Putting an engine against a load is the fastest way to find the weak link in your system. Most every other racing vehicle on the planet works to remove as much weight as possible in order to reduce the energy drain on the powerplant, the part of the whole power program that can’t be truly avoided. Minimize the total amount of power being used to put the object into motion and what’s left over is purely for your entertainment. In a pulling tractor, that’s not the case. You eliminate the lightness factor. There is going to be a load and it will tax the hell out of the powertrain. Choo-choo, my dude, because either your program is fully up to par or…well, that’s when stuff like this happens.

I don’t know which is more violent, a Top Fueler at the moment the throttles go full-open or what happens the moment a pulling tractor packs up and punches out in the middle of a run. There is no small failure on a run…when things break, they break BIG. Engines turn to shrapnel, fire leaps to the heavens, transmissions turn to dust. And if you’re really having a bad night, wheels that are as tall as a man leave and roll on their own accord. I’ve seen it.

Big or small, the sled will break them all.