TIMING IS EVERYTHING

I found Jeff Leonard's comments about how the stands empty after pro qualifying and fill just before, and the pit areas correspondingly fill and empty to be interesting. This has been touched on before many times, and people just say, "Yeah, yeah."

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All you have to do is work for a while at a major drag strip (one with a national event) in a capacity where your job may involve getting people or merchandise from one place to another and you realize how important it is to pay attention to the schedule.

In more than ten years at IRP, I learned that if you wanted to get around the property during the U.S. Nationals, you did it while the pros were running. We had people who practically made a career of delivering parts to the pit area during pro sessions.

In the last couple of years, we had another major rule apply. Never, never, never go over on the west side (mostly sportsman) just before a lane call for Super Gas or Super Comp. Can you say "grid lock?"

Another point, I liked the Agent's comment on changing the locations of tracks, like Joliet being referred to as "Chicago." Seems like the reverse was always true at IRP. National Dragster always used, "Clermont" and changed my copy to the same thing when I sent anything in.

On the other hand, once during the Southern Nationals, one of our people was looking at the paper and asked me, "Why do they call it Atlanta Dragway? It's nowhere near Atlanta."

My reply? "For the same reason we don't call this Clermont Raceway Park."

John Potts

INDEXES

I agree with (Burk) 100%. Maybe the index should be 7.50 it doesn't matter. A faster index for all Super classes and qualifying would be excellent and it seems everyone can almost run those numbers anyway. If you can't, go bracket racing.

Kurt Carlson

THAT'S ENTERTAINMENT?

Jeff,

I surfed by a Professional Bowling program the other day and after 5 minutes of watching I thought Vince McMahon had bought the PBA.

What's with everything has to have an attitude? Even the Orange County Choppers father and son and Food Fight on the Food Network.

For me, it takes the fun out of it. I tape all Drag Racing and fast forward all the interviews and commercials. I just want to see the racing. Period!

Al Booton

LIKES THE OLD CAR LOOK

Thanks for the story of the Hot Rod Reunion in Bakersfield! It's good to see those funny car guys are building cars that really remind me of the old days. The cars in your pictures look more like the kind I remember at OCIR than the front engined dragsters running today. What is the deal with front engined nitro dragsters looking like a wacko cross between a dragster and a funny car and the driver sits up so damn high. I don't remember old dragsters with billet Allen Johnson aluminum cylinder heads either. Keep it simple and affordable!

Steven Lang
Phoenix, AZ