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In the majority of cases, the bonds between the two or three generations of racers involved in family-based teams are forged right from the beginning. Sons and daughters begin at a very early age to go to the track with their mothers and dads, and then progressively work up to become the key player on the team when an appropriate apprenticeship has been served.
There have been exceptions to the rule, of course, and perhaps none more gratifying than the way a father and son ended years of estrangement thanks to the great sport of drag racing.
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| Dave “Pops” McCoy sets up son Keith prior to a run in 2003. The two have been racing together since 2000. |
Keith McCoy did indeed spend his early childhood touring the Midwest with his father David and mother Judy, but as he grew older, he and his dad slowly drifted apart, and for a number of years they had a very uneasy relationship. Here is the story of how a love for cars and racing eventually brought this family back together again.
David McCoy, who lives in Galesburg , Illinois , has been involved in racing and building show cars for over 35 years, which coincidentally is just around the time his son Keith was born. “I bought my first car at the age of 15, he recalled. “It was a ‘54 Chevy that I later put a 283 small block, straight axle, and a ‘55 Chevy rear-end in so I could run it at Drag City in Springfield , Illinois .
“In 1970 I bought a ‘62 Nova for competition in D/Hot Rod,” McCoy continued. “It had a small block Chevy with a tunnel ram at first, but later I switched to fuel injection. My most distinct memory of that car was what it put me through on Mothers Day of 1973, which would turn out to be a very bad day for my family. We had buried my uncle that morning, and that night my mother would visit me in the hospital. I rolled the Nova five times at over 100 mph at Assumption Raceway when the wind got under the front of the car and it went air born. What a ride! Four weeks later, I had purchased a '66 Chevy Super Sport and was back in action.
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Keith McCoy |
“In 1975, I put my slicks on a self to gather dust for a long time, however. Drag racing had become too expensive for a man raising a family, so I moved on to building show cars. I bought a '62 Corvette, which was basically a basket case, and did an extensive restoration job on it. I showed the car from 1975 until I sold it in 1987 and won a lot of awards with it.
“In 1988, I purchased a Funny Car body from Haywood and Neer and built a car from the frame up to make it street legal. It had to be inspected by the state before I could get it licensed, and this proved to be a tough deal. I spent a number of days before a judge proving that it was street legal. After I finally got it out on the road, I was always being stopped for one reason or another. I won all of the court cases except one, and that was on bumper height. I solved the problem by rigging the body with hydraulics so I could get in and out of it. After a few more stops the cops finally gave up and left me alone.
“Eventually I sold the Funny Car and started building up a ‘65 Chevy Impala that had belonged to my son. The front of this all-steel car slid out 8 inches then raised up on hydraulics. I showed it at the Car Craft Nationals and at Super Chevy and earned top-five honors. The highlight of this particular car's history came in 1989 when I won an engineering award from Competition Engineering. I was so emotional at the ceremony that my wife Judy had to tell everyone about the car. I sold this car in 1991, and for the next four years I spent my time painting cars for other people.
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| Dave waits for the McCoy team's time to roll to the line at the NSCA finals in Columbus , Ohio last season. |
McCoy's hiatus from competition didn't last long, however, as he recalled. “By 1996 I had the urge to get back into drag racing, and teamed up with Wes DeWees to run his '72 Nova SS in the National Muscle Car Association's Modified Street class. I bought a motor for the car, (my wife didn't speak to me for a week after I told her how much I paid for it), put everything together and went street-legal racing.
“In our first season, we finished 11th in points. The next year, 1997, the NMCA made a bunch of changes, and they dropped Modified Street . Fortunately, a group of NMCA officials went out on their own and formed the National Street Car Association, which kicked off in 1998, and they kept Modified Street on their roster. We continued to run in the class, generating best passes in the 8.40's and qualifying in the top five most of the time. We finished 3rd in points that first year with the NSCA, but in 1999 the partnership broke up as Wes needed to spend more time with his family.”
