Grumpy Jenkins with his second Stock Eliminator 1966 Nova that ran in both SS/C and B/FX. After his first Nova was destroyed in a towing accident after the 1966 US Nationals, he showed up later in the year with this replacement. It ran in both the 1967 NHRA and AHRA Winternationals, before being replaced by his legendary Camaro. This is the A/S Nova that propelled Jenkins to fortune and fame running a 327ci, 350hp L-79 small block (with and estimated 420hp after Grump’s massaging), 4-speed against the Dodge and Plymouth 426ci Hemis, setting a class record of 11.66, back when a mid-11 second stocker really meant something. In 1967 Chevy added Grumpy to their payroll. They knew they had a winner. After Grump’s time with the Nova it was sold and ran in C/MP out of Johnstown, PA, for years after.
If you’re longing for the glory days of Pro Stock when it represented Chevy, Chrysler, and Ford, with mountain motor majesty and gear banging action, you are in luck. A touring group of Pro Stock stalwarts with strict rules governing the cars’ specs, tied to the eras they represent, could soon blow into a dragstrip near you. Mike Ruth, who races a Bob Glidden tribute Ford Fairmont, started the Midwest Nostalgia Pro Stock Association (MWNPSA) to race like-minded drivers with similar tribute cars, “paying tribute to the legends,” as he says. Attending many of the nostalgia drag races throughout the Midwest and East Coast, this gang of 10 or so cars representing slammers from the late-1960s to 1980s run times ranging from 9 to 7 seconds in the quarter-mile. “We like to pair them up evenly and then put on a show,” Ruth says.
Running on a pro tree, heads up, these cars are really racing. Most of the cars are accurate recreations, with safety updates certified to current NHRA specs. Ruth cautions that the faster the cars go, the more modern they have to be, so the group is very serious about keeping the accuracy and then matching the cars, rather than owners reaching for ever-quicker times.
The majority of the cars have four-speed Lenco transmissions and all of them feature steel rear back halves and tops; no carbon fiber, no beadlock wheels, aero scoops, Pro Mod–style wheelie bars and wings, and no nitrous or turbos. “The fans are more savvy than you might think,” Ruth says. Plus the original builders, families, or estates first sign all of the cars off, which also lend a certain amount of legitimacy to the cars. In some cases, the offspring of racers—like legendary driver Ronnie Sox’s son, Dean—show up to drive one of the recreated rides. Says Ruth, “He’s a big fan of what we’re doing and sometimes comes out with the Billy the Kid car of Billy Step, which his dad drove for a time in the 1970s.”
With the value of name Pro Stock cars being so high, and as most are in museums, there’s little chance of ever seeing them run again. This is an excellent way to see, hear, and smell 1970s and 1980s Pro Stock cars again, with a bunch of owners enjoying keeping the flame alive.
“We’re all friends, and so we try to help each other out,” Ruth says.
Share the excitement of Pro Stock from back in the day, with some cars and owners that bleed Pro Stock. If your view of the current state of affairs in Pro Stock is making you yearn for the glory days of Grumpy Jenkins, Reher and Morrison, and Bob Glidden, then check out the MWNPSA schedule at MWNPSA.com and make plans for some heads-up, pounding Pro Stock.
Jungle George Kubis’ 1978 Plymouth Arrow stays true to the original Billy the Kid car shoed at one point by Ronnie Sox. A 498ci Keith Black Hemi features Stage 5 heads, Quick Fuel 1050 carbs on an original Weiand intake, with a Lenco four-speed, and McCloud clutch. Kubis, along with Doug Christansen, fabbed the chassis, with Glen Gilmore handling interior chores. Kubis and Gary Gabehart shot the infamous red, white, and blue paint combo.This recreation of Bill “Grumpy” Jenkin’s 1981 Grumpy’s Toy XVI Camaro owned and built by Pappas Motorsports features a Jenkins/Black Arrow 500ci Chevy with carbs built by Davinci Performance. Richard Earl at Suncoast Race Cars built the chassis, housing a four-speed Lenco, and Strange rear end, axles, struts, and brakes. Paint was handled by Precision Auto.Mile Ruth’s Bob Glidden 1978 Ford Fairmount started out as an original no-name Pro Stocker, which Ruth made a few changes to in recreating the Glidden ’Mount. A 500ci Ford SVO block and heads fill the engine compartment with head and intake porting and flowing by Xccelerated Flow Solutions. The Lenco four-speed puts power to the original “Thru Bolt” 9-inch rear with back brace, and Strange centersection and axles. Body and paint by Chuck Esdale features Brando lettering.Another Grumpy’s Toy, this one being the IX 1973 Vega, a car that originally raced in the 1970s and 1980s before being configured into the Toy in 2012 by current owner John Denbrock. Mid-Towne Collision in Howell, Michigan, handled paint and bodywork, with help from pals Bill and Chris Merrill, Rick Hanifan, and Stacy Karnes.Mark Pappas’ tribute to Pro Stock driver Lee Shepherd is this 1981 Reher and Morrison Camaro. The 500ci engine was custom built by David Reher, spinning a four-speed Lenco, Browell housing, Boninfante clutch, and complete Strange rear end. The chassis was fabbed by Chris Duncan Race Cars and painted by Precision Auto.Here’s what we mean by “mountain motor majesty.” Dual carbs on a cast hi-rise, proudly displaying all of its 500 cubic inches right in your face. From the looks of those headers, it looks like you could stick your arm into the head ports!
Some hot rod enthusiasts want to go fast and some want their cars to be unique, but whichever way you flip the coin, the essence of hot rodding is self-expression. There are a million ways to go fast and a million more to personalize and improve the look of your heap. While digging through the HOT ROD archives, we came across these two cars, shot within a month of each other in 1956. In the same window of time, you see two completely different approaches for personalizing cars back in March 1956. The Caddy is from Florida, though it appears to have been shot just outside of the Indianapolis Speedway, while the smoothed-off 1946 Ford is from California.
One endeavors to improve the aesthetics with add-on accessories—piling on if you will, to draw attention through the abundant use of chrome ornamentation and adding external components. The other does the opposite: removing much of its ornamentation to reveal a simplified form that draws attention due to its starkness. Neither one is right or wrong, although most HOT ROD readers would probably prefer the Ford to the Cadillac. In the end, you’ve got to love the way our passion for modifying cars expresses itself in so many unique and unpredictable ways.
It’s mind blowing that modifying a Gremmie, in most cases, makes them look better no matter how they’re modified. This Gremlin looks especially good. Maybe it’s because there’s less sheetmetal, or maybe because it’s hugging the ground at an insane degree? We don’t care the reason. We like this screaming yellow zonker, and hope that by featuring it for Freak Show Friday it will encourage you to go outside of your comfort zone and build something wild! As is shown it can be as cheap as dirt. It just takes some time, skill and the guts to do it. Are you in?
