#41  
Old 01-05-2012, 04:53 PM
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I agree with the positive comments. I thoroughly enjoy reading this. Keep it up!!!

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  #42  
Old 01-05-2012, 05:00 PM
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Default part 29 more goose

by now all around the shop it was a bird sanctuary. a real bone yard of 1st & 2nd gen birds. when asked what kind of car he'd like to race, kenny said he wanted 1 like T.J. drove. well, that was fine with me, so we looked over the yard & selected the cleanest '68 body we could find & pulled it into the shop. by now i was an old hand at this so i told kenny where to start stripin out all the unnessesary stuff & he went to work. i pulled the 455 out of the goat & bolted it up to a th400(which the former owner assured me had a hd intermediate sprag, but as we soon found out, he lied) & we used a stock 13" converter. this is the same 455 i got when i pulled it & put a 400 in a friends '70 goat. it was still stone stock & by the end of 3 years of racing we figured it had been to well over 100 races & approaching 1000 passes. and at its last race it was still running 12.50's as smooth as a sewing machine. anyhow we got it together & i showed kenny how to handle the 2 car rig. then i bought a new '78 1 ton & put ramps on the back, built another 455 for the goat & we were soon ready for a 3-car team race season. & what a season it was. it turned out to be our best season ever. during the '78-'79 seasons we went to nearly 100 races in 4 different states. kenny drove our 2-car rig thousands of miles. he later drove log trucks & i've often wondered if, while he was pullin a load of logs, he ever thought back on those good ole days when he pulled 2 pontiacs to the races every weekend.

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Old 01-05-2012, 05:52 PM
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Default part 30 the goose takes flight

our b-ball coach in high school had a habit of giving everybody a nickname. he gave me mine when i first went out for the team. he looked at me & said " boy you're big around as a tub" & to this day some who knew me then still call me "tub". & by the way, he didn't leave me in that shape, he ran me 'til as a senior i was a lean mean fightin machine.(if you'll forgive me i'll post a picture to prove it) it was the thrill of competition & the desire to excell i learned during those b-ball days that would later inspire me in racing. i guess i picked up the habit from "coach". ever sense, when i hang around somebody long enuff, something about them will inspire me to hang a nickname on 'em. sometimes kenny would get that far away look on his face & i would say "boy, you look like a goose in a fog, where are you?" well it stuck, from then on, we called him "goose". in the south there,s a "bubba" on every corner. i would say to goose "hey bubba hand me that hammer" so he started callin me "bubba". he'd call & say "hey bubba, what time you want me to be at the shop?" "til this day, his greeting to me is always "hey bubba" well goose learned quick & soon started winning rounds & gettin in the $. our records show that he was winner & i was runner-up at 1 race. & 1 special race he won when me & T.J. were already out. on the next to the last time trial he slowed down, so when he came back he told me there was no 2nd gear. well, i'd already been here, the guy lied--stock spag--not hd. but he said it would still go into hi. so i told him to run it up a little higher, then hit the shifter twice real quick & maybe it would go straight from 1st to 3rd-- it worked & only ran a couple of tenths slower. so we dialed accordingly & he marched right on thru the field for the win. after the last race in '79 i sold him the truck & gave him the bird, thinking he would keep on racing. but i guess he was young & hearing the call of the wild. i later found out that he sold it to the owner of a chopper shop who wanted a street racer. i was told he was a tatooed, hard core biker type they called "squirrel" don't know if he ever raced it or not. but if he did his oponent would have to beat a 12.50, which it ran every pass like a sewing machine.

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Old 01-05-2012, 06:44 PM
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Default part 31 tiger tales

