Joe Szabo

[Stefano]

Does anyone know or Recall the name "Joe Szabo"? He drag raced here in the Chicago/Midwest area at least till 1970.

[Mr70]

I went to Ardmore School in Villa Park,Il. in 1972-73 with a new transplanted student named Carl Szabo.
His mother was also our Lead Den Mother for Cub Scouts in 1973.
I think he had a car racing uncle or relative,but don't recall his name.I never met him,but thought Carl said he was into racing cars or building engines bigtime.
I really can't remember what his forte was.
Carl would be the same age as me today,42,and worked/co-owned Villa Park Auto Body off of Villa Ave. across the Street from the Original Ovaltine Factory,up to at least 1982-3 the last I saw of him & his Father,as we lost touch soon there after.
Thought maybe this could help you.

[kwhizz]

I knew Joe Szabo......he and Ralph Richter had a 62-64 Nova called PSYCHO.....it had a Injected 500" big block with a clutch turbo......he also owned a T.V. and Radio repair business on Irving Park just a little east of Nickey Chev.....

Ken

[Chevy454]

Yahtzee...!

[Stefano]

Ken,
Talk about a needle in a haystack?? How did you get to know Joe? Did you ever see the car Run? What years?

[kwhizz]

I lived in the same neighborhood as Ralph and Joe....we sort'a hung out together....When the car was finished they were in the UDRA gasser circuit and I went to a few races with them, the car had a 500" Injected big block......It was one of the first "Large" motors that was built in the area....they put a ton of money in the car but weren't the best when it came to dialing the car in......remember, this was with early 60's suspension technology , and gob's of horsepower......when the car was finished.....it had blue tinted plexiglass windows all around (including the windshield).......when Joe drove it for the first time , he realized that the blue tint didn't allow him to see the christmas tree lights at all....the blue tint cancelled out the lights......back to the drawing board.......the car ran 10 flat which was crazy for the time.......they ended up breaking a valve and did quite a bit of damage to the big motor and backed off the racing....Ralph got married and everyone sort of went their seperate ways .......I hear the car is still around somewhere......they ran the car as I remember 66-68 timeframe......

Ken

[kwhizz]

Another Interesting thing about Drag Racing Now and Then......is that the stands were full every weekend then.....Shake Rattle and Run is just before Psycho in the video.....Pretty Cool....

[Dave Rifkin]

Maybe it's just me but, I think the reason the stands were full back then was because the cars were actually cars and not some fiberglass replicas; plus more cars had manual transmissions where the drivers had to "drive" the cars.

To this day I enjoy watching the stock, super stock and competition eliminator classes much more than the top tier classes. I prefer to watch cars that are closer to stock bodied vehicles that I can relate to; something that I could actually aspire to driving. Of course I'd also get rid of the delay boxes and all the electrical crap too.

[sYc]

Very cool...

[Dicky]

Good looking cars. I see Jeg Coughlin Sr.'s car at 6:30 for you Ohio fans.
DH [img]<<GRAEMLIN_URL>>/flag.gif[/img]