Pete Chapouris, the “Pete” of Pete and Jakes fame, who would go on to resurrect the moribund So Cal Speed Shop, has died. He was 74. The San Gabriel Valley, California, native grew up around fast cars due to his dad, who had a series of customized hot rods. That and the hot rod climate around the Pasadena area sparked a love for old, fast iron. Working for Clayton Manufacturing building dynamometers in the late-1960s, he built a series of hot rods for himself including a resurrected old 1934 lakes coupe that caught the attention of Rod & Custom staffer Gray Baskerville, who was also following the build of another 1934 coupe by former R&C staffer Jake Jacobs. The pair was featured on the cover of R&C, while Pete’s flamed coupe became the star of the made-for-TV movie The California Kid starring Martin Sheen.
It wasn’t long before the two went into business starting Pete and Jakes Hot Rod Repair, building customer cars and also a project car for HOT ROD magazine. Soon the “Repair” part of their moniker was dropped, to morph into Pete and Jakes Hot Rod Parts. With Jake’s ability to create clean, affordable parts for Model As and Early Ford cars, and Pete’s business, manufacturing and marketing savvy, Pete and Jakes became synonymous for state-of-the-art hot rod components by the mid-1970s from their shop in Temple City. This was at a time when the second coming of the hot rod was happening, putting P&J in the right place at the right time. They went on to build a series of projects followed by HOT ROD magazine to help promote their component lines. By 1987 they sold their business to Jerry Slover in Peculiar, Missouri, which continues today under son Jason. Pete went on to the Specialty Equipment Marketing Association (SEMA), helping to form the Street Rod Equipment Association as a means to bring some clout to the young industry to help battle legislation and position them for a better footing with the National Street Rod Association. This became the Hot Rod Industry Alliance we know today. From there Pete joined friend Bob Bauder to again build cars, and then broke away to form what became So Cal Speed Shop after broaching the idea with So Cal founder Alex Xydias. This too became a highly successful venture, resulting in numerous franchises throughout the country. Pete’s reach allowed him to mentor many an up and coming builder, both through So Cal, but also through his efforts to stay connected to the industry as a whole. He leaves behind his wife of 50 years Carol, daughter Nicole, son Peter IV, and five grandkids. His influence in the style, quality, organization, and culture of hot rodding is immense, and will be his professional legacy.
For a Friday the 13th Freak Show Friday we had to come up with something sinister and sick; so here ya go. How much more sick this is than sinister is up to your perception of what we have, which we at HOT ROD have trouble determining. Camaro? Ferrari? Corvette? Who cares what they started with; let’s revel in the majesty of the display of bondo sculpting expertise. What inner demons compelled this person to execute this unique combo of craftsmanship and fright escapes us, but maybe his shrink knows why. Rather than ponder, let’s just enjoy this person’s ability to get their demons out manifesting itself in the perfect Friday the 13th Freak Show Fright day.
Fifty years ago, a woman emerged in the drag-racing scene and changed the face of the quarter-mile sport, modeling what women can achieve in an especially male-dominated field. Shirley Muldowney, the fresh-faced shoe from Schenectady, New York, received her NHRA pro license in 1965, and by 1966 was piloting an injected Gas dragster in this shot from the NASCAR Summernationals in West Salem, Ohio. Is that determination in her face or satisfaction from envisioning a trajectory to become a three-time Top Fuel World Champion in 1977, 1980, and 1982? Said to be the most naturally talented Top Fuel driver ever, after her recovery from a violent crash in 1984, she continued running in Top Fuel until her retirement in 2003. Besides making a difference as a model for what women can achieve, she continues to make a difference with her Shirley’s Kids charitable organization, helping children in need in communities where drag racing takes place. She’s a role model not just for women but for us all.
While some might call this a Resto-Rod, we call it timeless. Dick Rundell’s 1928 Ford phaeton graced HOT ROD’s December 1966 cover, with Dick lowering his Hilborn-injected small block into the Model A tub. This shot was from a later date for a Rod & Custom magazine feature. What this proves is that all of the mumbo-jumbo of body mods and tricks so prevalent in hot rod builds today are unnecessary when you can take what is basically an unmodified Model A, and with the right stance, wheel/tire combo, and clean craftsmanship, build yourself such a timeless looker like Rundell’s tub that holds up from 50 years ago.
Lew Arrington built a series of mean “Brutus” Funny Cars, with this 1971 Mustang his last. Originally based out of San Jose, California, he eventually migrated to Pennsylvania. Besides his string of Funnies, he is also credited with driving the first rocket-powered Funny Car. Always show-y, this Brutus was adorned with freak dots on the hood and top, which you may or may not be able to see in this grainy photo from one of those damp nights at Orange County International Raceway in 1971. Arrington’s last Brutus burned up at New England Dragway in 1972. Arrington died of heart disease in February 2008.
In our occasional look back at HOT ROD editors, we bring you the editor with the distinction of holding that position for the least amount of time: nine months. “Too Tall” Pat Ganahl is the first to admit he knew his days were probably numbered when he took the position. It wasn’t from a lack of talent or experience, but maybe a lack of tolerance for office politics. Internal politics can get nasty, and unfortunately, Pat held reign during a time when HOT ROD overlords outnumbered the editorial side.
His nemesis was John Dianna, who on his first day as HOT ROD publisher announced he would make the staff work 110 percent. Pat immediately replied, “Gee, that sounds good to me, I’d like to slow down about 40 percent.”
Pat had a master’s degree in English literature after first pursuing mechanical engineering, so he was more than qualified when first venturing into the publishing fringes leading to editorship of Street Rodder magazine, barely a year old at the time. He had been offered a job at HOT ROD by then-editor Terry Cook, but needed to stay in Orange County so wife Anna could finish her doctorate at the University of California, Irvine. Commuting to HOT ROD’s Sunset Strip digs was deemed too far.
Pat stayed with Street Rodder for five years. Says Pat, “I didn’t want to be a hot rod writer, I wanted to be a real writer, so I ended up getting a job at Sunset magazine as an outdoor travel editor.” He also did freelance stories for the likes of Guitar Player and Sports Illustrated, among others. “By then, I had already done a couple of technical books for SA Design—one on nitrous oxide and the second on Ford engines—and they sold well.”
A chance encounter with HOT ROD Editor Lenny Emanuelson on the starting line at the 1983 Winternationals at Pomona became prescient. Lenny asked Pat why he was working for a “housewives” magazine when he was the best hot rod writer he knew? Pat responded, “Well, if that’s how you feel, I want to work for HOT ROD, and I want your job.” Lenny said, “OK.”
Things were changing at Petersen Publishing, HOT ROD’s mothership. Longtime VP Dick Day was retiring, and there was a plan for HOT ROD Publisher Harry Hibler to replace Day, with Lenny jumping from the editor’s chair to publisher. Now their plan was complete, with Pat set to become HOT ROD’s next editor. He started in May 1983 as a staff editor, waiting for the changing of the guard.
