NITRO SPEC RULES NOT ALL BAD

NHRA protects racers from themselves?

3/8/05

t’s easy to rail against the NHRA’s recent announcement of an engine moratorium for its nitro classes—especially since the sanctioning body went so far as to say it’s part of developing an NHRA "Spec" (their quotation marks) Top Fuel/Funny Car racing engine.

First off, maybe I’m just being a prickly editor type here, but why the quotes? To me it suggests that they’re trying to soften the blow, as if putting little marks around the word makes it some sort of ironic equivalent. Just call a spade a spade, I say, and get on with it.

The NHRA is moving toward mandating specified engines in Top Fuel and Funny Car—period. In fact, it wouldn’t surprise me at all if someday all engine blocks, cylinder heads, intake manifolds, fuel injectors, blowers, and even clutch systems for the nitro burners are available only from authorized NHRA suppliers, just as critical components like fuel and tires already are.

Obviously, purists and traditionalists aren’t going to like this one bit. It takes away innovation, they’ll cry; it mocks the history and nature of these classes to go ever faster; it just won’t be real drag racing. And a few years ago I would’ve agreed. Heck, I agree even now, but the writing’s on the wall and something has to be done to rein in both speed and cost. I don’t know if spec engines are the answer, but at least NHRA is taking a bold step to find out.

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I’ve argued in this space before that fans—even longtime, experienced, knowledgeable fans—can’t tell the difference between a 300-mph pass and a 330-mph pass by anything but the scoreboard, but I also firmly believe that those big numbers are critical to the appeal of the sport. So I have no problem with NHRA limiting engine technology as long as we still regularly see those 320- to 330-mph laps.

And I’m well aware the fuel classes were built on record setting, but they were bound to reach their limits. NASCAR found its limit in the late ‘80s when it decided 200 mph would be its never-exceed speed, and it’s maintained and enforced that decision for all these years, obviously without losing ground in the popularity race.

Normally, I can’t stand the “It-works-for-NASCAR-so-it’ll-work-for-us” mentality, but in this case I think it really does work. NASCAR refocused from record-breaking qualifying speeds to hyping the setting of the field and presenting close racing (thanks in large part to what have basically become spec cars), and I don’t see why a similar shift in focus would necessarily hurt nitro racing.