[GM_427_Racer]

Chapter 7

This saga is drawing to a close, maybe one more chapter after this.

Since the last chapter was such a disaster, I will try and make this one a little better. I mentioned that it was time for an upgrade to a different tow vehicle and a different trailer, again my Dad stepped in and found me a 1964 Chevrolet Suburban with a 283 and a three speed manual transmission, which was geared a lot better and had a lot more stability than the Monte Carlo for towing a trailer with a race car on it. There was also a local racer that in his spare time use to build low cost trailers in his garage. When I say they were low cost, I mean low cost. They were built out of 3x3 thin wall box tubing, with bolt on hubs (another story for another time), wooden 2x10 planks for where the car sat and the front axle had a surge brake set-up on the front hubs, but at least it had brakes. I used this set-up for a while and it worked a lot better, in fact I used this very same trailer to tow all over the eastern part of the country up until 1981 when I moved up to a fifth wheel enclosed set up.

The second NHRA points meet I took the Yenko to was in Saginaw, Michigan in 1973. I made it through Technical inspection without a problem, but believe me I was sweating it through the whole process. Fortunately, I did not have Marty Barrett to pick the car apart as he did the first time in Columbus and in all fairness to Marty, he was doing his job as he always did and pointing out to a novice how things had to be done, if they wanted to race on "HIS" race track. A different friend of mine went with me to this race, actually a neighbor of my parents. The time trials went fine, nothing special other than my neighbor kept telling me I was not leaving at a high enough RPM from the starting line and the car would be quicker if I did raise it. You have to remember that at this time, you did not run off of Class Indexes made by NHRA, your dial-in was the current National Record for your class. At that time, I believe the National Record for SS/D was a 10.93, so when we went into class eliminations, that 10.93 was my dial in and I had not even been within two tenths of that mark ever. I think we had 3 time trials that day and we kept getting progressively faster, but not anywhere near the National Record.

When they called for first round of Super Stock, it was getting to be early evening and the sun was setting. As we were pushing up through the staging lanes, it was pretty much dark (I mention this for the next chapter). My friend and I are pushing up through the lanes two by two and I try to start counting the cars back to see who I am going to line up with for first round. After doing it a couple times, (there were some delays), it kept coming up the same. There was a white 1969 Camaro convertible SS/NA and as I am walking by there are all kinds of decals and lettering and some of the lettering that was really important to me was the fact that on the front fender, it said "NATIONAL RECORD HOLDER", if that wasn't bad enough, it was also lettered with the name "John Lingenfelter". I am thinking, Holy Crap, I have to run John Lingenfelter, are you kidding me??????? For some of you OLD guys on this sight, you might remember a car magazine called "SUPER STOCK", well I had a flash back to one of their covers on one of their recent editions that showed none other than John Lingenfelter doing a hellacious (if that is a word) smokey burnout with this same Camaro convertible and he had this huge grin on his face as he was doing this burnout and I am thinking, YUP, this is the guy, this is the MAN.......... As I mentioned before, it is now dark and everyone has their parking lights on (again, important for next chapter). I think as I am coming out of the water burnout, just do the best you can, REV it up and hit every gear. So we are all staged and his lights start to come down and I am concentrating on my side of the tree as my lights begin. Well, instead of looking at the tach and holding it at a certain point, I thought the hell with it and just put it to the floor just before I let go of the clutch. WOW, the Yenko left like it never had before, front wheels in the air and getting it. I pull second gear and he is way down track, hit third gear and I am gaining on him quickly, pull my BABY into high and I think, DAMN, I am going to catch him. I blow by him at about 1200 feet and ran the fastest I had ever gone to that point in my young racing career, as memory serves me, I could be wrong, but I think it was an 11.03, which was just a tenth off of the record. I cannot believe what just happened and I am thinking, "What just happened?" I get back to my trailer and my buddy is just as happy as I am and he kept telling me, "I told you if you revved it up, it would leave like jack da bear!!" He was right, so we started cooling the Yenko for the second round. Back then, there were no ladders, you just pulled up to whoever you pulled up to and that is who you ran, unlike today where every competition round is run off of qualifying.

We didn't change anything and took the car to the rear of the staging lanes. Just like the first round, there were a bunch of cars ahead of us and I did what I did first round, I walked to the head of the lanes and started pairing cars up as to how it looked like who we would run. As I counted them back and I did it several times, it came out the same. I would have to run a yellow Dodge, now this was not just any yellow Dodge, it was a Super Stock Hemi and it belonged to Ron Mancini from the Detroit area. Now for those of you who do not know Ron Mancini, he was not Ronnie Sox or Herb McCandless, but in the Mopar circles, he was pretty dog gone close, and definitely a legend at a young age in Michigan. I thought, oh well, just do what I did the first round, drive the same way and the Yenko can do what it does and we can move on to third round. Everything went well, the burnout was good, staged shallow just like the first round, revved it up to the moon, just like the first round, the car left with the wheels in the air and I hit every gear just like I wanted. There was only one problem, that big ole nasty HEMI, passed me about the same place that I had passed JL in the first round. My day was over, but I was really proud of how the Yenko ran and as you have just read, I am still telling the story.

In the next and last chapter, I will tell you how I met John Lingenfelter in Pomona, California about a year and a half later and our discussion about that race. Oh yeah, he remembered!!!!!!