BOBBY LAGANA, JR. - YOU'VE COME A LONG WAY BABY

Bobby Lagana Jr. is not your average professional drag racer and he’s content with that assessment.

“Me and my brother Dom we’re gypsies,” said Lagana, 31, from Scarsdale, NY. “We're vagabonds, gnomes. We got a race car with us, and once in awhile if I can help out with the house bill, I do. We don't ever go there anyway, and the longer we stay there they get mad at us anyway. We live in peoples houses; we lived in Virginia on someone’s couch for four years. Still got stuff over there.”

Lagana is a throwback to drag racing’s pre-corporate days. He’s an old school racer trapped in a desperately modern sport. Junior is the kind of son that makes Bobby Lagana, Sr. , a proud father.

“Our responsibility is to keep the people around us happy and to try and keep peace, you know just to bring happiness really,” Lagana admitted. “This car allows us to do that. Now don't get me wrong, I love nitromethane", that is why I do this. Hey, I don't care about the TV, no offense to the press, none of that stuff. That’s not what motivates me.

That big truck and trailer was intimidating. We could fit this truck and trailer inside of it. We’re back in our element now. We’ve got our pop-up tent, our parts sprawled all over the place, but the car looks great. I’m happier than you could ever imagine. - Bobby Lagana, Jr.

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evening’s second seeding

For a brief moment, Lagana witnessed the light at the end of the tunnel in drag racing, when he was named the driver for Evan Knoll’s Top Fuel dragster operation. He would finally have a chance to race on a more than reasonable budget and obtain the opportunity to work out of an eighteen-wheeler. He was also a teammate to Clay Millican, admittedly a supporter of Lagana’s efforts throughout the years of hardship.

The light at the end of the tunnel turned out to be a train.

Shortly after the first race, Millican and the rest of the team were told to seek employment elsewhere and the race shop Lagana had begun working from was closed down.

Such a misfortune was just his luck, but not his downfall. He simply took his car, loaded it into his enclosed trailer and towed to Rockingham, North Carolina the next week.

“We're all just trying to get through this and I'm going to do the best I can to make sure everybody's happy and in the wash everybody is going to be happy,” Lagana said. “Life isn't easy, it's not, it's tough. You have your faith, and together we're all good people. Some people approach it differently and we just got to make sure we're eye to eye. I really love people and I hate it when people are upset and mad, I hate that.

“Imagine if the whole world could be happy right. It would be pretty wild wouldn't it?”

Lagana has followed this creed throughout his life and even when he faced two critical adverse situations, he continued stepping forward even when the pain seemed unbearable. The first of those experiences came in June of 1998 when he was involved in a vicious racing accident. The second came with the loss of his mother, Marie Lagana.

He was the victim of a hung throttle on his under-funded dragster during the 1998 IHRA Empire Nationals in Rochester, NY. Lagana went off the end of the strip and suffered numerous serious injuries including severed fingers on his right hand.

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IHRA competition director Mike Baker, who was first on the scene, testified that he believed he was walking up on a dead man. As he put it, “There was no way anyone could have survived that.”

Lagana did because he’s a survivor. He was racing two months later. As a testament to his determination, one year later to the day of his crash, running in the same lane, he defeated Danny Dunn to win his first round of competition.

Shortly after the comeback, Lagana learned his mother had cancer. She kept the illness largely under wraps.

“When my mother was dying I was on the road racing,” he said. “My sisters were taking care of her and Dom and I were out racing. I asked her, took her by the arm, looked in her eyes and asked her what she wanted me to do. She was sick but didn’t tell me, heck, didn’t tell anyone how bad she was. She looked me right back in the eyes and told me I couldn’t stop racing. I know if we would have stopped then it would have made her worse and I like to think there was a certain amount of joy towards the end of her life in knowing her children were doing what they loved to do.”

Marie passed Dec. 14, 2000.

“Looking back of course I wish I would have spent more time with her,” Lagana said. “But Dom and I were out doing what she wanted us to do. She’s still with us, I think of her every day. Everything happens for a reason and there is a reason she wanted us out there racing.”

One of the things that come out of Marie Lagana’s passing was the development of Bobby’s relationship with his little brother, Dom. Through their mother’s illness they leaned on each other, helping each other through. Brothers always have a strong bond, but the bond between Bobby and Dom is at a unique level.

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“There really are no words to describe how I feel for my brother,” Bobby said. “People have no idea what they are missing by not having someone in their life like Dom is in mine. I never have to question anything and I know he will always, always be there for me. There is no amount of money, no sponsorship, no deal that would ever separate us. We’ve been together constantly for so long and he wants what I want…to go racing.”

Going racing makes Lagana happy. Taking the pain away from others does to. If he had his way, he’d be the peacemaker of the world and keep on dragging.

“I'd run for that job,” Lagana admitted. “I'd try and do it. I hate seeing the news nowadays because most of it is so stupid; it could be resolved so easily. Hey if there is anybody out there going to read this press and they think I don't like them, they're wrong man, I love ya all.”

Lagana would run for the President of the United States in a heart beat. He’s currently driving a dragster on the IHRA tour promoting the National League of POW-MIA Families and giving the veterans a welcoming billboard. Lagana is patriotic to the tens, and he’s in love with his country.

He knows that dreams come true in America. After all, he’s the shining example.

“I’d give it a shot,” Lagana said. “We’d go on the road and campaign. I’d bring Dom with me and we’d blaze a trail. We’d run our campaign like we do our Top Fuel dragster. We’d make the campaign stops at Subway and McDonald’s because that would be all we could afford.”

Subway and McDonald’s fit into the element he’s used to. Lagana’s not the caviar and cocktails kind of drag racer. Even an eighteen-wheeler wasn’t his shtick.

“You know we’re almost back to our element,” Lagana said, looking over at his weathered Chaparral-typed trailer. “That big truck and trailer was intimidating. We could fit this truck and trailer inside of it. We’re back in our element now. We’ve got our pop-up tent, our parts sprawled all over the place, but the car looks great. I’m happier than you could ever imagine.”

Lagana is happy because he’s come a long way and arrived full circle. He’s more than happy being in his unique world, outside of the law of averages.

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BOBBY LAGANA, JR. - YOU'VE COME A LONG WAY BABY