"Rock" Fans Go Berserk!
Film at 11!

5/7/03

efore I haul off and toss this fistful of pasta, I do have to preface my remarks. Rockingham Dragway is owned by one of my favorite people in all of drag racing and all points extending from the center of the compass, Steve Earwood, and I want the reader to know that what's described here is a part of the past. A day spent at Rockingham for any event is vastly removed from the "Apocalypse Now" setting described below where Purple Hearts were given out to the campers and top end berserkers who survived the weekend and had the scalps to prove it.

I think it was 1992, but Steve and Pro racing teacher extraordinaire Roy Hill became the new sheriffs in town at "the Rock" and the waters were calmed tremendously. I know, I was there.

I missed the first Winston Invitational in 1989 when Connie Kalitta, Don Prudhomme, and Warren Johnson won the pro titles, and I can't remember why, but I missed the second one as well. Somewhere in those two years, good buddy Earwood took over the reins at Rockingham, and I put the Invitational at the top of my National DRAGSTER assignment wish list. Sometime around then, DRAGSTER hired on Kevin McKenna, a young guy with a

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lot of track saavy and knowledge, and he had told me that Rockingham after qualifying was the Dodge City of race tracks. You could see all 10 commandments go down in the pine campground that fronted the track on Highway 1.

I also had been prepared for my Rockingham experience by the one person who has probably been to more race tracks than anyone I know, Bret Kepner. He told me that when it comes to wild national event facilities (and I stress "national event" facilities because there are smaller tracks that resemble C Block at Corcoran State Prison and reach even greater depths), Rockingham was the topper. "Old" Bristol was second, followed closely by the old Atlanta Dragway, which I wore out in the last issue of DRO.

Anyway, the fans pull out all the stops at Rockingham. I have been to countless rock shows, maybe 50 to 75 professional fights, one L.A. Raider game, and a couple semi-pro hockey brawls, and Rockingham fits like an Isotoner(r) glove. True, the toughest crowd, meaning serious world champ street fighters, is a boxing match. You get cheeky with some small Latino guy in an expensive suit and you may be mouthing off at Marco Antonio Barrera. Translated (and depending on your state of sobriety) months of reconstructive facial surgery might await you.