the '60's & '70's were a special time in this country. there was the viet nam war that nobody understood. all the post ww2 babies were coming of age & they were "wild in the streets". there was the hippie movement, nudist colonies, biker gangs, on the coast there was the surfing crowd, every sort of sexual activity you can think of & they all danced to the sounds of the latest rock & roll. there was pot, lsd & and any thing else they could find that would give'm a buzz or send'em on a trip. it was "tune in & turn on man" & some of them even lived to tell about it(sadly, some didn't). but for the gearheads it was all about musclecars. by 1970 there was about anything you could possibly want, from a 6cyl mustang to a 426 hemi or a shelby cobra & every thing in between. & we thought it would go on forever, but it didn't. federal regulations & the insurance companies sealed the doom for our beloved musclecars. soon those that were left were just old wore out cars that nobody wanted anymore.(but as we now know that would later change). most had been rode hard & put up wet as the cowboys say. by the mid '70's most were in purty sad shape. but at the time i thought it was great. i could buy a goat or a bird with the original 400 motor & trans & usually with a decent body for $300 or less. so i started round'in 'em up & draggin 'em in. i recall 1 such vechicle, a '70 goat ragtop,400,4sp. the windshield was busted, the top was ragged & it needed paint, but hey, it would still run & drive & for $300, what was to think about? when i got it home & T.J. saw that it would run, she said "lets go for a ride". so we dropped the top & took off up the road. it was neat. as i can remember its the only ride i ever had in a ragtop. i used the motor parts, sold the 4spd & it set for years while we were busy racin & just rusted down. thats sad but thats just how it was back then, they were just old wore out cars nobody wanted. i didn't keep count,but i'd say i probably bought maybe 50 birds including 1st & 2nd gen & at least 25 goats. i also bought tons of big cars to get 455's & th400's. when workin on a race car it was great to just go outside & get what you needed. if i could have somehow looked into the future i would now be a wealthy man-- but who knew?

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Old 01-06-2012, 11:07 AM
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Default part 32 ra4 goat

in the '70's, if you had a friend working in parts at a gm dealer, you could buy a ra4 head for about $100. i,d heard so much about em, i decided to try a set. there was a young man who showed interest in racing in '77, so i put a 455 together with ra4 heads on it. he liked my '69 goat so we just went to the bone yard & picked out the best prospect. it was a clean '69 except for a little rot on the lr qtr. we soon had it ready to race, but this boy didn't like the looks of my ole stickered up cars, he wanted a nice paint job. he said that he had helped some other guys do some paint & body work & he knew how to do it. so i said "knock ya'self out". i had only dabbled a little with paint & body work & discovered that i hated it, so i was not about to sand on it, if it never raced. well, he worked 100's of hours & finaly got it lookin purty good, with gray primer, almost ready to paint. he decided to go ahead & start racin & finish the paint later. i figured it would run a little better with the ra4 heads, & it did. the 1st pass was a shocker. with only 3.73 gears & a stock 13" converter, it was a "wheel toter". i was used to a little air under the left front, but this goat jerked the front wheels what looked to me like a foot (it was probably only about 5-6") & carried 'em maybe 20' or more. i was shocked! i later put the battery back up front & made some other ajustments & got it calmned down some. fast foreward now to a later race at tyler , tx. we're between time trials & all 3 cars are parked side by side in the pits. all of a sudden we heard a loud crash & when we looked around there was dust flying everywhere & the 2 goats were bouncing around. when we went to investigate, here's what we found. a guy with a mopar (challenger i think) was running hot, so he came flying through the pits, & turned the key off so he could coast back to his pit. he forgot that the steering wheel locked when the key was off. he was going so fast he didn't have time to turn the key back on, so he just locked up the brakes, thats what caused most of the dust we saw. well, he hit the lr of the gray goat, right where all the bondo was & knocked it into my goat, bangin up the lr qtr quite a bit. after all the body work he had done on that qtr, makin it look good, he had told folks that the body was perfect, no bondo at all. but there it was, exposed for all the world to see. i guess he just could't face people after that. as far as i know he never raced again.

  #46  
Old 01-06-2012, 12:02 PM
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Default part 33 wild in the streets

