The idea of racing off road trucks in stadiums and arenas all over the country was born from the fertile mind of Mickey Thompson. The guys was obsessed with off road racing and even more so, he was obsessed with finding a way to bring all the excitement of that sport to the world wrapped in a package that they would pay to see. He succeeded and the reason he did is shown below. Thompson’s first foray into putting on “contained” off road races happened at the famed Riverside Raceway in California. While not as tidy as the stadium product he would end up with, the races proved that (a) people would come and pay to watch and (b) the concept would work as far as the racing end as well.
Today’s high flying, tube chassis trucks with suspension travel that can be measured in feet are literal space shuttles as compared to the leaf sprung, bone jarring, kidney busting trucks, Jeeps and cars in this video. The show is fantastic. Vehicles are flying, crashing, sliding, and running completely on the edge at every turn. The fans ate it up and Thompson filled his pockets with their cashola. You need to stick around until the end of this short video to see a freaking ’55 Chevy and a damned Pacer in competition with the big trucks and Jeeps.
As cool as the high flying machines of today are, we’d love to see some of these leaf sprung trucks getting after it in a vintage class or something!
Thanks to Ron Thomas for the tip on this video!
Wait….an AMC Pacer?
Intuitively, it seems in last place…..