It seems at this point fate stepped in and took a hand in the proceedings, according to McCoy. “Wes leaving the team when he did turned out to be a good thing in the long run, as it led my son Keith and I to finally get together and race, something I'd wanted to do for a lot of years. Unfortunately, in his younger years Keith was more interested in partying than drag racing, and we didn't exactly see eye to eye for a number of years. Thankfully, by the time Wes and I dissolved our partnership Keith was in his early 30s, and he began to see things in a different light. I think he felt that Wes was taking his place with his old dad somehow, and he really took to the idea of racing with me once we sat down and talked about it. It was a great day for our family, I can tell you that.
“Keith and I started building the 1979 Trans Am in June of 1999, and it was quite an experience for us both. We finally finished the work in April of 2000 and prepared to take the new car and new driver to the track for the first time. We hauled the car to Cordova , Illinois one Friday night to see what it, and Keith, would do. The car was brand new, after all, and Keith had never driven on the strip. As far as I was concerned, if we could just get back to running in the 8.40s like I had when I last raced with Wes, I'd be happy.
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| Long drives to the races can wear a person down, so Dave takes the opportunity to catch a few Z's while waiting to tech the car. |
“The first thing I had to do was teach Keith how to do a burn-out. Once he had that figured out, I decided it was time to send him down the quarter-mile. I told him to take it real easy, and if something stupid happened, like the car going left or right, to get out of the throttle right away. He did a pretty good job for a new driver, and clocked a couple of 10.50 runs on the motor only with no nitrous. The car did try and go right on him once, but he lifted like he was supposed to and there were no problems. I recall he had a best 60-foot time of 1.70, and he was all excited about how hard the car launched.
“I decided he was ready to make a pass with the juice turned on, so we went back to the track on Saturday and turned him loose. On the first attempt the car hiked the front wheels three feet into the air, and it headed for the center line. Keith got out of it like he was told, and we warmed the bottles up, adjusted the pre-load and went up to try it again. The wheels came up again and this time it went to the right. Keith got out of it and then back in it, just like I told him not to, but he blasted off an 8.50 run. He came back to the pit shaking with excitement, handed me the time slip which showed we had a 1.30 60-foot time, and said ‘Damn, that launches hard - let's do it again!' This from a guy who couldn't do a burnout the day before!
“The next weekend we went to Byron , Illinois so Keith could get his NHRA license. He finally logged his three 8.50 passes, and Bob Hood and Nick Scavo signed off on his license. Once he had that in his pocket, we hooked up with the Outlaw Super Stock group at one of their events a few weeks later to get Keith into some actual heads-up competition.
“We qualified pretty well, and went to the third round of eliminations in a close race, 8.466 to 8.460, both cars running 170 mph. Keith was learning fast, and by the time we got to our first NSCA at Cordova, Illinois, we qualified 4th with an 8.32 and went three rounds. Then we headed for Bowling Green , Kentucky , where we qualified 4th again, this time with a mark of 8.29, and we went two rounds.
“Then it was on to Stanton Michigan , where we qualified 5th with an 8.37 and went on to the finals. Keith ran against Jerry Morgano, who won with an 8.05 to Keith's 8.24. The best part of the deal was that Keith treed him pretty badly, .479 to .507, so he was getting better behind the wheel and we were working as a father and son team at last.”
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| The Trans Am launches hard at Atlanta Dragway in 2003. |
Over the course of the next four seasons Team McCoy continued to improve, winning their first race at Union Grove , Wisconsin and finishing runner-up two other times.
In addition, they spent money when it was available to upgrade the car to NSCA Super Modified specs. The original iron block 449-inch Chevy engine, built by Fast Times in Chicago , later gave way to light aluminum block version, thanks to Mrs. Ed Donovan. “I wanted to lighten the car up, but I couldn't really afford to buy an aluminum block and rebuild everything. I had steel rods in the old engine, so I would have to replace those with aluminum pieces as well,” said Dave. “I figured I might be able to swing a deal at the PRI show in Indy, so we went down there hoping to find something we could afford.
“Before we went to the show, I had phoned Donovan Engineering to see what their prices were like. The lady I spoke with gave me the information and said to come by their booth when we at the show. When we got there, I asked to see the lady that I had spoken with, but because I didn't get her name I didn't know exactly who to ask for. I was told that Mrs. Donovan was the only lady in their office, and that under no circumstances did she answer the phone.
