Old Drag Car Pictures.........

[jannes_z-28]

Here are a few from Indy 1979 when they had the US Nationals 25th anniversary.

One of Dale Pulde and Mike Hamby's War Eagle. They ran a kind of mild engine combo of 426" when all the others were up around 500". War Eagle did pretty good anyway with a more economical setup. They were also among the first teams to use 18-wheeler rigs. This year most of the Pro teams still had Chaparall-trailers and Crew-Cab Trucks.




This one is from the roof of the motorhome that Strange Engineering parked at the finishline. On finalday it was crowded and a lot of racers came up after they had been out of the race. Lil'John Lombardo with another guy is reading a Swedish DragRacing magazine that I had brought with me. The two men at the right is Don Hardy (white shirt) and Chris "The Greek" Karamesines, I think they are looking through one of my other mags.



I have some more photos that I can't find at the moment. When we arrived at the track on Wednesday afternoon we saw the first round of Funny Car Qualifying and what a round.
In 1979 not many Funny Cars had done any 5 second runs, I think it was only Don Prudhomme in 1975 and someone else in the summer of 79 before US Nationals.

Now we saw three straight runs with Ray Beadle in Blue Max 5.95, Gordie Bonin 5.97 and Billy Meyer 5.99. This was the only 5-second FC runs of that race and there were not that many people there that day to witness it. I am glad I did. I have photos of those passes but I still have to find them.


Jan

[Xplantdad]

Neat stuff Jan!

[Bill Pritchard]

This is a forest green 70 Nova L78 4 speed running at Oswego (IL) Drag Strip some time in 1970. It was owned by Dorothy Steele and driven by either Dorothy or her friend Bruce Thompson, both of Aurora IL. This car was raced from virtually day one, and occasionally street driven. When they finished with all the usual Day 2 mods and got it all dialed in, it ran 12-teens. They purchased most all the parts to build and install a ZL-1 in the Nova but that project languished. Bruce and Dorothy also bought a brand new dark green 72 Nova SS350 and modified and raced that for about a year. Then Bruce got drafted and eventually Dorothy sold the 70 to a friend of mine.