Watch Tommy Ivo Assemble His Dragster At His Home Shop Circa 1965 – Awesome Video


Watch Tommy Ivo Assemble His Dragster At His Home Shop Circa 1965 – Awesome Video

(Video credit: Tony Williams/DragTimes2 YouTube) I like to break my pal Keith Turk’s chops from time to time because he describes things as being “magical” and that cracks me up. This time Keith will be able to fight back at me because this video IS truly magical. What you are going to see below is three minutes of pure historical awesome in the form of Tommy Ivo assembling his top fuel dragster in a small garage before the 1965 season. The session is narrated by Keith Jackson as Ivo works on the car. We’re guessing that this produced segment was part of some larger event coverage, maybe Wide World of Sports stuff that would have made sense for the time.

Watching him carry the bare chassis into his workspace and then load the center section into the rear end housing, pound the axles in, bolt the front axle on, lower the hemi in and crank away with a ratchet is really something else. At the time Tommy Ivo was not appreciated as being the hands on, greasy hot rodder  and racer that he actually was but history has done Ivo right by recognizing his dedication and skills not only on the track but in the shop.

This video certainly is idyllic and while it is about a “real life” as modern reality TV is is a great window into the past. We all want to remember the foundational heroes in drag racing like this. We want to see them working and bleeding over their racer in a humble shop. We want to see them lowering a hemi into place with a chain fall, and we wan to see them as the real world guys that they were. This video maybe unmatched on this front. We’re loving it!

The tie in to the US Nationals here is that this is the car that Ivo would ultimately race against a young Don Prudhomme in the final round of the Big Go that year with Prudhomme taking home the race win and building the foundation of a legendary career that will be celebrated for as long as nitro drag cars are run around the world. Just fantastic stuff. The other cool thing to think about is that virtually across the street from Lucas Oil Raceway on Northfield Drive the majority of the big league nitro teams have their palatial shops. From a home garage to multi-million dollar businesses that employ dozens, the sport has changed in way unimaginable 50 years ago.

PRESS PLAY  TO SEE HOW TOMMY IVO ASSEMBLED HIS TOP FUEL CAR IN 1965 –


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