i had a friend & schoolmate who had to go to viet nam right out'a high school. like most guys he didn't like to talk about it much when he got back, but sometimes he would. he told me about goin out on patrols. they would assign a different guy to walk point every time they went out, 'cause the point man was more likely to get shot at 1st or to hit a booby trap of some sort. he told of how some of the guys would be so scared they'd cry & beg not to have to walk point. he said that after he'd been there for a few months he sorta resigned himself to the fact that he probably would'nt make it out. so he would listen to these poor guys beggin & cryin & he would volunteer to walk their point. he got by with it for a few months, then he got shot in the foot & got to come home. it took many months of treatment, but they were finaly able to save his foot. after he was able to go back to work, he bought a halloween orange 440 6-pack cuda or challenger (i forget which), it was quick. he got tanked up 1 nite & got into a street race. he won the race, & there was plenty of shut down room before the curve, but he stayed in it & could'nt make the curve. the car was totaled, but he survived. i thought at the time how sad it would have been, after all he had been thru serving his country, if he'd died in that street race. there were 2 reasons i never did much street racin, the danger & trouble with the law. but i must confess, i did participate in 1 street race. i was minding my on business, goin to see T.J. & just enjoyin the ride in my ole '69 ra3 4speed goat. as i started thru this little town, i saw somebody in the road, flaggin me down. i thought maybe they needed some help or something. but they had seen me coming. they had heard about my ole goat & flagged me down to challenge me to a race. i did'nt know the boys, but i had heared about the car. it was a 428 cobrajet 4sp torino. it had a reputation as the badest thing for miles around this little town. i sized him up & figured as heavy as that body looked, i could probably take him & i knew that there was a nice wide stretch of road just around the corner. by then i'd had plenty of practice snatchin on my 4sp, so i knew just what to do. when the boy ridin shotgun got out & dropped the flag, i went to work. it wasn't really even close. the tiger jumped all over that ford & mauled it. i just eased on back to 55mph & cruised on over to see T.J. don't ever remember seeing that ford again. but 1 thing i know, they never flagged me down again!

  #47  
Old 01-06-2012, 12:49 PM
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Default part 34 trailer trash

i always spent most of our money on drag racin, so we never had enuff for a decent house. we just set up a cheap single wide trailer house by the shop. & that was just fine with me. all i needed was a place to eat & sleep. i had a day job, then worked on pontiacs at nite. i guess that was another reason some of the uppity chevy boys didn't like us. they figured we were just poor trailer trash tryin to race our raggedy old pontiacs. anyhow, when you have a cheap trailer house, its e-z for mice to get in. i remember sittin on the couch, watchin t.v. & we'd sometimes catch a glimpse of a gray blur streakin across the floor behind the t.v.. we didn't have a cat so all we could do was set out traps & we'd catch 1 occasionaly. but there were always permanent residents with us. in the spare north bedroom there was a perfectly formed mouse hole--just like on tom & jerry. later, we got a slightly better trailer that the mice had a harder time getting into, & we got 2 cats. that purty much cured our in house mouse problem' but they would still nest up in the insulation under the house. one day we watched as a long(maybe 6-7') chickin or rat snake crawled slowly up the tie-down strap & up into the insulation to lie in wait for a mouse. i had to tell ya'll that to prepare ya for the pontiac story. another young man from the neighborhood showed an interest in racin, so we put together a 2nd gen for him--'76 if i remember correctly. 1 day we were gettin ready to load up, when we heard this young man(who for now will remain nameless) holler & jump back from the trunk he had just opened. i said " what's the matter?" he said " there's a snake in there!" i went & looked in the trunk & sure enuff, there was our rat snake coiled up in the trunk, waitin on lunch. although quite harmeless, a 6-7' snake surprize can be quite alarming. we all got a big laugh out of it, & of course from then on we called our newest racer "snake". by the way snake went on to help wrench on & race several 9 & 10 sec pontiacs with another pontiac racer friend. he still tinkers with 'em from time to time.

  #48  
Old 01-06-2012, 01:22 PM
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Default part 35 rain on our parade

one year we decided to build a float for the monroe christmas parade using a drag racing theme. we went to a local cotton gin & borrowed a cotton trailer. a local racer had a nice alchohol dragster & he offered to let us use it & his shop space to build the float. so we went to work. T.J. had all the skill, the rest of us just did the grunt work. she did all the lettering by hand & even painted a large depiction of a starting line christmas tree that i believe was made of 2 sheets of plywood. i reckon that would make it 8' square. it looked real nice. then the car owner helped us get the dragster onto the trailer & secured. now all that was left was to make lots of fake flowers out of kleenex to trim the sides of the trailer with. sounds e-z but it was hard work. i think we worked on it about 3 weeks. but it turned out real nice. we made the deadline & were ready to rock, but it rained on our parade. we decided it wouldn't be nice to take the mans dragster out in the rain, so we just started strippin it back down, took the trailer back & never tried that again. it did look good & its the only drag racin float i've ever seen. but i've led a sheltered life, so some of you may have seen lots of 'em. we'll post some pictures in case some might wanna see it.