As a staffer, Pat had fun doing a supercharger shootout, teaming with Gray Baskerville to cover the fledgling nostalgia drag racing efforts taking place in northern California, and generally doing all of the cool stuff you’ve come to love from HOT ROD. “I did a story called ‘Re-evolution,’ which was preserving, restoring and re-running vintage dragsters,” Pat says. “Garlits was putting his museum together and Art Chrisman had restored his Hustler dragster. The idea was to find an old dragster, restore it, and take it out and run it down the track. It was something the reader could do that was affordable and fun.”
Another assignment was HOT ROD’s “Flashback ’57,” a 1957 Chevy to be given away at the HOT ROD Supernationals to some lucky participant. “I did the Flashback ’57, and all of the corporate attorneys got involved, plus Dianna liked to make rules,” Pat says. “He told us we couldn’t do any mechanical modifications if we were giving it away. Here we are HOT ROD magazine and we can’t give away a modified hot rod. Everything on the car had to be stock mechanically, but I could do body mods, so we did it as an early 1960s mild custom/street rod. It had a dual-quad, 270hp, 283ci, T10 four-speed, posi rear end, and it even had stock repro seat covers.”
Then, before the planned musical-chair plan could commence, “John Dianna came waltzing through the door,” Pat says. Dianna was a polarizing figure at Petersen, with some loving him—others, not so much. “It didn’t take long before Leonard threw up his hands and said, ‘I’m out of here, I can’t work for this guy.’” Pat was next in line.
“There were so many stock cars on the covers of the nine issues I did, and it was Dianna choosing them. I was editor, but he was picking the covers,” Pat says. “The things I got into the magazine were the things I got in edgewise.”
Oct. 1986 was Pat’s first issue after Lenny vacated. Says Pat, “I had a staff of five people besides me that included Gray Baskerville, John Baechtel, Marlan Davis, and then two guys we called ‘the kids’: Todd Howard and Scott Dahlquist. What was really fun was that I was never a manager of people before, so you can imagine what it was like managing such a diverse group, especially Gray and Marlan. Having staff meetings, corralling their ideas and then putting it in a magazine every month was fun.
“The first cover that was my own was ‘Low-Buck Specials.’ I put three homebuilt cars on the cover. I got called into John’s office and was dressed down because there was an old guy at the gas pump and I didn’t have some sexy woman instead.” That same issue is well remembered for Pat’s “Caddy Hack” article. “The whole idea was Newton’s laws of physics. Without spending a dime on the car other than cutoff blades, by taking weight out, it will go faster and faster with the same amount of horsepower.” Variations on this theme have been tried numerous times in HOT ROD since.
And, of course, the infamous swimsuit issue followed. “The point was that every April we did some kind of spoof or April Fools’ thing; in fact, we made fun of John Dianna the year before,” Pat says. At the time, no swimsuit issue existed besides Sports Illustrated, so this was fertile ground to try something a little different and hopefully increase newsstand sales, too. “I went back to the earliest issues of HOT ROD when they had ‘Parts With Appeal’ with the girls holding parts in swimsuits next to a car,” Pat says. “Back then a lot of photographers got women in bathing suits to pose next to cars they shot. Why were these girls in bathing suits next to cars—they weren’t at the beach? So that was the irony and spoof. Dianna OK’d it and we got cover comps made.”
Every six months, editors had two-year planning meetings with Petersen President Fred Waingrow. Says Pat, “We’d have to go to Waingrow’s office with Dianna sitting to Waingrow’s left and circulation guy Nigel Heaton at his right. There were a bunch of suits telling us what we needed to do to our magazine to make it sell better on the newsstand. Waingrow would go through an issue and yea or nay what he saw. As editor, I had these boards made up as color comps—drawings of upcoming covers so they could be approved. One was a girl in a polka-dot bikini standing by the car with the blurb ‘First and Last Swimsuit Issue?’ In these meetings, if Waingrow thumbed through the pages and turned a page back everyone would freeze and go, ‘Oh my God!’ So I show this cover comp and start to explain it and Waingrow goes, ‘What?’ with this flabbergasted response. Dianna literally jumped up on his chair—he stood on top of his chair and said, ‘Mr Waingrow, this is the first I’ve heard of this—I don’t know anything about this.’ So Dianna disavows the whole thing. I explained that it was going to be in fun and it was spoofing the old Parts With Appeal, that they would be professional photos with each girl dressed in bathing suits like you’d see at the beach in California, not salacious. We would credit the hair stylist, whose bathing suit she was wearing, things like that.”
Without getting too far into the swamp, Waingrow did approve it and the very rocky road leading to Pat’s swimsuit issue wound its way to completion. If you thought this was the reason Pat was fired from his editorship and sent back to staff editor purgatory, you’d be wrong. That happened a few days after the swimsuit issue was complete. Dianna wanted to replace Pat’s managing editor with someone else, which Pat felt was arbitrary and without warrant. This was in the days before human resources, so there was no advocate to take up personnel issues. Pat pushed back, telling Dianna if he didn’t like what he was doing, to find another editor. The next day, Pat was no longer editor of HOT ROD.
Says Pat, “The big thing was the swimsuit issue hadn’t come out yet, and of course, when it did it was a huge success. It takes a few months to get the sales figures once it’s off sale, so it wasn’t until months later they found the swimsuit issue sold 100,000 more copies on the newsstand. That was almost $300,000 in Mr. Petersen’s pocket—it was total profit. And guess who took all of the credit for it? John Dianna.”
Pat stayed with HOT ROD until mid-1988 when he was chosen by former HOT ROD Editor Lee Kelley to bring back Rod & Custom magazine. “The whole thing was totally bootstrapped, and we brought it back successfully,” Pat says. “At six months, we were within 5 percent of Street Rodder’s circulation. I did R&C for the next five years, although doing it by myself almost killed me.” From there he continued writing occasionally for HOT ROD, R&C, as well as a new magazine called Rodder’s Journal. More books followed—20 in all—but it has only been in the last few months that Pat has done something he never thought he could do. “I’m retired,” he says. “I’ve done a lot of good stuff, I’m proud of what I did, and I think it was pretty well done, creative, and spoke to the audience, so I’m done.”
Throughout his career, Pat has built a succession of cars, including restoring his historic Iacono dragster, building a two-time March Meet Top Fuel–winning dragster with his hero Gene Adams and Don Enriquez, and a myriad of street cars that include a 1932 Chevy coupe, 1932 Ford roadster, 1952 and 1953 Chevys, his 1956 Ford F-100 pickup he uses to haul his race cars, and more. “Building cars was my hobby and writing about them was my work,” Pat says. “I’ve always been building a hot rod. Part of my success is I was building while I was writing about it. My only regret is that I didn’t have time to work on my own cars more. Now I look at retirement as not only can I get the house finished but I can get some car projects done.”
