Riverside Raceway, located in the town of Riverside southeast of Los Angeles, was the site selected. The Hot Rod and NHRA crowd figured on a huge turnout of cars (500 was the absolute limit) and a goodly amount of spectators. Pomona Raceway had its own weekly show and couldn't get free to host the race and Lions Dragstrip was hosting two-day UDRA Top Fuel show that same weekend, so the Riverside facility figured as a natural.

While most remember Riverside from the days of Formula-1/Indy Car drivers like Dan Gurney, Roger Penske, Graham Hill, A.J. Foyt, Rodger Ward, Jim Clark, and Jim Hall, the place did hold drag races from the very early 1950s on. If there was any problem, it was, save for the very late 1950s and very early 1960s, not many races were held.

Track manager and former L.A. Rams NFL star Les Richter was more than happy to hold the show and sunk $40,000 into track improvements for the event. This involved fencing, thousands of yards of earth moving, paving and spilling, developed a huge pit area in the area adjacent the long straightaway to the Champion Spark Plugs spectator bridge off of turn nine. The track was upgraded to include a strong shutoff area and new bleachers.

The ads preceding the race painted a pretty picture. After announcing the first Hot Rod Magazine Championship Drag Races on June 12-14, the reader's eyes were caught by the words "Biggest Prizes!" Over $37,000 in cash and merchandise was put up by the event backers.

In the days of the $500 to $1,000-to-win purses, the Riverside race stacked well. The Top Fuel winner would get $2,000 cash and a brand new 1964 Ford Mustang, the Top Gas winner would get $675 and the new Mustang and, in a special drawing, some lucky spectator would get a Ford, too.

The list of stars was superior, and it had to be. At Lions that same Saturday weekend, Southern California Top Fuel stars like Paul Sutherland's "Charger," the Donovan Engineering dragster with Tom McEwen up, Ted Gotelli-Denny Milani, Adams-Rasmussen-Stewart, Zeuschel-Fuller-Moody, and Jim Brissette's dragster were just a handful of the big cars scheduled to appear.

However, the Hot Rod meet had its gate attractions, also. Scheduled to appear were Top Fuel teams like Greer-Black-Prudhome, recent Winternationals winners Crossley-Williams-Swan, Connie Kalitta, Don Garlits and Connie Swingle, Joe Schubeck, and the "Frantic Four" dragster of Weekly-Rivero-Fox-Holding. Other teams like Stone-Woods-Cook and "Big John" Mazmanian's A/GS Willys' and the Top Gas dragsters of Winternationals winner Danny Ongais, 1963 and 1964 Bakersfield winner Gordon Collett, and Tony Nancy's streamlined, rear-engine "Wedge" were also among many of the stars.

In addition, NHRA announced that the race would be a Regional Championship event. Winners of the race received the above bonus awards plus points towards the association's world points championships. As per usual, such a race meant that National Records could be set for hot class (Top Fuel, Top Gas, Comp, etc.) entries during the three-day show. All NHRA national event race crews would be working the show under Southwestern Director Bernie Partridge's baton.

The race proved to be quite successful and, short of NHRA's Winternationals and Indy Nationals, was the best event they produced that year. The car entry level was around 400 cars and 24,000 fans for the three days filled the bleachers. The racing was above average.

 Copyright 1999-2001, Drag Racing Online and Racing Net Source