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Old 01-06-2012, 02:27 PM
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Default part 36 no home field advantage

i've described the cold & sometimes hostile reception we got from a lot of tracks. it was like always invading the other guys home turf & never having the home field(except at haynesville) advantage. it was many times very unpleasant. it was a new experience for us. we were both friendly & outgoing & willing to help others. we both came from very friendly, well liked families in our little town. i guess, to us, this was like culture shock, something quite different than we were used to. we met a few nice folks, but very few. T.J. said " surely all these people can't be this bad." she set out on a quest to try & find more more folks to befriend & maybe visit with at the tracks. then she thought of a group called the "fellowship of Christian athletes" she said "i bet there's some nice folks in that group, i wonder if there's an organization like that for drag racers. if there is, maybe we could locate some of its members & make some new friends at the tracks." so she wrote to nhra, inquiring of them if they knew of any such group or org. here's an excerpt from the letter she got back. " in reply to your recent letter inquiring as to the existance of an org. of Christian racers, i know of no formal group in drag racing. i think it would be super & will be most happy to help in our area in any way i can." & here's what ihra said, " we know of no organization of Christian racers in existence, however should you be interested in starting such an organization, we would like to be made aware of it... well, thats all she needed to hear. that was her "word from God"-- start it yourself!-- so she did. she found out all the leagal stuff that was nesessary & got the ball rolling. the rest as they say is history & thru this we finaly did get to meet lots of nice people & made a few friends along the way. it was extremely refreshing! T.J. worked at an advertising design studio, so she had all the contacts she needed to take care of all nesessary printing. so she started getting the word out & recriuting new members. she designed the logo & had decals printed so members could display them on their race cars & tow trucks. we'll post a copy when we learn how. later a similar org. was formed who could cover national events & point meets. when they got large enuff, T.J. handed the ball off to them, closed out fcr, & joined their group, racers for christ (RFC). if you look closly at the cars when the races are on tv, you'll see some wearing RFC decals. you may wanna sign up. you can meet some nice racers this way.

  #50  
Old 01-06-2012, 10:42 PM
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Hey ponyakr I bought my 1969 GTO convertible out of Sulphur back in 1985 and got another one out of Many a couple of years later. I was in Leesville- nothing but dirt tracks around there. Did you ever see the guys yard out behind England Air Force base in Alexandria, right off hiway 1? He must have had 30 GTO's but not in a junkyard. I hadn't thought of that place in years until you described your yard but I know you are way up north.

Later

  #51  
Old 01-07-2012, 10:04 AM
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Default part 37 a little dirt

dirt track racin is not for everybody. its dirty. dusty & muddy. whether your running fast or not, there's always some fool ready to plow into 'ya, ending your nite, & requiring a full week of hard work to put it back in race condtion. its not a lazy mans sport. it takes a lot of hard work to keep your car ready to race, week after week. when we were bracket racing there were many weeks when we didn't even unload off the trailer-- there was nothing to fix. that don't happen in dirt racin. there's always someting to fix. even if you don't get wiped out buy the demolition derby dude, you still have to go over the car every week to see what needs to be repaired or changed. & it always needs washing. the track is always wet & muddy when you 1st go out, & after a few laps of " packin the track", you've got mud caked all over the car. in bracket racing we've had slicks last a whole season & front tires several seasons. that don't happen on dirt. tires wear out quick, especialy the rr. & sometimes you don't even get through the race with 4 usable tires. there's always sharp objects of all kinds hangin off some of the cars & the slightest side by side contact can slice a brand new tire open & render it a pile of junk. once the race starts, for the driver, its a nasty world. the track is still muddy & the car in front of you will sling mud in your face. you must have a clear helmet shield with thin plastic tearoffs you can peel off when they become caked with mud. otherwise you'll lose all ability to see whats in front of you. by the end of the race your dirty, sweaty & tired. so with all these negatives, what makes guys wanna put theirselves thru this? its the thrill of competition, the desire to compete & do it better than your opponent. & when things go right, its loads of fun! i'm a witness.

