Every few weeks my mental notebook fills up and anyone dumb enough to hit the link and read my column is forced into a scary walk through the strange place that is my brain. Fact is, when I’m not writing stuff about cars, I’m thinking of stuff I am going to be writing about cars or otherwise day dreaming about big trucks, bulldozers, candy, and anything else a healthy five year-old thinks about regularly. You clicked the link, so you have no one to blame but yourself. Bottoms up!
A while back, in our forum section, I made mention of the fact that one of my primary mechanical pet peeves were stock Harley-Davidson motorcycles with race pipes on them. Lots of noise and not much action. A recent experience made me reconsider that stance. I was traveling on a Sunday morning with my two sons, Tom and Jack. We were doing what most husbands are doing on Sunday morning, heading to the local home center to buy supplies for the latest home improvement project. On our trip we encountered about 30 members of a, um, “motorcycle riding fraternity.” These were easily 30 of the baddest-ass looking individuals I had ever seen and they appeared to be heading somewhere with a purpose. I fear for the person who was at their ultimate destination. Anyway, we stopped at a red light and the entire group pulled up in the lane beside us. It was pretty awesome. Those bikes, not race-pipe equipped, but sounding very healthy were literally vibrating the ground in one of the coolest displays of power I have ever felt. I quickly asked the boys if they felt the vibrations from the motor moving the truck. My oldest son Tom quickly responded in the affirmative. Both the kids were staring over at the bikers and one of them, an older guy with a big beard quickly looked over and flashed the kids a grin that was shy a couple of chicklets. The kids laughed and I did too. The light turned green and the group thundered off ahead of me. These guys were experienced riders and when they decided to turn left, the guy in the front pulled across on-coming traffic and the rest of the group turned with military precision. Like I said, wherever they were going, I don’t think it was to make a flower delivery.
In my experience, projects are made up of small, large, and Pyrrhic victories. The small ones happen when you can sneak 15 minutes with your car or truck and you manage to flawlessly complete a task that should have taken 25 minutes. The large victories are the ones where days, nights, or weeks of struggle result in something being accomplished that you (a) didn’t know you were capable of or (b) represented a piece of the project puzzle that could have stalled and languished for months. The Pyrrhic victories come because you decide to knowingly ignore stuff you should otherwise be doing and forge ahead on your junk with the blinders on. I indulged in the latter on the day that Tony and I slapped most of the motor together in Goliath, my project truck. I ignored the kids acting like animals in the house, my wife’s frustration, the fact that I hadn’t consumed liquids in 10 hours, the fact that my wife made a nice dinner for both Tony and I, and the fact that the kids, who I normally see for far less time than I’d like to, got put onto the far back burner for the day. As I sat on the corner of Tom’s bed and he laid down to sleep, I realized it was the first time I had really spent with him all day and another 70 hour work week was looming in the morning. There’s no worse feeling than that. Lesson learned, I felt hollow. Redemption comes this Sunday when I take the boys to the drag strip. Epic win.
I think about drag racing a lot. Probably far too much, but that’s my cross to bear. Lots of time I get myself hung up on mentally tracing the evolution of the sport from where it began to where it is today and how things could be different. Obviously, the founders of the sport (many of whom are still with us, but are not young) could have never envisioned a world where 300-mph laps would exist. I think the thing that would really throw them for a loop would be the modern door slammer racing environment. So much about door slammer racing is based on self-imposed restrictions. Tire size, turbo inlet size restrictions, minimum weight requirements, etc. It really runs counter to the ethos of the sport’s roots, but it makes for some incredible racing and has led to amazing innovations in suspension refinement and power delivery. With the 8.5 Outlaw guys hauling ass on a teeny slick that smaller than what Stock Eliminator cars making half the power can run, where will it end? Will there be guys running 10s with front runners mounted on the rear axle? While the restrictions may be foreign to the original drag racers, the effort, attitude, and drive of the competitors would be very familiar. That stuff doesn’t change.
So who or what really killed the import/sport compact drag racing thing? It’s like the Kennedy assassination, lots of theories but no real evidence. My take is a little off the wall, but I think it was the event and series organizers that ultimately screwed themselves. I don’t think you can blame drifting which was hoisted up by the automotive media as some sort of explosive trend that was going to sweep the nation overnight and every track in the country would be hosting events. Aside from California, it’s basically non-existent on a “pro” level around the country. I can remember being at the early sport compact events that happened shortly after the “Fast and the Furious” came out. These were just normal drag races, with packed stands and people rooting for and against cars and drivers. Then, all of a sudden it became super important to make these “lifestyle events.” That was code for tarting them up with a DJ, a “hot body” contest (clothed strippers), a rave tent, a guy making balloon animals, someone juggling fire, lasers, and whatever else a middle-aged track operator or series administrator thought would appeal to “the kids.” By putting the focus on everything but the cars, it is no surprise that people stopped coming when they figured out they could see a better DJ at a club, go to a better rave at an actual freaking rave, and see actual strippers at a strip club. It was a classic case of people trying to steer their customers into what they thought the customers wanted as opposed to actually finding out what they wanted and adapting to cater to them. I really feel for the racers who were competing at the professional level in that genre because they got screwed the worst. They should have been the stars, not all the ancillary crap that turned the drag strip into a fairgrounds.
I really want to drive a wheel-stander. Anyone want to train a new driver?