His current project is what he calls his “Road Rod.” Says Pat, “I’ve never had a hot rod for more than to drive around town, even though I’ve driven my roadster to Pleasanton several times with the 1940 trans and 1934 rear end. My 1948 Chevy had the original 4:11 gears in it, with a 235ci straight-six with every piece of speed equipment you could put on it and a stock 1948 Chevy transmission. I put 14 transmissions, six engines, and four rear ends in that car during the time I had it. I used to drive around with a spare transmission, regulator, and generator in the trunk, and I’ve changed axles by the side of the road—I went through all of this with that car.”
So now he’s building a cruiser from a very nice 1933 Ford Fordor sedan, something with enough accouterments so both he and Anna can drive it anytime, anywhere. “I don’t care how fast it is, I want air conditioning, an electric fan, Vega steering, disc brakes, single AFB, 9-inch rear end, adjustable coilovers. It will be practical, comfortable, with Toyota Camry seats with lumbar support, and we’ll leave the hood shut so you don’t see the air-conditioning hoses and all of that,” he says.
Why does he do all this? “Not only do I love HOT ROD magazine, but also I love hot rodding as an American culture. If you’re a hot rodder, you’re a do-it-yourselfer, you’re creative, you’re inventive, and hopefully somewhat artistic. The idea about building a hot rod is to take something not worth a whole lot, take what you can afford, and make it better. As Petersen first said, ‘To modify it for improved looks or performance.’ I’ll go further by saying a real hot rodder can do anything. It gives you the confidence to modify anything and make it personal and better. Plus, there’re all of the stories and characters. I was able to do the book on Von Dutch and then the book on Ed Roth, and these were real characters.”
Life and retirement is good for Pat Ganahl, and we’re sure you’ll get a chance to see him somewhere down the road in his black and bitchin’ 1933 Fordor with his wife Anna, a backseat full of luggage, and a cool story to tell.
Pat Minick, part of the drag racing triumvirate of Farkonas, Coil and Minick; has died. Fondly remembered as the shoe for the popular Chi-Town Hustler Funny Car in its early incarnation, the trio was a terror on the match race circuit in the 1960s and 1970s. Says Austin Coil, the Hustler’s tuner who would go on the become John Force’s crew chief for years, “Minick’s skill behind the wheel was critical to the Hustler’s success. Other teams were making plenty of horsepower with Black and Pink motors, but the teams were running those motors detuned to get the car down the track without smoking the tires or breaking parts. Minick could manage big horsepower with his foot. He controlled the throttle flawlessly at a time when most drivers were simply planting it on the floor and hoping for the best.” Minick’s long, smoky burnouts became a staple of Funny Car staging.
He retired from driving in 1971, but remained a part of the Chi-Town team through 1990, helping to win back-to-back NHRA Funny Car championships in 1982 and 1983 with driver Frank Hawley. Starting his career in a dragster, he shifted over to Super Stockers in the early 1960s. After teaming with Coil they fielded a 1967 Barracuda Funny Car built by Farkonas in his mother’s two-car garage. Avoiding national events to instead take advantage of the lucrative match race scene, they were winning races and making lots of dough. Following the ‘Cuda with another home-brewed Funny—this time a 1969 Charger, the car was known for its smoky burnouts Minick did from a standing start as opposed to the standard rolling start, launching the Charger to half-track in a bellow of smoke and noise. So popular was the Chi-Town car the team was booked for over 100 match races a year at their height. Known for taking their parts to the limit, the team was one of the first to start between-round engine teardowns. With Minick handling bookings and budgets, Minick’s son Wayne went on to become driver of the Hustler from 1985-1990, when Minick Sr. retired from racing. Minick would eventually purchase the remnants of the Chi-Town Charger in the early 2000s, restoring it to its former glory days, to forever remind drag racing enthusiasts of one of the most popular and competitive names in drag racing.
We dig this guy’s style. Though a bit hard to see, there’s a 1980s Ford F150 at the other end of this jet engine. What it was for, and whether it was ever finished is a matter of conjecture. But whatever the outcome, we would like to think this was a street driven commuter that took the kids to school, the family to Sunday services, and mom and pop to their weekly polka dances. Realistically, it was probably a stillborn exhibition drag car, which begs the question how many HOT ROD enthusiasts in the hinterlands have one of these in their back-40, or garage waiting for more time or money before hitting the strip? We’d like to see whatever outrageous projects you have stuffed away. Submit to hotrod@hotrod.com and let’s talk.
Originally held in Oakland, California, the 68th Annual Grand National Roadster Show is still referred to as simply “Oakland” even though it’s celebrating its 14th show from the LA County Fairgrounds in Pomona, California, this weekend January 27-29, 2017. This weekend the hordes will concentrate at the fairgrounds to see who will win the title of “America’s Most Beautiful Roadster” and take home the 9-foot perpetual trophy. We’ve assembled images of the winners from the last four years to remind you of the previous victors and give you a framework for how past selections has looked. The judges very much favor the clean, traditional method of roadster building as these winners would indicate. The days of the design-y, modern take on old roadsters lost favor with the new way roadsters were judged starting in 2011. While the more traditional winners may not have as much bling or wow factor, they faithfully adhere to the “beautiful” part of their title.
We’ve scoured the entire 2017 Grand National Roadster Show to bring you the first images from the overwhelming new show cars and hot rods this year. Yes, there are a few roadsters at the 68th annual event, but the “Roadster Show” is really a general car show, with the usual Suede Palace and also the special building devoted to some of the great 1955-57 Chevys from the past and present. We’ve covered it all, so check our gallery and come back again for more posts throughout the weekend. We’ve also got some great interviews and coverage live on HOT ROD’s Facebook page so if you want to see a lot more then check that out, too.
There are so many modifications to behold here that it’s hard to find where to start. This was a Chevette, but it has been transformed into an altered wheelbase pickup truck—and a step-side at that. It’s hard to tell whether this might be a mid-engine or rear-engine setup. Those chrome stacks suggest diesel power, but there doesn’t seem to be much room between the rear axle and seat to fit anything, so maybe the stacks are just for looks? If so we’re thinking it’s air-cooled VW-powered. Whatever is motivating the Chevette, and motivating the builder, it’s one unique and freaky ride.
The Winternationals are upon us, and to celebrate let’s turn back to 1969. In the far lane is Nelson Carter’s former Imperial Kustoms Charger, now named “Superchief” after he conducted a name-my-Funny-Car contest. Over the years Carter’s Funny Cars were shoed by Ron Perau, Steve Bovan, Dave Beebe, Tim Grose and Bob Pickett, among others. In the near lane is the familiar name of Don Schumacher, who back in this period was driving his own Funny Cars he named “Stardust”. His 1968 ‘Cuda was originally Butch Leal’s Logghe chassis car, which Shu purchased when Leal went back to door slammers. This car ran a best of 7.22 at 205.50mph. The ultimate victor in Funny Car at the 1969 Winters was Clare Sanders in Jungle Jim Liberman’s Nova flopper.
