1001 Drag Racing Facts. Doug Boyce

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       Jack Chrisman (right) and crew pose proudly with the twin Chevy-powered Howards Cams Special. The surrounding hardware is but a fraction of what the Twin Bear accumulated into the 1962 season. Jack has the honor of recording the first 8-second quarter-mile time with this car. In 1964 he introduced the drag race world to the first blown and injected nitromethane-fed full-body sedan. This 1964 Mercury Comet is considered by many to be the origin of today’s Funny Car.

      52 Mickey Thompson was without a doubt one of the sport’s true innovators. In 1962 he developed his own Pontiac aluminum Hemi cylinder heads (20 sets), bolted a pair on a poked-and-stroked experimental aluminum 389 block measuring 450 inches, and dropped the works into a Dragmaster rail. Jack Chrisman was hired to drive the car and he proceeded to defeat Don Garlits at the 1962 NHRA Nationals. Jack cranked out an 8.76 at 171.75 mph in the final to give Pontiac its only Top Eliminator win.

      53 The 1960s were by far the most innovative, diverse decade in drag racing history. Take the Cook brothers’ B/Fueler (on alcohol) for instance. They designed and built their own direct-drive three-wheel sidewinder, debuting the spectacle on January 6, 1963, at San Gabriel. Driven by Jeff Jahns, the side-winding 297-inch Hemi rail had initial times of 8.77 at 177.5 mph.

      54 James Warren and Roger Coburn were the first ones to make use of the Simpson drag chute, in an AHRA competition in 1965. With the introduction of the Simpson chute, racers could finally say good-bye to the army-surplus chutes they had been using.

      55 The Bakersfield-based team of Warren, Coburn & [Marvin] Miller sure earned the name Ridge Route Terrors. The team was so feared in Southern California during the latter half of the 1960s that the competition posted lookouts at off-ramps to see which track the team members were heading for. Once it was determined which track they were going to, the competition headed for a different track.

      56 Val LaPorte holds the distinction of being the first known AA/FD pilot to run his car off the end of a track and submerge it in a drainage ditch (now there’s something to be remembered for). Val did the deed at Florida’s Palm Beach International, now known as Moroso Motorsports Park, in 1965 while filming a local beer commercial.

      57 Don Garlits and those on the Left Coast have always had a love/hate relationship with each other. Maybe it all stems from 1960 when Garlits was paid a large sum of money to appear at Bakersfield. During the early 1960s, the pendulum was leaning toward the hate side, I think, and was compounded by his win at Bakersfield in 1965. Not only did Don grab Top Eliminator, but his stablemate Marvin Schwartz took runner-up. Garlits took his first Bakersfield win with an 8.10 at 205 mph to Marvin’s 8.15 at 175 mph.

       Known as the Ridge Route Terrors, James Warren, Roger Coburn, and Marvin Miller earned their much-feared reputation. Their competition went out of their way to avoid these guys. (Photo Courtesy James Handy)

      58 Have you ever wondered where that long-standing feud between Garlits and the late NHRA President Wally Parks originated? Well, wonder no more. It harkens back to the first Winternationals held in 1960 at Spruce Creek Drag Strip in Daytona, Florida. The winter meet was a mix of the NHRA and the recently formed drag race division of NASCAR. After a week’s worth of dragging, local hero Garlits was crowned overall points champion and Top Eliminator champion. After driving back up the track in the wrong direction, Garlits became involved in a heated argument with Parks, who immediately disqualified him. Although the two were the biggest names in the sport, they never had what you might call an agreeable relationship.

      59 Early A/FD heroes were Steve Porter and Herb Reis and their world’s quickest and fastest Oldsmobile. The Olds became just the fourth Top Fueler to crank out a 7-second time when Porter and Reis hit a 7.96 at 189 mph on December 9, 1962, at Pomona. They came close to defeating Garlits in the final at the 1963 NHRA Winternationals.

      60 Pete Robinson didn’t earn the nickname “Sneaky” for no reason. Prior to the 1963 running of the NHRA Nationals, Pete had installed a jacking system on his small-block Chevy-powered AA/Dragster (sound familiar?). Trying to get one up on the Hemi competition, Pete staged his dragster, raised the rear, and spun the tires at approximately half throttle. When the light turned green, he lowered the rear and got the jump on the Hemis. Although nothing in the rulebook noted that the jacks were illegal, after Robinson set low ET with an 8.50, NHRA Director Ed Eaton quickly banned their use.

      61 With Ford support, Sneaky Pete made the switch from his fuel-fed small-block Ford late in 1965 to an SOHC 427. The manufacturer had built the engine specifically to battle Chrysler’s Hemi in NASCAR, but when Bill France said no to the exotic engine, it was passed on to the drag guys. Unike the Hemi, the SOHC was never tamed for street use and after 1968 was no longer available.

       Sneaky Pete really SOHC’ed it to them with his 427 Cammer. Among other innovations, he designed his own gear drive for the Cammer, which replaced the flexible chain Ford used to run the two cams. (Photo Courtesy Joel Naprstek)

      62 Pete Robinson’s only world championship came in 1966. In the finals, Pete downed Division 7 champ Dave Beebe with a 7.19 clocking.

      63 In 1963, Drag News hailed Dale Grantham’s turbine dragster as the future of the sport. Dale’s turbine weighed a meager 725 pounds and produced 800 hp. The turbines, originally used as DC-8 starters, were modified and used just one combustor for both turbines. Fueling the turbine was kerosene. The fuel and air were admitted through the combustor and ignited by a Champion igniter plug. Water injection cooled the charge from 35,000 degrees to a manageable 1,000 to 1,200 degrees. Built in just six months at a cost of $14,000, the car had quarter-mile times well into the 9-second range. Due to poor traction, the dragster’s true potential was never realized.

      64 Garlits cracked the magical 200-mph mark at New York National Speedway on August 2, 1964. Big Daddy pushed his Wynn’s Jammer to a once-unthought-of 201.34 in 7.78 seconds. As Don climbed out, he was quoted saying, “It’s like being in another world.”

      65 Ed “Big Daddy” Roth, Rat Fink extraordinaire, entered the custom rail scene in 1965 when he debuted his Yellow Fang full-body dragster. The 392-powered car featured a full Tom Hanna body with a (some say) grossly extended, pointed, tail end. Piloted by George “Bushmaster” Schreiber, the 153-inch rail initially featured an enclosed canopy. The NHRA frowned upon the enclosed cockpit, which Roth solved by cutting a square out of the plexiglass. In mid–1966, Yellow Fang was one of the few streamliners capable of cracking 200 mph.

      66 Why is it that rock ’n’ roll super groups are rarely super? Drag racing has had its share of super groups. The Magicar of chassis builder Kent Fuller, engine man Ron Winkel, and PR man Kaye Trapp showcases just one. Although Magicar failed to meet performance expectations, its uniqueness made it an instant standout and a key in the evolution of the dragster. While most rails of the day relied upon a solid mounted rear axle, the Magicar used a coil-spring suspension, mounted on a subframe.

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