Well we told you he was going to do it and he did it! One of our all time heroes is back in action officially after making a couple of eighth mile blasts at South Georgia Motorsports Park last weekend. That’s right, 88-year old Captain Jack McClure sat in his hydrogen peroxide rocket go kart again and once again attacked a drag strip in anger. As mentioned above these were eighth mile passes because that is what race organizers had approved the near 90-year racer to do. This video was put together by “Rocketboys” member Kurt Anderson. The guy you will see standing in front of the kart and giving Jack instruction by hand signal is Ky Michaelson. Ky (as we have written a million times before) restored the kart and applied his many, many years of rocket experience to making sure it was all up to snuff before Jack got back on it.
Here are the time slips for the three runs (source: Jack McClure) –
Note the last 60′ time. 1.05-seconds! Yahoo, that is MOVING in anything but on a go kart powered by a rocket? Yeah, buddy! The point of the exercise was not to set any sort of big records or turn the Earth backwards but simply to get the kart on the track with Jack in it and make sure he was comfortable again. Now that we have seen him handle the machine with the same level of skill that he did more than 40 years ago, the hunt will go on for a track to sign off on some quarter mile squirts. At least that is what we are hoping. If this is enough for Jack, so be it and we are very proud to have followed his adventure back to the track. It has been an amazing story and we can’t begin to understand how satisfying it must have been for Jack himself to be sitting there on the starting line like he did oh so many years ago.
It is pretty amazing how stable and otherwise non-dramatic the driving situation appears to be. You will see tow runs facing forward and then if you skip to about 10:00 you will be able to see a run with a rear facing camera. THAT one is absolutely stunning. Make sure you watch the rear facing camera because you really get a sense of how hard the thing leave and accelerates off the line. Stuff just vanishes in a cloud of fluffy white steam.
I hope I’m having this much fun when I’m that old.
I agree!!
136mph in an 1/8 mile……..in a go kart; not in your life will you ever do that much less when you are 88 years old. He’s my new hero.
just the coolest thing ever on a drag strip, he goes down the strip like he has been doing it every day, really hope he gets some kind of tour together ( Left Coast PLEASE). long live CAPT. JACK thank you BS, saw him at Fremont back in 1972, did not appreciate how special it was at the time!!—–a limited tour with the Greek would bring the house down, a promoters dream