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Old 01-07-2012, 10:39 AM
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Default part 38 flashback

i just had a flashback of something that for some reason i forgot to mention. one sat. we pulled into the pits of our local dragstip a little late & were looking for a place to park. all the spots where we usually parked were taken, so we kept driving slowly ahead, looking for a spot. it looked like there might be 1 beside a big oak tree just to the left of the staging lanes. but just before we got to it, we noticed 2 men standing in front of us, arguing. well the fists started flying & soon 1 guy had the other down & was thrashin him severely about the head. they finaly got up and the winner started walkin back to the tower. the other man ran over to a nearby pickup & came back waving a gun & shouting obsenities at the guy who had just given him a whuppin. i don't know what kind of a gun it was, but it looked to me like a cowboy style 44 magnum. & he was right in front of us. i didn't know whether to duck or start backin up as fast as i could without running over somebody. thankfully, some guys came over & wrestled the gun away from him & tried to calm him down. when the other guy had started walking away we had recognized him as the track manager. we later got the whole scoop. the guy with the gun was a hot head with a drinking problem. he'd started an argument with the manger which resulted in the incident we witnessed. for it, the man was banished from the track for life as i remember it. he later died in a racing rollover at another track. he'da been o.k. but his harness was loose & he was thrown partially out the window. so the moral of the story is, if you drink, wait til after the race to start, especially if your driving a race car. it can make things a lot more pleasant & enjoyable for others.

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Old 01-07-2012, 11:18 AM
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Default part 39 more dirt

i mentioned before that bracket racing is not a spectator sport. at most of the tracks we raced the only spectators in the stands were there just briefly to watch their car run then they went right back to the pits. but circle track racing is just the opposite. you can see evidence of this at almost all the nascar tracks. i think some tracks seat over 100,000 fans, not counting the millions watching by t.v. most people don't understand the competitive aspects of dealing with reaction times, dial-ins, & breakouts. but its e-z to understand it when the rule is, the 1st man to finish 500 laps wins. also it can be quite exciting to feel the ground shakin & hear the deafining roar of 43 800hp race cars as they they streak by at 200mph. what's not to like? but unless you live close to a big track, most folks don't have the funds or the time to spend a weekend at a nascar race. thats where the small local dirt track comes in. for very little money' you can spend a fri or sat nite enjoying some very exciting competition. no, they're not as loud as the big boys, but they still disturb the peace. if you've never been to a dirt track race, i urge you to check 1 out the next time they book in a big late model show at a track near you. you may like it more than you thought. you've noticed from the t.v. coverage of nascar events that many are loyal fans of certain drivers. although dale jr. has'nt done done to well lately, if he does any thing good in the race, you know it imediately because he has lots of loyal fans. if you go to enuff races at your local track, you'll , no doubt find yourself pulling for certain drivers. some really get into it. i,ve seen guys go rite up to the fence & flail their arms like a windmill, trying to root their car on to victory. i knew 1 woman that took it a little too far. she,d cuss & holler at the drivers & the flagman til soon the bleachers were empty for at least 20' around her. my advice would be, try it, you might like it.

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Old 01-07-2012, 12:12 PM
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Default part 40 enter at your own risk

if you decide to try dirt trackin as a racer instead of a fan, its a different world. its a very hostile invironment. it don't matter to some guys if you are a beginner or a vetran. if you get in their way or slow them down, they'll nail you, whatever it takes to move you out of their way. back in the old days, a major incident on the track, usually meant a fight in the pits. most tracks have reduced this problem slightly by inforcing the no alcohol in the pits rule. but it still happens. some fans actually like the fights. they think it just adds to the excitement & entertainment value of the sport. but i'm a gearhead, i like the competition. now if your going to get into dirt racing with a pontiac, i warn you, its an extremely hostile world. its world ruled by chevy. & they don't take kindly to a pontiac trying to enter their kingdom. all the rules are geared to favor the small block chevy, using a 350 block. many chevy boys try to say that all pontiac motors, including the 350's are big blocks & therefore not allowed. 1 very popular class specifically excludes all bop motors. in the rules, when listing the legal blocks, it reads gm(chevy only) some classes allow bop--but 350 block only, some just show a max ci limit. before you enter, check out the rules. if you doubt that its a chevy world, look thru a circle track parts catalog. except for a few ford parts, its nothin but chevy. this is such a well known fact that many of the parts are not even listed as chevy, its just assumed that everybody knows its for chevy. several classes allow any iron head. look at the list of hp aftermarket iron heads for chevy. brodix, dart, & on & on. but at this time, if you run a pontiac in an iron head rule class, you are limited to 40+ year old iron heads, which must be ported to make any decent power. of course, if you have the big bucks you might be able to find a set of ra4's before the deep pocket collectors buy'em all up & lock'em away. that may have already happened. but there is a good side to this. it is very rewarding to beat a chevy on his home turf!

