Your eyes do not deceive you, you are looking at every bit of a 1980s Funny Car on paddle tires preparing to rip the sled down a pulling course with all of the strength normally used to rip the slicks clean off of the wheels with. In the 1980s funny car exhibition pulls were a big deal for the U.S. Hot Rod Association’s monster truck shows as part of the side entertainment that included tractor and truck pulls and the early stages of the big-tire behemoths crushing cars. This was the kind of fodder a young kid with access to TNN in the evenings stayed up watching. Seeing cars like the Chi-Town Hustler Daytona and the Sultan Thunderbird would hike the nose into the air as thousands of horsepower worth of violence dug two trenches down the pulling surface. Cars on dirt…sue me, I was five, and this was bad-ass. These things looked like Matchbox Hot Rod Racers without the shifter in the back window.

One car in particular to note is the “Magnum Force” Ford Tempo. There’s a great story about the name of that car…he had a fleet of pulling vehicles that all had the “Magnum __” theme to the name. According to the legend, the word “magnum” wasn’t chosen lightly…after an argument, someone’s wife shot someone in the stomach with a .44 Magnum point-blank and the man lived to tell the tale. Not only that, but the man refused to press charges against her. It’s racing from the 1980s…could be true, could be pure marketing BS to spice up the story. Either way, enjoy some classic dirt-flinging floppers!