We believe this is a Toyota Cedric, which is not imported to America, and also not in the purview of typical HOT ROD minutia; but in the context of Freak Show Friday, why not show it to you? Beyond which car this actually is; there are other, more immediate questions; like what is going on here? We are also curious about the car next to this with the tubular Saturday Night Fever-type stars and things, which is not to say we are also not just as curious about the tubing exiting the hood of the Toyota. Could we say they are some sort of headers? Or maybe dummy headers, meant for show? Yes/no? Which is also not to say we aren’t equally as curious about the lifted rear; and what, exactly, it is meant to do for performance, or anything? But isn’t it great that modifying cars can take on such a wondrous, puzzling, yet unique form, especially to all of us jaded hot rodders who believe we have seen everything? Obviously we have not.
A cool shot of one of the most dominant Gasser greats is Ohio George Montgomery with his Ford SOHC-powered 1933 Willys coupe. That blower is one of Montgomery’s own magnesium units he produced along with Sneaky Pete Robinson. When all of the mag-cast pieces including end plates, drive assembly and intake manifold, were utilized, a total of 54 pounds was reduced over an aluminum 6-71 blower. Rotors remained aluminum, as it was determined there was much less tendency for galling between the mag case and aluminum rotors. The blower and intake could be removed as one piece, which can’t be done with a typical GMC 6-71. Most examples of the Montgomery/Robinson superchargers we’ve seen incorporate two blow-off valves in the intake manifold, but we count four—and there could be more, in this image from May 1966.
The Dark Corners of Fuel-Injected Pro Stock Motor Mysticism
Prepare yourself for a deep, dark dive into a racing rabbit hole. Head first. Pro Stock racing is part of the professional triumvirate of NHRA drag racing, and in 2016, fuel injection was mandated for the first time. The goal was to try and inject the class with more relevance to what’s in showrooms today, to generally invigorate the class, and to interest new teams and engine builders in taking a shot at participating in the most complex—even scientific—class of automobile racing this side of Formula 1. It’s extremely secretive, and rightly so for racing that gushes money to chase 1/100th of a second in the quarter-mile. This is serious, arcane, yet entertaining racing.
The air intake is the most visible change with the new fuel-injection mandate for 2016. All of the teams we talked to had problems with NHRA rules dictating the air being picked up low, where track heat adds to the hot, dry fuel charge. Some say for every 10 degrees of intake heat you lose 40-plus horsepower.
With carburetors as the only means for introducing fuel into a 1,500hp Pro Stock engine for close to 50 years, many of the teams knew nothing about fuel injection. With only months to go between NHRA announcing the change and the first race of the 2016 season at Pomona in February 2016, having a race-ready car was a painful mountain to climb. 2012 Pro Stock champion Allen Johnson summed it up when he told us, “I felt like the biggest idiot that ever walked—we couldn’t even get the danged car to crank for a day.”
We spoke with four of the top 10 teams from 2016 to first drill down into their engine programs to find what worked and didn’t, discover what some of their strategies were to try and take advantage of this new world they found themselves in, and finally give their thoughts on where Pro Stock is headed.
Our experts include Jason Line, 2016 Pro Stock champion; John Nobile, a veteran Pro Stock driver who now oversees his son Vincent’s Camaro, which was third in points in 2016 and is part of Elite Motorsports’ team of three Pro Stock cars; Chris McGaha, a privateer who came in seventh with his Harlow Sammons Racing Camaro, but also builds Mopar engines for 14th Place Deric Kramer; and Allen Johnson, the Dodge privateer who, for 20 years, could count on Dodge sponsorship until 2016 when he lost that sponsorship but gained Marathon Oil backing.
The Johnson story was an interesting side note to see where the 2012 world champion would land without his forever sponsor. For 2016, Dodge shifted its sponsorship weight to Elite Motorsports and its drivers: two-time Pro Stock champion Erica Enders and five-time Pro Stock champion Jeg Coughlin. At the end of the season, a disappointed Elite—trailing behind Johnson, who snagged eighth in points—announced it was going with Camaros for 2017. Soon after, Dodge dropped out of Pro Stock entirely. Johnson will run a Dodge Dart with Marathon sponsorship through the 2017 season with a certain amount of satisfaction.
Not everything we discussed gets covered here—we just didn’t have the space. Some questions about engine programs we couldn’t get answered, but all of the intense racers we spoke with were mostly forthcoming, with Line suggesting, “Anything I say, [other teams will] learn something one way or the other, and so the only way I have felt I can win is by not speaking, but it’s not good for our category, fans, or our sponsors.” Some builders deflect specific questions about combos, saying that anyone can make any component work, and this latitude is what they like about Pro Stock. Oblique-speak is a crucial component of Pro Stock. Just getting these builders to tell us anything about their programs is a rare event.
NHRA mandated teams must not cover engines, but a chorus of teams objected, voicing that intake-manifold design secrecy was of utmost importance. A workaround is this carbon-fiber cover, which allows full visibility for fan observations without revealing the intricacies of each team’s intake design.
Engine Blocks
Currently, there are three engine blocks used for GM teams and two for the Mopars. The current most popular GM-developed DRCE2 (Drag Race Competition Engine) followed the DRCE1 block and is the most common basis for Pro Stock power. The DRCE3 block was to be an improvement on the 2, including a new head design. This new block features a raised cam location to increase the distance to the crank, adding more and larger cam bearings, going from five to nine for better support as well as providing more landscape for radical ramp profiles and high lobe lifts. Depending on a team’s actual layout, they may not use all nine bearing opportunities. The longer cam-to-crank dimension also makes for shorter pushrods, resulting in less deflection and more stability, all combined to make more power on the dyno. But on the track some teams felt those gains did not translate, so the 3 has become somewhat of an orphan, as all of the GM teams with the exception of Line’s ran 2s exclusively. Some adopted the 3 heads for their 2s, while Line used both the 3 head and block.
The DRCE4 architecture was developed as a response to the 3’s unpopularity. It split the difference between the longer cam/crank dimension of the 2, and that shorter dimension found on the 3. An advantage of the 4 is that teams can use DRCE2 or 3 heads, whereas in most cases, DRCE3 engines only allowed for DRCE3 heads. There are no DRCE4-specific heads. Cam bore increased yet again, allowing for either 70- or 80mm bearings.
For Dodge, there are two Hemi blocks: the 2.0 and 2.1. The 2.0 has a mirrored intake and exhaust configuration, while the 2.1 has an intake/exhaust, intake/exhaust, and so on configuration.