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Old 01-07-2012, 12:59 PM
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Default part 41 gotta start somewhere

a pontiac racer friend, who hereafter i'll refer tom as mb, got disgusted with bracket racing & decided to try dirt trackin. he decided to start with a '68 bird(which he later discovered was probably not the best choice) he was a good mechanic so he soon had it ready to race. he invited me to go watch him race. i had never been to a dirt race so i did'nt know what to expect. i was pleasantly surprized. these cars were loud & fast as they came roaring by, scratchin & clawin & slingin dirt everywhere. the track was a high banked red clay oval 1/4 mile around. the fast cars were runnin rite at the top, up close to what i later found out was called the cushion. the fastest car in mb's class was a white mustang with a 351 cleveland motor. it was screamin. sounded like 7000rpms or more. when he got to the turn he would hang his right rear tire against the cushion & in a flash he was headed back down the opposite straight. but wait, where's mb, he,s in the race too. i looked & there was poor mb. he was going really slow, compared to the mustang, & he was sliding back & forth, all over the track. it looked almost as if he was on ice. by the way, i just thought about it. the driver of that white mustang is the father of the boy that drove our modified last year. i wanted to know what mb had to say about the race when he got back to the pits. he said, the motor sounded o.k., but no traction at all. all he had was some real hard street tires with a few grooves cut across'em. well, i'd learned long ago from bracket racing, find out whats workin for the fast guys. so we eased on over to the mustang to see what he was using. the name was right there on the side, Dirt Bozz. we felt of the tread. it was soft as a drag slick & had plenty of grooves already in it. i already had a little speed shop, so i called around & found out that a place in ark called marsh racing tires sold the dirt bozz. so we got some headed our way. from that time on, mb's luck began to change.

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Old 01-08-2012, 03:51 PM
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Default part 42 pinks all out ?

i thought of something that i havn't talked about much that some may find very interesting. in '73 i started racin at an airstrip track in haynesville La. there was no tree & no timing equipment of any kind. we had no idea how quick or fast we were going, much less what our reaction time was. the spots were given in so many feet head start, which for the 1st 100' or so was marked off with paint on the track surface, between the lanes. for any spot longer than that, it was strickly up to the flagman to estimate. for those long spots, the flagman would sit on the fender of the car & ride down the track to what he considered the correct distance. purty advanced technology huh? then he would back up a short distance & flag the race from there. i think i've mentioned beating the pinto with a bounty on his head. i suspect he got that bounty put on him thru wins he got as a result of spots that were far too long. the car was obviously stone stock & he drove it to every race. nethier me nor T.J. could remember( its been a few years) exactly what class he ran, but it was somewhere in the w-x-y-z range. i ran d-stock. i remember that the spot was 410 ft. so the flagman got on the fender & they rode of into the sunset. can you imagine what would happen today if somebody jumped onto the fender of somebody's race car? anyway they drove on down to what looked to me to be at least 1/2 track. the flagman got out & took his position. at this point i didn't think i had a chance. this spot looked ridiculous. so, just to add a little drama to the situation & to help entertain the crowd (this is the track where we had so many fans) i got out & held my hand up as if shielding my eyes from the sun & looked intently down the track as if trying to make out some distant object. yes, this really happened. i am not makin this up. then i climbed back in the goat & got ready. & it really was sorta hard to detect the motions of the flagman that far away. anyway, i got to the line 1st(according to the finish line man, there to determine winners) & drove back down passed the crowd, who by now were jumpin & cheerin & goin wild. yah, they loved the ole goat. i don't blame 'em, i did too!

