JANUARY, 2005

DRAG RACE
Kentucky, New Jersey, Ford Mustangs, Burning rubber,
Coor's Light, Testosterone, etc.

By Will von Ratblood

PAGE FOUR

These events have in them an idea of an America that existed long ago, when steel dinosaurs roamed the states. In a way going to the track is to step back in time, back to when big and powerful cars were the rule, before fuel efficiency became a concern, before vehicles with only four or three cylinders, before the flood of imports, before electrics and hybrids. Like with camping or the county fair there is an element of nostalgic removal to a better, more simple place less civilized by the advance of technology. As the typical consumer car of the day continues to change, appearing less and less like its brutish ancestors, perhaps automobile racing will take on more archaic, antiquated appeal.

Part of this appeal, for domestic auto enthusiasts at least, includes an automobile world without imports. The anti-import sentiment is strong with the Ford fans. Shirts and bumper stickers get the point across for those who don’t pick it up in conversation or on Internet message boards: Be American - Buy American. It’s a message muddled in light of the complex trail of modern day manufacturing: some American cars are assembled in Mexico; some Japanese cars are assembled in the states; parts in American cars can be from all over; and there’s the question of corporate ownership -- Chrysler is owned by German Daimler for example.

A desire to support American jobs is part of the anti-import thing; distaste for the entire import racing scene is another perhaps bigger one. The import enthusiasts are a younger, new wave, a next generation of racers, and it should be no surprise that their presence creates a sort of generation gap in the sport. “It’s the attitudes of the people who drive [imports] that make people feel the way they do,” said Patrick. A love of racing was passed on to him from his father -- a common thing for fans and drivers -- who raced cars in the fifties. Import racers are “mostly young kids,” he says. “They are not experienced drivers. Most would rather street race and don’t like the rules of the track. They bring bad attention to what we do -- organized racing at a track.” K.J. agrees more is in question than just land of manufacture. “Many people say they ‘don’t like’ imports, but I think the sentiment is more toward the import racing scene as a whole, not just the cars,” he said. “The blaring music, the immaturity of the racers, the cars that look more like spaceships…and the technology that I think intimidates many of us who are used to carburetors, pushrods, and the relative simplicity when it comes to an American car, as compared to an import.”

You won’t see any bloody domestic vs. import confrontations at these events however; maybe that is obvious, since after stepping from the parking lot through the gate you see nothing but Fords all day. One big Mustang love-fest, it’s more rock concert than football game despite the intense competition. As participants have pointed out, at sporting events you can see fans swearing at each other and provoking fist fights - you won’t find any of that at the racetrack.

When not racing, working on their cars, or venting hostility over imported cars, fans and participants keep up with the latest in the racing world on websites and also through The Race Pages, a large newsprint magazine put out by the NMRA that covers events and drivers and anything worth mentioning during a season. Its pages include driver interviews, a mind-boggling array of auto parts, picture after picture of cars with smoke coming off their tires, and a few ads with women posing next to such items as suspension systems and exhaust components. A full page ad for Jet-Hot exhaust parts brags that the manufacturer was selected by U.S. Army contractors to provide exhaust systems for the Stryker assault vehicle, an eight-wheeled, heavily armored troop transporter “ideal for blitzkrieg attacks against our enemies.”

 

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 8th

It is around 10:30, a beautiful, clear morning, and the stands are beginning to fill. Racing has been going on since about 9:30 -- bracket time trials -- and everything proceeds about the same as in New Jersey. The elimination races continue, only this time determining the winners for the year in each class. I sit back and watch from an upper row in the stands. Sadly, some children here are not wearing earplugs. At the farthest point away in the stands the sound is still extremely loud even with earplugs in, and standing in an area nearest the cars -- close to the starting line, or in the pits -- it is deafening, physical; you feel the vibration in your body, the pressure on your ears through hearing protection. This is best understood in the pit close to the car. At idle engines sputter and crack sounding not so much like they are running but exploding, spitting metal with a machine gun sound. And when they are given gas and revved up, they absolutely roar.