When asked about each teams’ engine of choice, you get different reasons. Says McGaha, “I’m using a 2 and you’ll find that most guys are, except for KB [Line]. If you’re running a 2, then as parts don’t become available, you’ll be able to run a 4 and use some of your 3 stuff to convert to 4, and vice versa for the 2 guys. The 3 never seemed to kick off, and nobody could make it go, so a lot stuck with the 2. In 2009, Line got the 3 to work and they’ve been the only ones to be successful with it.”
Nobile confirms, “Whatever it says on the dyno, you can’t always believe it. And if it has more power on the dyno but not on the track, that doesn’t mean it’s no good. We might have to change our whole thinking process about that change. It’s a science. If there’s time, we will go back to it and take another look.” Line contests the dyno numbers not translating to the track: “If it makes power on the dyno but doesn’t on the racetrack, then something is skewed about one of the two tests. The scorecard doesn’t lie, it has no feelings, so whatever you run you run—so that doesn’t make a lot of sense to me.”
A number of teams were beginning to start 4 engine programs when the fuel-injection change was announced. Says McGaha, “We’ve been doing so much fuel-injection development that it got pushed to the side. My goal for 2017 was to do a 3 head on our 2 block, and if Pro Stock continues on its current path, we’d like to do a 3 head on a 4 block.”
Adds Line, “It’s not like we weren’t winning with the 3, so there was no reason to stop and go work on the 4, and so we put it off and only worked on it sporadically. We hope to have it where we would like it to run for 2017.”
“I’ve always liked the 3 head,” McGaha says. “On carburetors, obviously the 2 had the advantage because other teams and we were outrunning KB. Most of us with 2 programs were a lot alike and doing better than the KB 3s until this year. They were always 0.0100th to 0.0200th back or sometimes just even. But on injection they overcame, and is it because it’s the 3 platform? I don’t know.”
Packaging components and also the bulky intake was confounded by the new NHRA rule eliminating hoodscoops in an attempt to maintain a more stock-looking profile. With certain teams wanting longer intake runners, the hood became the impediment, shunting runner length for the first time.
Is the Hemi Better or Worse Than the DRCEs?
For Johnson, his fortunes improved midseason after switching to the Wilson and CFE heads with the intake/exhaust, intake/exhaust, and so on configuration. Says Johnson, “That motor design has been around for a few years, but proved not beneficial to carbureted motors.” He decided to dust it off and try it with fuel injection and was surprised. “With the fuel injection and the lower rpm limit, it proved to be better.” Why? “It just has more torque at lower rpm. The Hemi we’ve been running for the last few years is real good at high rpm, and that’s why it runs so good in bad air—Denver and places like that.” With gear changes at lower rpm, Johnson was at a disadvantage until finding magic with the un-mirrored Hemi heads. Are Hemis inherently slower? Johnson says, “The rpm range we ran before, the Mopars were good or better at high rpm. When they moved the rpm range back, then we’re pulling back in the gear change at 8,400 to 8,500 rpm when we used to shift at 9,100 to 9,300 rpm, and that’s what really hurt the Mopar engines. The Chevys probably had 30 lb-ft of torque more than we have now—that’s the big difference.”
McGaha builds both GM and Dodge engines, and says he knows specifically why the Hemis are down on power: “It’s where the intake valve is positioned in the cylinder head. Even though the port is short, you used to make it up on the manifold because Dodge intakes were always 3/8- to 1/2-inch longer than Chevrolet. When I was doing the engine for Kramer [Pro Stock Dodge] last year, I was trying to make [runner length] as much like a Chevrolet as possible. To judge on the dyno, you measure how much fuel is going through them, and that’s how you tell if you’re improving anything on them. I was able to get the Dodge engine to make the same fuel flow as the Chevrolet, but the Chevy on my dyno will make 1,500 peak hp. The Dodge could make about 1,470 hp, but at 9,000 rpm, it was a night-and-day difference. The Dodge could not make the power at those fuel points. Others may want to differ, but I have tested them and have the facts to back up what I’m saying.”
A Camaro and Dodge competition will be a rare sight in 2017, with Dodge out of Pro Stock and Ford having left a couple years ago. Without Ford and Dodge, all of the Pro Stock racers we spoke with lamented what the future might hold for their beloved sport.
Fuel-Injection Development
The mandate for fuel injection came down in the middle of the 2015 season, so teams were still in the hunt with their 2015 combos, all but restricting time to begin development of their 2016 FI programs. Spec Holley throttle-body, ECU, injectors, crank and cam sensors, and smart coils were mandated, while wiring harnesses, fuel rails, connectors, and optional sensors were available but not required. The ECU allowed for a myriad of calibration changes from injector end angle phasing, duty cycles, and fuel pressure, though you’re limited to 90-psi injectors. All of this meant one of the main areas of development centered on the intake manifold, where complete latitude could hold gains based on trial and error, and months of dyno time. But the catch was with the elimination of the massive scoops as a mandate to make for more stock-looking door-slammers, you were limited to how long intake runners could be before the plenum banged the hood. So besides length, the shape of the runners, injector location, and size and shape of the plenum were all variables that within certain physical parameters were limitless.
Rumors of some teams testing 200 or more intake variations were laughed at by all of the teams we broached the subject with. Anywhere from about 10 to maybe 35 variations were tested by teams between the end of the 2015 season and the February 2016 Pro Stock kickoff. Says Johnson, “At the beginning, we probably did three different designs and then we were very fortunate to hook up with Wilson Manifolds, and his first design was what we considered perfect. Then we went through two to four revisions of that and are still coming with more revisions.”
Jason Line says they experimented with 10 intake manifolds before they were happy. “We went at it like we knew nothing, because we didn’t. We put together a test matrix for how we should do things. When we did tests, we optimized each combination the best we could. We didn’t have a lot of latitude with injector location, so we did more with other things. The hardest part was optimizing each combination to make sure we weren’t leaving something out there.” Nobile wasn’t satisfied with the intake he started the season with, but experimenting during the season was not good for the Elite Camaro. “We were right on everybody’s tail by the middle of the season, then we started testing a new manifold, and that put us back—I’m kicking myself for doing that,” he says.
Of Johnson’s intake experiments, he says both plenum design and runner length were his main focus: “We just had to keep pecking around to maximize torque without hurting high end, so it was all of the above.” And injector location? “We’ve had them all over the board. We’ve turned them upside down and sprayed them up into the roof—we’ve had them everywhere. There are so many things you can play with that we probably have not hit on half of them yet.”
So is there a lot to be gained in intakes? Johnson says, “I think we’re splitting hairs right now, but now we’re redesigning the whole top end of our engine. We’ve made a big change in the design over the winter, and hopefully that will step us up the little bit we lack.”
