(Photos by Mr. Wanbaugh) Pat Foster was a certifiable bad ass in the drag racing world, although most probably know him as one of the pioneer Funny Car drivers, not the driver of Woody Gilmore’s first rear engine dragster. In fact, this is one of the dragsters that came well before Don Garlit’s famed move to rear engine dragsters. Garlits may have made them work, and made them famous, but he certainly wasn’t the first guy to build or race one.

So when Bud Wanbaugh sent me an email with never before published photos of that Woody Gilmore built, Pat Foster driven, Leland Kolb powered, front engine dragster I knew we needed to tell the story. And what better way that with Pat Foster’s own words? Thanks to WeDidItForLove.com, we’ve got Pat’s accounts of the fateful ride to go along with photos and words from Bud Wanbaugh as well.

You’ll notice that this dragster was a lot different than rear engine cars of today as the engine was much farther back. In fact, so far back as to use a v-drive style unit to connect to the rear axle. And who’s idea were the giant front wheels and tires? Look closely and you’ll notice a few things on this dragster that are much different than the rear engine dragsters we know today.

Here are some excerpts from Bud’s email to me.

Hi Chad,

I’m sending you some photos of the ill fated Woody Gilmore/Pat Foster rear engine dragster. My dad took these photos. Leland Kolb’s engine was in the car and as such his crew ran it. My brother was a member of Kolb’s crew at the time which is why my dad took the pictures. I don’t think very many photos exist of this car.

These photos show the 5^th wheel [wheelie bar] (which turned out to be the main reason for the cars demise) and other interesting design features. There is a Pat Foster memoriam on WDIFL We Did It For Love web site in which Foster gives a detailed story of this car and the crash (my brother was on the starting line when he crashed and said he couldn’t go to the finish line because he was convinced Foster could not have survived the crash).

Here is more of the story from the We Did It For Love website, where Pat Foster himself tells us about this particular ride. (Photos and words courtesy of We Did It For Love.)

“There was no particular reason that Woody and I decided to build a back motored car. It began as lunch talk and grew from there. We decided to do the car with Woody supplying the materials and me donating the labor. We approached John Bateman to use his running gear and one of his 392’s. He agreed, so the work began. We felt to be able to achieve the balance of the better running front motor cars of the era we needed to get the static load on the rear as high as possible so we inverted the rear end, used a small gear drive off the pinion to reverse the rotation, came back through the rear housing to the bell housing. Back of block to centerline of rear ended up about 18 “.

Some how, John and Woody had a falling apart and Leland Kolb ended up the motor supplier. After two outings with the piece, both marred by poor handling, we slowed the steering from the regular 6-1 ratio to 10-1 and headed to the Beach for more testing. The car hooked hard and made a very nice, straight hard run until entering the lights, at which time it picked up the front end violently, got on the fifth wheel just behind the seat, tipped on to left rear and catapulted the car over the right lane guardrail where it struck a light pole. By the way, we started in the left lane.

Garlits called me a week or so later in the hospital and asked my opinion was the accident, as he was thinking of building a similar car after his accident at Long Beach. I told him to put a wing on the front, no fifth wheel and to slow the steering, the rest is history.”

Pat Foster

More to The Story from Foster…

Woody and I built the car and used Leland Kolb’s engine and clutch. We thought it was time to get the driver out of harms way, so did the car as a spec project. This was before Garlits and Swingle did his. Soon after crashing the original car Woody made the changes needed and did another for Duane Ong, that performed well.

The car I crashed had the engine too far to the rear and needed a front. wing. Also prior to the night at Long Beach we had made a couple of attempts at OCIR and Irwindale, where we determined the steering had to be slowed considerably. That handled, we went to the ‘Beach’ convinced we had it figured out. On it’s initial run that day it hauled ass, straight as an arrow to the 1100-1200 ft mark then violently started a blow-over. A single fifth wheel, close to the axle centerline caused it to tip onto the left rear slick and launched it over the opposite guardrail, where it hit a phone pole about eight feet from the ground.

Myself and the front half of the car dropped to the bottom of the pole while the rear half with the engine went through the spectator parking lot and ended up almost at Willow St.

Gar called me in the hospital after two weeks and asked if I had any suggestions for his back motored car he and Swingle had on the jig. I told him to slow the steering and not locate the engine as far to the rear as we had done and to consider a wing on the front.