The 1984 NHRA US Nationals was an event that marked some interesting career starts and one very interesting career re-start. For the starters there was a young guy named Jim Head who showed up and won the funny car class with an unsponsored flopper. It was the guy’s first win and it launched a career that carries on until today where he’s still a forward thinking and aggressive crew chief with driver Blake Alexander piloting his car. The career re-start? That involved the greatest drag racer of all time, Don Garlits.
By the time 1984 rolled around, Garlits had been largely absent from the sport he had helped to build for a few years. Citing financial reasons and other concerns, he had not really been interested in attacking the tour. Plus, by the standards of the day he was an old man. At 52-years old Don Garlits was the oldest guy to ever reach a top fuel final. His road to Indy was an interesting one. Longtime friend as well as an occasional racing partner Art Malone had been poking at Gar to get back after it and teach these kids a lesson. When Garlits finally told Malone he would do it if the bills were paid, Malone called his bluff and asked how much it would take.
Pulling the most recent top fuel chassis he had out of his museum and updating it with the mechanical technology of the day in a mad thrash, Garlits and Malone rolled through the gates of what was then Indianapolis Raceway Park unannounced.
They were a curiosity. These old guys with their semi-awkward and older looking car, complete with wire wheels on the front were really going to embarrass themselves among the crop of current day nitro runners? Then they qualified. Then they won a couple of rounds. Then it was Monday and they were racing in the finals. Connie Kalitta was the opponent and even the rough and tough Kalitta had to have known that he was sitting next to one of the all-time great stories in top fuel racing history.
The best part of this video is when Garlits tells the story of meeting Kalitta as a 17-year old kid when on a cross-country trip to the Bakersfield March Meet. It is amazing.
