The Future of Sportsman Drag Racing?

By Wes Tarkington

What to do....what to do....

I recently sold my trusty 8.90 (Super Comp, Quick Rod) dragster in favor of a brand new IHRA Top Dragster, Quick 8, Super Quick dragster machine. I had a hard time doing it because the old car was deadly consistent--a winner. It could go to any track and hit the 8.90 or 5.70 (1/8 mile) index at will. It was so maintenance-free all I ever did to it was change the oil once a month and hit it with the power washer between events.

Why would I get rid of a money making, fun to drive car in lieu of a high-maintenance parts eater like the new 6-second 200 MPH ride? My reason might surprise you. It's not the lure of going much faster and moving up a few steps in the sportsman ladder. No, instead, it was due to my overwhelming disgust of what the "Super" or "Rod" classes have become.

It started out innocently enough. My dad and I built a low-buck dragster when I turned 16. It was an outdated (even for 1986 standards) Paul Peyton chassis with a lethargic small block Ford. I don't think we made an 8-second pass for over a year, but somehow we managed to actually win some rounds in 8.90 competition. As the years went by, we learned how to make the little motor sing and were suddenly faced with the problem of having a car that was too fast. Along came the stutter box. But, just as we got a handle on how to make it work, NHRA banned the device. While IHRA continued to allow it, we had to devise another way of controlling the E.T. of the car so we could compete in both sandboxes. We tried massive amounts of ignition retard in high gear, bigger tires, taller gears, and even a method of lifting at half-track and counting in my head (which actually worked best). Then came the new car in 1991. Suddenly, we had a modern chassis that worked better and was lighter. Now we were really screwed!

A funny thing happened mid-year, though. My father was transferred from Cleveland, OH back to our home of Dallas, TX. We arrived a bunch of wet-behind-the-ears 8.90 racers that had done very little of what was known as bracket racing--a weird little phenomenon that was never on our list of priorities.

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I was bound and determined to race Top Fuel and this paltry little 155-mph slug was merely a step towards that goal. We found that there was nary an 8.90 event like we were accustomed to at Norwalk Raceway Park or Quaker City Dragway. We never HAD to bracket race. So, anyway, here we are, getting thrown into the shark tank with the Richardsons, the Phillips, and the rest of the division 4 hitters with our no delay box, no throttle stop (what the heck is a throttle stop?) small-block Ford dragster. It only took a half-season of getting our asses handed to us before we were suddenly knocking on Peyton's door to buy the new-fangled parts. The 1993 season came and went--a few 8.90 race victories and even more wins at these "bracket race" thingies. We began to get the hang of it.

After almost eight full seasons, our little engine gave up the ghost one fine Sunday in Paris, TX. We were already getting outrun by the 468's and 502's, so rather than fix the baby motor, we went the full mile and found a used Ford Pro Stock wedge engine. Suddenly, we went from running 155 wide open with the tongue hanging out to running over 170 with ease. At the 1994 Chief Nationals in Dallas, we had "Top Speed" in Super Comp with a first-round blast of 173.98 mph along with a winning 8.913 E.T. At the time, there were only a few racers able to break 165, but it didn't take long before 170 was the norm, along with the horribly noticeable throttle stop lull.

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