The Once and
Future Funny Car
5/8/06
I first got hooked on drag racing in the 1960’s. I even wrote my earliest piece in DRO about “My First Time” at the drags on a dare from Dave Wallace. Something happened early on after getting hooked on nitro -- it was the evolution of the Funny Cars from steel, altered wheelbase doorslammers on nitro to the fiberglass counterparts.
Fortunately, I was able to see East-vs-West spectaculars at Lions, Manufacturer’s and 64-Funny-car events at OCIR and lots of Saturday night flopper shows at Irwindale. Yep, I was a lucky SoCal native, and the volume of year-round races spoiled us with the intensity of the nitro shows right there in front of us -- freeway close as the radio commercials on KFWB, KRLA and KHJ touted. I didn’t go to every one of them by any means, but I knew there was another Funny Car show right around the corner, so if I didn’t make one 64-Funny-Cars event, no biggie.
Viewing Jack Chrisman in the Sachs and Sons ’64 Comet B/FD at Indy at age 15 probably had something to do with my love of the floppers and warping my brain. (DRO file photo)
I don’t remember exactly when the local Funny Car show disappeared; it was a combination of expense, the demise of Lions, Irwindale, San Fernando and OCIR, but they are long, long gone. I’ve often remembered the Manufacturer’s Meets at OCIR, how innocent we all were with pit spaces full of ramp trucks. No terrorism threats, it was just those who wanted to buy a ticket and which Funny car stars were running. And the ticket costs were next to nothing, in 2006 terms a real entertainment value.
Funny, but it didn’t matter much which drivers were driving which cars. They had to be fiberglass bodies, make smoky burnouts, dry hops and look like they were on the edge of being out of control the way Wild Willie Borsch drove the “Winged Express” in that great Bob McClurg shot at Pomona, before it was a Fairplex. The words “Funny Cars” had and still have a magnetic, hypnotic effect on the public.
Funny Cars never could hold a performance candle to the “Ridge Route Terrors” of Warren Coburn & Miller, Garlits or the Greek and the other killer dragster players of the time, but for me there was always this affinity I had with the floppers, one could find something kinda like it at the local Dodge, Ford or Chevy dealer. Part cartoon, part carnival side show, all drag racing, but those guys like Dale Pulde, Dickie Harrell, Randy Walls, Joe Pisano, Roland Leong, the Snake, the Ace, the Mongoose, Pat Foster, Jim Dunn, Mr. Norm, Dyno Don, Jack Chrisman, Gas Ronda and so many more provided hours and hours of entertainment for us. Dragsters...who needs em!
As a teenager I was sucked in big time. It has been said that those who ignore history, are condemned to repeat it, and, damn, I hope so this time! Today, with resurgence of vintage nitro Funny Cars sporting pre-1980 bodies -- and by my rough count there are about 32 -- where are all the new floppers going to race in 2007?
Since the majority of classic VRA-legal nitro Funny Cars reside on the Left Coast I find many different ideas of how competition should be handled. At this time Goodguys appears to want to host the annual March Meet with possibly two more events. Some owners I have spoken with don’t care for a points system, some want Chicago-style match races, and others are satisfied with three or four West Coast Goodguys-type events with a year-end champ crowned and a few match races thrown in.
Back in 2000 I remember the grandiose promises of Bill Chapman’s ADRA trying to siphon off the “lucrative” nostalgia/vintage market from Goodguys. They parked their flashy big-rig operation down the road from Famoso Raceway with the promise of a “professional” series for the nostalgia bunch. With one big race in the books, the vintage guys were hooked deeply. This was yet another distraction and a stab at Goodguys that some rabid supporters are still paying off credit card balances for ADRA expenses when it folded. Then a rumor pops up recently that NHRA is considering a “Museum Series” to manage vintage races at NHRA member tracks if Goodguys cuts back. Oh God, NO!
My solution is to take baby steps to let the Funny Car movement grow. Let market factors decide if there is potential to embrace eight or 10 events But for now stay out of the big venues like the Fairplex, Sonoma and the like. If some promoter wants to lay it out there at comparatively smaller tracks like California Dragway, Sacramento, Boise, Famoso, Tucson, LACR, Speedworld, Woodburn and Rocky Mountain Raceway in Utah, see if the groundswell of ticket sales follows.
Work on your Funny Car acts you guys, cultivate real sponsors, share tune-ups, hire professionals to book the shows and create your PR to build buzz in the local papers and with us in the national media.
Chance the Gardener said it best in the movie Being There, "As long as the roots are not severed, all will be well in the garden...there will be growth in the spring."
Remember your roots, but do it your way, not by copying the BIG Show. Do it with flair: put on a show with smoky burnouts and dry hops and, hopefully, we’ll be seeing today’s version of 64 Funny Cars advertised here in DRO and on local AM/FM and now Satellite radio stations as we did in back the ‘60s.
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