There is again a break during the day when the jet cars are brought out to race, but this time there are two of them and both are running properly. They release loud bursts of flame as they inch toward the starting line. The whir of the engines rises, the Christmas tree light turns green and with a deafening explosion, flame shoots from the rear and the cars nearly disappear down the track. These vehicles move so quickly that the scene looks like a cartoon, unnatural.

Some men are brought out onto the track and interviewed briefly, but I can’t tell what they’re talking about over the squawking public address system. Soon the remainder of the competition is ready to resume, but not before being marked by some ceremony. After a prayer that includes the drivers, America, the troops, and the sponsors, and then the playing of a horrible rendition - prerecorded I think - of the national anthem, eliminations for the remaining higher classes are ready to begin.

Race after race, car after car goes down the track. The crowd seems to grow then thin out on cue; apparently many are only interested in seeing certain classes race. Eventually Billy’s car comes up to the line for his first run. Both cars perform their pre- race burnout -- racing the engine, spinning the tires, smoke coming off them, while only letting the car move forward a few feet. (This is partly to heat the tires for better traction, and partly to show off and excite the crowd). With the help of some direction from crew members, they each back up slowly through clouds of their own smoke to just behind the starting line. Engines now revving menacingly, the drivers inch forward till their respective front wheels are in position, till they're properly staged. The tree lights change, the race starts, engines roar, tires spin and smoke but immediately something is wrong. Billy's car has ceased accelerating, the opponent leaves him behind and a belt that has broken off the car is left lying on the asphalt not far from the starting line. It takes thirteen seconds for the car to reach the finish line. The previous night there had been adjustments made to the suspension, resulting in a miscalculation that caused the car to respond differently off the starting line; some back and forth on the gas was too much for the belt, and the previous night’s work was undone in a second. An anticlimactic end to a bad season.

The car will be taken home, worked on and tested for months before being ready for the start of the next season. The trailer is packed up for the final time this year. That afternoon I climb into the cab of the truck for the non-stop ride home, one that, since I’m beginning to feel the start of a flu coming on, will turn out to be near as grueling as the all-night bus ride that brought me here two days ago. I’ve gazed at rows of Mustangs in the sun, their hoods up, polished engine parts shining. I’ve heard conversation after conversation, in English, that I did not understand at all. I’ve inhaled gasoline and other sorts of fuel fumes, burning rubber smell, and a toxic cloud of some lubricant called “Brake-Kleen” that Chris was using to attack bees that had been swarming around a trash can in the pits. And I’ve ingested large quantities of barbecued meat. I am sure that I will be out to the track again some time in the future, that I have a different appreciation for drag racing; and I am sure the next yuppie automobile fad will be to own and drive Stryker assault vehicles.

Later, at night, the truck rumbling down the highway, the gentle hills of Bowling Green long behind us, I start thinking about how far apart places are in this country, about how long the roads between these places are, and about all the vehicles that pass over them; all those engines, in the countless types of vehicles, running and pulling people and things along these endless roads.

I wonder if, in the future, when the world’s last oil well is spitting and dribbling like a nearly spent beer tap, when the roads are filled with tiny electric cars whirring about, when the last drag strip, overgrown with weeds, is paved over to make way for a big box discount store - I wonder if a few gas-burning cars and engines will survive, preserved behind glass in museums.[4] Groups of school children entering a building of the Smithsonian will gather around a ’68 Mustang, the hood open, and, staring at the mysterious array of parts inside, listen to the docent explain its history while pouring some fuel from a stash of gasoline into the tank. All present jolt with some surprise as the engine is started, but then lean in listening to the engine’s rumble and watching its vibration change as it is given the gas. After a minute or two it’s turned off and the engine sound echoes briefly through the cavernous building.

But until this future time of extinction we have the racetrack, a museum hardly.

•

So come, join us in our house of worship.[5] Choose a pew close to the action and accept the sacraments of a Budweiser and chilidog. Breathe deep our censers of tail pipe and tire. Listen to the roaring, deafening Word of car after car departing the apse of the starting line, flying down the nave of asphalt for that distant nirvana of the finish. The sky and clouds are our vault, helmeted drivers in flame retardant jumpsuits our deacons. Come bask in the spiritual glow of the internal combustion engine.

 

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