Seventh Place Chris Mcgaha is a competitive privateer, relying on his family owned oil-drilling business to fund his family’s Pro Stock habit. He told us that, surprisingly, when everything was added up, his 2016 season actually showed a slight profit.
Limiters
One of the confounding new rules has been the 10,500-rpm limit. By 2015 some teams were hitting around 12,000 rpm, as the higher they spun the engine the more power they found. Teams are allowed a soft limit, but most don’t use that. “We run right to the limiter,” Nobile says. “Sometimes Vincent will hit it just before the lights to push us through, but you’re always going to lose momentum when you hit the limiter.”
Positioned at the traps and listening to the cars zing through the lights, you notice some hit the limiter before the finish, begging the question, is there an advantage to hitting the limiter before the finish line? Says McGaha, “The reason you do it is because of the way you do the gearing. You don’t make power at 11,300 rpm or 11,400 rpm. You try to control rpm at each gear change to hit as high as you can. The Dodges had to do that. They set the pace because they didn’t make the torque [like Chevy], yet 400 to 500 rpm above a Chevy, they start to make the same power.” From there he says you might start experimenting with rear-end gear ratios, then maybe change transmissions, then from the start to the eighth-mile, this changes gear splits. Says McGaha, “By half track, we get enough to pick the car up, but then at the lights you’ll hear us on the chip. When we didn’t have the limiter, we knew we had enough room in there, so we didn’t care if it crossed 100 rpm higher—we were pressing the envelope, but nobody knew that because we would move the chip up.”
Another discovery by all of the teams was that the rpm limit varied from computer to computer, but even from one run to the next with the same computer. Some teams tickled the max rpm to see if they had another 50 to 100 or more rpm gifted by the arbitrary variances found in all ECUs. Says Line, “Yes, it’s always slightly above 10,500. It’s not as consistent as you might think. It might be 10,530, and sometimes it might be 10,570, so there’s definitely a variance; 40 rpm is nearing 1 mph, so that’s a pretty big variance. Does it affect the e.t. much? No, you might be off a thousandth or two.”
At the 2016 Finals, a frustrated John Nobile said, “We’re running against the damn limiters, that’s one of our problems.”
Chris McGaha on the right and his dad on the left provide the bulk of the mind and money behind Chris’s Harlow Sammons Camaro. Chris is currently running a new 2017 Camaro.
Cooling the Fuel Charge: Cheating or Not?
A big disadvantage with the new rules is the inherent inability to cool the fuel charge as with a carburetor. Says Nobile, “Pounds per hour to burn on the dyno indicates power—it’s a direct correlation. So you can’t burn as much fuel with fuel injection because the charge is dry and not cold, so it’s going to be down on power from a carburetor motor.” With fuel injection, the charge is dry, and confounding that is air is now taken in from an opening at the lower portion of the front end, where the hot track air rises. Not only do you lose the cooling from fuel but you’re ramming hot air into it from the air inlet that allows a maximum of 80 square inches of opening, which is much more than needed. But for a 500ci Pro Stock engine, for every 10 degrees of higher inlet temperature, you lose 40.3 hp.
“Where you lose from carbs to fuel injection is the cooling effect is lost from what you used to have. You’re trying to rebalance that to make the fuel-injected engine feel like it has the carbs on it, trying to do what Mother Nature used to do for you,” McGaha says.
Some teams found a gray area for overcoming this disadvantage, while others found any attempt to cool the charge as cheating. Interestingly, at the 2016 Finals at Pomona, a rules adjustment for 2017 was announced to close this fuzzy area once and for all. Here’s what McGaha says created this amendment: “You lose the fuel spraying in the intake cooling the air, and I told my guys the way you fix that is you have a spray bar inside of your intake, then you come out from that to a fuel line that goes to your regulator. The problem is that it’s so big it can’t idle with the spray bar spraying, so you need a way to activate it, and the way you do that is with those regulators made for guys who use turbos. If you shoot manifold pressure into them, it starts to raise the fuel pressure, so adding a check valve and using an outside source like CO2, which we all have in our cars, and shooting it to that regulator when you go to WOT, it starts shooting pressure and opens the check valve and a spray bar will turn on.” Were teams actually doing this? “I don’t know, but that’s one way it can be done,” Mcgaha says. “Did I do it personally? No, because I thought it was too gray of an area to be crossing. Did I pay the price for it? I think I did. I think that’s why I ended up in seventh. Who in front of me has it, I don’t really know. I know of some guys that didn’t have it, but nobody in front of me is admitting to having it.”
About this revelation, Johnsons says, “We never tried that, but we heard toward the end of the year that somebody was doing that. It was on our radar to dyno and to rig something up, but we just were not at that point. I didn’t see it as cheating, but it was a gray area for sure. I frowned upon it when I heard, but if they’re smart enough to take advantage of a gray area, my hat’s off to them.”
But the way Line sees it, it’s not a gray area at all: “The way you look at the rulebook is that if it doesn’t say you can do it, you can’t do it, so to me that’s cheating. How could you perceive it any other way?”
Line was really thrown when we asked about auxiliary intake cooling. He added, “Well, the cool thing is whoever it is, when they go to the Winternationals in February, they’re not going to run very good.”
Johnson commented similarly, “We hope everybody was doing that except us. If that’s the case, it will bring them right to the back of the field, and that will be a huge help for us.”
Says Line, “The correct answer for if we were running spray bars is, yes, we were, even though we weren’t, because now when they read this they’ll know we weren’t. And so what this does is tell them there is some place to work toward.” We told you this was secretive!
The Tune
According to all teams, the tune is extremely important, and finessing timing, fuel flow, exhaust pulses, gear splits, and the ever-changing weather all make for optimizing the weeks and months of testing, combined with the quick reflexes and experience of the drivers.
“We were the second fastest car—it’s all about tuning,” Nobile says. “Summit kicked our ass because of tuning. We now have AJ tuning our car, so I believe we’ll be awesome in 2017.” No one will give any specifics, and in some ways there can’t be specifics when factoring in different track altitudes and weather variables, but all teams spoke in general about the importance of the ever-finite tune.
Covering the Engines: Defying NHRA Rules?
Another NHRA mandate was to keep the engines exposed in the pits, something teams don’t like because it could reveal secrets. As Line says, “We struggle for every bit of horsepower we can find and don’t want to give up what we’ve worked so hard to get.” While this change seems simple, with the least amount of pushback, surprisingly, it became a huge sticking point for teams.
Says Line, “We told NHRA that if we had to uncover and show everything we are doing, we would have driven out the front gate. It’s not a crate-motor class; it’s a class that if you do something innovative, you should get rewarded—not penalized. I don’t know what we’d be doing [after quitting], but we’d be doing something else.” Line went on to say that NHRA never told them not to cover the intake manifold, and as you know, this is where the most room for innovation lies. In Line’s case, a cover that looks like an LS cover sits atop the DRCE3 engine, which NHRA says is legal.