  #57  
Old 01-08-2012, 04:51 PM
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Default part 43 any of ya'll remember?

i must now give credit where the credit is due. thru all these wins (which was almost every race that 1st 2 years) that were flagged, i cannot take any of the credit. all i did was pop the clutch & row thru the gears. the ole goat did the work. & it wasn't because i hopped it up with cheater parts. i assure you it was stone stock, just as delivered from the factory. i had driven it about 61,000 miles when i took it off the street to race. at the time the only work ever done on it was a new timing set. & that was the results of an engineering blunder at pontiac. i don't hear much about it anymore, so some of you may not even be aware of it. the smart engineers at pontiac decided to use nylon(plastic) teeth on the cam sprocket to make the engine run quieter. yes, even on the ram air motors. they were almost guaranteed to strip off by 50,000 miles. mine did about 40k. today there would be a recall & gm would be forced to change 'em out. i had no more problems with it after that. when i got ready to race, i installed a new clutch & pressure plate & raced the motor stone stock & unmolested all of '73 & '74. i guess thats 1 reason they were so popular back then, they were bad to the bone right from the factory. but with only a few exceptions, you could'nt just go to the dealer(at least in our neck of the woods) & buy a goat off the lot & hope for much performance. except for the judge, the dealers would order their cars loaded out with air, power everything, standard engine & pitiful gears like 3.08 or 3.23. & it got worse in the mid '70's. how about 2.41 & 2.56 ta's. no thrill there. i guess thats why so many people just wrote 'em off as cars that looked good but were real slow. i could have gotten 4.33 gears in my goat, but i knew it would be a daily driver, so i compromised with a 3.90. it would have been quicker with the 4.33's, but as it turned out,it didn't really need the extra help.

  #58  
Old 01-08-2012, 05:57 PM
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Default part 44 how it went down

how many off you have seen those old pics & hi lite reels from the early days of drag racing before electronic timers? they show very atheletic dudes jumping straight up what looks like 4 or 5 feet(thats not possible is it?), tucking their feet behind them & waving the flag waving the flag wildly. but it didn't happen like that at our track. T.J. & i discussed this & this is the best description we can come up with of exactly what took place. when 2 cars came up to run, the guys & gals at the scoring table would look up the spots in books provided by nhra for that purpose. at this time i assume there were still lots of tracks using flags. the scorers would then calulate the distance of the spot between cars. i suppose at least 1 of them had to be good at math, 'cause i don't think hand held calculators were out yet. when they got the results, they passed it on to the flagman who walked back out on the track to the point of the spot.(for those that were marked off) then he'd put the point of his flag stick on the correct paint mark. then with the other hand he'd direct the car getting the spot to come forward til his tire was centered, even with the paint mark. then he'd indicate for the driver to stop by clinching his fist. then he'd back up far enuff for the driver with the spot to get a good view. then he'd point, 1st to 1 driver then the other telling them to get ready. now, right here i remember it 1 way & T.J. remembers it another. i think the flagman kept the end of the stick on the track surface, then, after he had pointed at both drivers, brought the flag up to start the race. T.J. thinks he held the flag up, then brought it down to start. you'll have to excuse us, that was nearly 40 years ago. my how time flys when your havin fun. now, what happened if somebody jumped the flag? in pinks all out if you jump, your out. but back then, they'd just make you rerun it. i suppose if you did it more than once you lost, but i don't remember that happening. i'd love to see the figures they used to determine the spots back then. we didn't keep any records of it. if anybody has any, or knows how to get any info on this from '73, please let me know. this wasn't heads up racing, but it was definately no breakout racing. nobody had a clue how quick or fast you were going, 1st car to cross the finish line won. the bad boys today would've loved this.

  #59  
Old 01-08-2012, 08:40 PM
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Default

please post some pics to go with the stories. thanks

  #60  
Old 01-09-2012, 11:58 AM
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Default thanks a lot!

i've had my laptop for nearly 3 years with never any problems , including no virus problems. but sense i've posted some things on this site that some took offense to, i seemed to have picked up a virus & my laptop went nuts. coincidence? i sure hope so. but at this point i must remain skeptical. g thanks!

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