“Well, she had answered the phone the day I called, and after we met and talked in Indy, I got a good deal on an aluminum block! We also get a set of Manley aluminum rods, so we were good to go. Later, we had Matt Grillo at Lizzard Racing Engines build us a complete motor from our new components, and it turned out to be a real good piece. In fact, we ran our best-ever numbers the first year we ran that motor, a 7.78 at 179.
“We ended up in fourth place that season on the strength and lighter weight of the aluminum engine, and were pretty pleased with it. The next year we ended up in the number six spot, and really hoped to improve in 2003.
“Unfortunately, I took the engine to a guy a little closer to home for freshening up prior to last season, and I don't know what he did, but we ran into a lot of trouble after that. During testing we burned a piston, and when I took it apart to replace the piston I found a spun rod bearing, so I knew we were out of action for a while.
“I ended up calling Tony Bischoff at Bischoff Engine Service in Indiana , and eventually hauled the engine to his shop to see if we could get in at least a few races at the end of 2003. He did a great job for us, and with the newly rebuilt engine we were still able to finish ninth in the points in spite of missing a bunch of races.”
For 2004 the team has their BES powerplant ready to go, and plans right now call for them running the full eight-race NSCA schedule, if finances allow. There's no doubt that driver Keith McCoy is ready to strap on his helmet again, and the sooner the better. Keith, 36, told how he and his dad finally found the common ground that allowed them to work and relate as a family after many years.
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| Hanging out the laundry at the NSCA season opener in Belle Rose , Louisiana . |
“I was one of those kids who sat in the bleachers in diapers watching their dad race – in other words, I was out way before I can even remember,” Keith recalled. “It was just always a part of our lives when I was growing up. Unfortunately, Pop and I had some problems when I got a little older, and I decided that I wanted to go out and party instead of hanging out in the shop or at the drag strip.
“Needless to say, I got into some things that were likely going to cause me serious problems unless I got my act together, and thankfully, just as I was beginning to make an effort to get back on the straight and narrow, things just fell into place. Call it fate if you want, but Pop's partner was leaving the team, and I asked him for the opportunity to drive the new car he had been planning to build.
“I had always loved cars, and he knew it, I guess, so he was good enough to put aside our past differences and give me a shot at driving. He was smart enough to see that I wanted to make some changes in my life, and that this would be the way for us to get back together on a number of levels.
“We built out Trans Am together, and now I'm extremely happy to be able to go out there and make a seven-second pass. Believe me, I went through a lot of things, but there is absolutely no better buzz in the world than for me than being behind the wheel of that car. It's hard to describe to someone who has never done it, but it doesn't get any better than that, as far as I'm concerned.
“I love to travel and be out on the highway,” Keith continued. “Heck, we bought a new truck last year, and even though it takes both of us to make the payments on it, we love it. I live and sleep drag racing anymore, and I really don't know what I'd do without it and racing with my dad.
As far as the upcoming season is concerned, Keith is optimistic that the equipment they now have is capable of allowing the Trans Am to be competitive in their tough class. “The new motor Tony Bischoff built us seems to be a real good piece, and while it's not the highest horsepower engine in Super Modified, I think we'll be able to hang with the pack all right. Hopefully, it'll stay together all season so that all we have to do at the end of the season is freshen it up.”
Reflecting on the series of circumstances that brought his family back together again, Keith appreciates the efforts that his father has made over the years to make it happen.
“Without Pop I couldn't do what I'm doing now, and I owe it to him, no two ways about it. He's the man who makes it happen. Hopefully, I've been able to give him a few things as well as a driver. I'm pretty good at the tree, so I like to think that if spends the money and takes the time to get us to a race, then I want to be able to do my job and give 100 per cent behind the wheel. I totally hate to come back to the pit if I've made an error – I can't even bring myself to look him in the eye for a while because I feel so bad.
“He told me when we started this deal to just stick with him and he'd put me on the map, so I'm darn sure not going to leave him now!”
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