Valvesprings
Rumors have suggested that valvesprings are the most limiting aspect to increased performance because of their physical limitations, but every team we ran this by dismissed this, saying there is still more room for gains in valvespring applications.
Is There a Future For Pro Stock?
With Ford out of Pro Stock a couple of years ago and now Dodge/Mopar, with the exception of some privateers, it’s an all-Chevy show. Without the traditional rivalry between manufacturers—the foundation of Pro Stock racing—it has become a much less compelling class.
“You can’t have only one manufacturer,” Line says. “I just don’t think that will be good going forward. We don’t have a fan problem; we have a lot of fans, and there are a lot of folks showing up for the races. I don’t know ticket counts, but I hear from track owners that their fan count was up this year, so that’s all good. What we have is a participation problem, and it’s not just Pro Stock—it’s a problem with a lot of classes. This is a costly sport, and I’m not sure how you justify spending that much money.” There are really only three basics for fans of Pro Stock competition: you’re either rooting for the team, driver, or manufacturer.
As for how Pro Stock will change, no one had any real answers, and we didn’t discuss the future of Pro Stock with NHRA because we know it’s something they won’t discuss. Says McGaha, “I’m a younger guy and I race Pro Stock because it’s naturally aspirated [NA], and when you get down to it, this is all that’s left that is NA. What bothers me the most is when some say they want to change it from NA. GM had the Grand National in the 1980s that had turbos on it, but Chevy never had a forced-induction car until the ZR1 Corvettes in 2009. Now everybody has this notion everything needs to be forced induction in Pro Stock because factories are doing it, but in reality, only 5 percent of cars are forced induction and the rest are NA. I don’t know what NHRA is thinking, but that’s the nail in the coffin for me.”
Nobile would still race if Pro Stock went away. “If there’s only one manufacturer involved, there’s no reason for Chevy to stay, so I would really like to see Ford and Dodge back into Pro Stock. Look, there’s nothing like Pro Stock. Vincent was approached to drive a Fuel car and he turned it down, and we’re not interested in Pro Mod. This was the safest class in professional drag racing, and if they were to go to superchargers or turbos, they would blow that. If Pro Stock were to go away, Vincent and I would still drag race, but we would probably go bracket racing.”
Allen Johnson, in conjunction with Dodge, approached NHRA in 2015 about providing a future concept-spec Pro Stock Challenger. The idea was to have a 1,500hp supercharged crate engine based on the third-gen production Hemi in a chassis similar to current Pro Stock cars, but with stock-type sheetmetal. It was estimated that the 1,500hp engine in a Challenger would generate similar times to current numbers, but do it with something powered by a production-based engine that looked like a production-based car. Johnson said he was under the impression GM was behind their concept. They did not get much NHRA feedback, and obviously the fuel-injection mandate took the class in a different direction, with the end result that costs escalated and Mopar joining Ford in abandoning the class. Now it looks like NHRA might have erred in not giving the Challenger concept more consideration.
Johnson is not happy with the current state of Pro Stock: “If they continue down this road, you’ll have part-timers running four to five races and a couple racers running 10, we’ll struggle having a full field every week, people will lose more interest in it because you only have one brand of cars, and the class will really struggle.” Would he consider switching to GM? “No, I’ve raced Mopars all my life, and I would retire before that happens.” Is that because of brand loyalty or that it’s his whole program? “A little of both, brand loyalty being most of it. Reinventing the wheel and spending millions of dollars retooling with different parts, it’s too late in my career to do that.”
He says his future intentions are to continue in Pro Stock, but he won’t spend his own money doing it. So would it bother him to have to switch to a production-block-type of Pro Stock racing in the future? “Well, it might bother me, but for $100,000, I could race half of the year and this other stuff could just sit—it’s not eating any oats if it’s just sitting.”
Jason Line adds, “We knew that somebody, somewhere, was going to figure this out sooner and better than the rest, and that within a year we would all be running the same, and that’s what happened. To me that’s boring and not what racing is about—it’s about being faster than somebody else. But if you’re working within a small box that is so restricted there’s no room to be better, then how are you going to be better?”
How, indeed. The future will tell.
Veteran Pro Stock driver John Nobile, currently crew chief for son Vincent’s Pro Stock efforts with team Elite, reminds us that Pro Stock is the safest class in professional drag racing, which this office end of the typical car exemplifies. NHRA’s safety rules are to be commended.Quick, catch a glimpse before it’s hidden away. This was from the 2016 Pro Stock debut at the Winternationals at Pomona in February. By the following race, most teams had permanent covers hiding their intake manifolds, considered the area where some of the most imagination takes place.The Summit team of Jason Line and Brad Anderson were 1-2 in the final count, winning Pro Stock’s first fuel-injection season. Line was so adamant about not allowing a view of his intake manifold that he was prepared to leave this event and all of Pro Stock, telling us he was not going to give up the time and effort his team spent on developing their intakes for the sake of the new NHRA rules.For 20 years, 2012 Pro Stock champion Allen Johnson has relied on Mopar sponsorship, but found himself without his forever sponsor for the 2016 season. His current sponsor, Marathon Petroleum, is backing Allen’s Dodge Dart through the 2017 season.Vincent and father John Nobile placed third, behind the Summit racing juggernaut. John was adamant about the tune being the weakest component of their 2016 season, telling us they were the second fastest car, but that intake-manifold experiments midway through the season hurt them.Chris McGaha, who runs a Camaro but also tunes Mopars, says the Hemi is less competitive because where the intake valve is positioned in the cylinder head makes for a shorter head port. Racers compensated by lengthening the intake runners and running the Hemis at higher rpm. Now with the elimination of hoodscoops, there’s no longer room under the hoods to gain the extra 1/2-inch length needed, and rpm are capped at 10,500 rpm. This is Jeg Coughlin’s 2016 Dodge Dart. Both he and Erica Enders switched to Camaros for 2017.While the boxed and gusseted rear-end housing is impressive, as is the Lazarus spool, most of the technological advances in suspensions have been seen in the shock absorbers, which are capable of varying dampening for better traction throughout their typical run.
Bookending much needed storms on Wednesday and Friday, today teams set up shop for what looks to be a rain-shortened qualifying schedule for the 2017 NHRA Winternationals at the Pomona Fair Grounds. With sunshine likely back for the weekend there will be racing. The Winters is where we get to see the new cars of the season, and what a season it’s looking to be. If you haven’t already read about the crazy 2016 Pro Stock season and what the future might hold for Pro Stock this year and beyond, check that out as the crew chiefs and drivers we talked with were quite candid about the previous season and this new season of mostly all Chevrolet Pro Stock Camaros.
We had a chance to walk the pits to get some closeups of some of the Top Fuel engines, bare chassis, and general mayhem that takes place during set up. Check it out and come back for more all weekend.
