wally is born.

Picture 8

Hemi Challenge cars. I snuck down after the parade to see how many stick cars there were and how many automatics, etc. One of my favorite parts of the weekend.

race schedule

Here’s what Monday’s race schedule looked like. Note that we started with Alky cars at 8:00. There were teams with blown dragsters up on the chip before 7am. It was cool to be at the track that early to see and hear all of that before sunrise.

promod

This was one of the coolest races of the whole weekend. Billy Glidden, who made his first five second pro mod pass the day before and managed to hang on to the 16 qualifying spot. Glidden had Don Walsh in a new turbo Camaro during first round and managed to win on a hole shot with a margin at the strip of 88-ten thousandths of a second. The crowd went wild and I got to interview Billy on the top end. He was as happy as I have ever seen him.

 


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20 thoughts on “Barnstormin’: The Big Gone – Lots Of Words, Lots of Fun, and Lots of Hours At The 60th US Nationals

  1. 38P

    Hemi, Hemi, Hemi . . . Yeah that great . . . but you left out the part where the Cobra Jets closed out Super Stock and snagged a boat-load of class wins.

    And what brand of car was Billy Glidden wheeling?

    1. Brian Lohnes Post author

      I didn’t write a race report. I wrote the stuff that I’ll remember when I am hopefully part of the 100th one. I pretty much figured anyone that knew who Billy Glidden was would know he’s driving the same car he’s been in for years.

        1. 38P

          Yeah, so what? Bruab made a big deal out of identifying Walsh’s car (which is also id’d in the photo) and all the Hemi stuff . . .

          But he didn’t say anything about the Cobra Jets winning their third Factory Stock Showdown in a row . . . or the Cobra Jet Super Stock finals close-out, or Paul Candies’ quickest Super Stock pass in history, lapping his SS/AAA 2010 Cobra Jet to a scorching 7.859/170.02 . . . Isn’t all that stuff memorable, too?

          Sure, it’s not a “race report’ . . . but it’s almost as if U.S. Nationals’ title sponsor Chevrolet edited out mentions of their top rival nameplate . . . .

          1. Brian Lohnes Post author

            Dang, I did forget some stuff.

            Bruno Massel notching the first national event win for a COPO!

            The first national event win for the fifth generation Camaro funny car body!

            Talking to Jim Luikens who was one of the best Chevrolet parts men of the 1960s while working at Berger Chevrolet.

            Yukking it up with the guys from The Block Chevrolet Performance blog.

            Getting the Chevrolet tattoo on my face.

            And lastly but not leastly dilligently preparing to tell the world how into the Bowtie you are on the DW live stream next week. Yay!

          2. RockJustRock

            Heh, so Brian’s memory has an anti-Ford bias because he found the wrong things memorable? How IS life on Planet Speedy today anyway?

          3. 38P

            Be sure to mention my “Camaro” is powered by a BBC . . . or better yet . . A LESS!

            See ‘ya next week! 🙂

  2. Cletus T Rickenbacher 3rd

    The Big Go has been on my bucket list for near 40 years. I would be spectator only as neither of my cars fit an NHRA class, bracket racers only.

  3. Piston Pete

    Great job Brian. I was there all day Thursday as you called the SS and S elims and on Friday when you and Mr. 4-Speed did a fantastic job with the Hemi Challenge. It was also me (the big, hairy, white bearded biker) who yelled “BangShift rules” at you yesterday from the starting line fence. You should be proud, young man, you’re on your way to join the list of great announcers. Thank you for what you do. Remember, always be yourself . . . unless you can be Batman. Told you I was there Friday night.

    1. Brian Lohnes Post author

      Pete, thanks! Sorry I couldn’t chat at that point, there were about 40 guys in my ear trying to figure out what was coming next. Hope you had a good time. I think it was a heck of a race…it sure was from where I was sitting.

      Spending that time with Herb McCandless was awesome!

  4. jerry z

    Hope you’ll share some of Herb’s stories Brian!

    Even though I’m a tried and true Bowtie fan, one of my favorite Pro Stock teams is Sox and Martin!

  5. ch3no2junkie

    Im so happy that you got that job Brian! Even though we’ve never met, I feel like I have a friend on “the inside”. Keep up the good work!

  6. Jim

    The one thing that troubles me is all the pictures and video bits I have seen of all the door slammer racing, no one appears to be in the stands at all. They appear empty. What’s worse, all the door slammer racing is never seen on any tv programing that I know of. I could care less about the Super categories which I would like to see eliminated completely, but all the racing other than the big 4 pro categories never are seen for the most part, ever.

    1. Brian Lohnes Post author

      Jim, the Pro Mod television show starts in October on the Velocity channel. At the races I am at where the pro mods run, I am doing the interviews at the top end for the show. It should be awesome.

      1. Jim

        Thanks for responding but I kind of was referring to stock, super stock, Hemi challenge, the big 3 featuring the new COPO, competition eliminator. The pro mods a great but more like a funny car these days than anything else. Your in the tower from time to time these days and maybe you could simply ask those pulling the strings why no air time is ever given to these classes, ever. No one will ever gain interest in them if they never see them. Now that the big 3 are spending more time and money in that direction it seems strange that they are all still treated like they are all a waste of time to them. Thanks.

  7. Mike Gates

    Been to Indy 27X…!st time was 1972..spent 5 days camped out at the drive in across the street…Had to miss this year due to work injury..was very hard to watch on Espn3..just cant express the feeling of Indy ..something you have to experience…what makes it worse is I only live 30min away…..See Ya next year Indy…

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