If you have it, he’ll see
it. That’s all John Force needed a glimpse of. Not a physical appearance thing.
It’s the kind of look that could be considered drag racing’s version of the Eye
of the Tiger.

Force had it once, lost it
briefly, and gained it back. It was the look that vaulted him from a
fast-talking, truck-driving, ad pitchman into the winningest drag racer of all
time. The death of Eric Medlen in a post-Gatornationals testing accident dealt
the 14-time champion a blow harder than he’d ever experienced in life.

“I was looking for a
driver and all of a sudden Neff showed an interest in driving,” Force said of
his recent hiring of Mike “Zippy’ Neff. “I asked him if he was serious. He told
me that it was what he always wanted to do.”

Then Force saw it.

“He had the look in his
eyes,” Force said. “I realized it. I figured Schumacher would make him a
driver. I don’t know why he didn’t. I guess he has his reasons. He’s a good
businessman.”

Just like that, Force saw
an opportunity and seized it. He made Neff the driver of the fourth JFR Funny
Car with his only driving experience being on motorcycles, and not drag racing.

Funny Car bodies have been
at the forefront of the news lately, with the Toliver/WJ incident getting some
press and also generating a lot of Internet traffic in various chat rooms, but
the Impala body saga is the one that has drawn the most attention from those
affected.

Don Prudhomme’s team, as the
semi-factory GM operation, was the first to get the new shells, which replaced
their previous Monte Carlo bodies. As the
highest placed GM team in last year’s points chase it would have been expected
that Tony Pedregon would have been next in line for a body. And the projected
delivery date for the Quaker
State team’s first shell
indicated that, but in the end that date was pushed back, and both Tim
Wilkerson and Gary Densham had their Impalas before Pedregon.  Scuttlebutt at the time suggested that the
Pedregon team was bumped to the bottom of the list because Cruz Pedregon was
actively courting Toyota.
The Japanese auto maker backs Pedregon’s midget team, and it was rumored that
he was seeking sponsorship for his Funny Car operation as well. That has ever
been confirmed. 

Consequently Tony Pedregon
did not debut his Impala until the Atlanta
race, and on the car’s initial run the body forward of the windshield was
destroyed. Crew chief Dickie Venables had the ESPN people on site provide him
with a slow motion replay of the incident and it was determined that the area
between the burst panel and the injector opening flexed downward three times
before fracturing and initiating the breakup of the rest of the forward portion
of the body. The body had been mounted with the same basic “tree” structure as was
used on the team’s Monte Carlo shells but it
was assumed that the different proportions of the body compared with the
earlier unit contributed to the failure. 

The
Northwind unveiling party brought together about 50 or so people that
had something to do with the rebuild of the famous old car last 16 months.

It
was the Saturday before Father’s Day and a perfect time for a bunch of old guys
to get together for steak and chicken and catch a glimpse of the finished
product: The Northwind Top Fuel Dragster had been brought back to life
after all these years!

It
was one of those Northwest days in the spring where it is sun-showers-sun-showers
all day long. I drove from my home in Issaquah, picked up Dave Jeffers in Puyallup, and headed up to Jack Coonrod’s house in Vancouver. It took about
3 hours each way, so it was 6 hours of nostalgia drag racing talk that day as
Dave was the early driver of the gold-flaked machine back in 1965. He’s a nice
guy who has been blessed with a good memory. He talked about things that I
certainly couldn’t remember.

Dave
is a Northwest guy from the Centralia
area who loved to build drag cars and, of course, drive them. He had spent a
lot of time with Walt Austin at Puyallup
Raceway Park
in those early days, driving many cars and doing very well behind the wheel. An
opportunity came around for him and he moved to California to build cars for Race Car Specialties
(RSC), a well-respected chassis shop. Soon after, his former contacts from the
Northwest asked him to drive the new Kent Fuller magicar, the Northwind,
and Dave was more than ready for that opportunity also.

The opportunity was
enormous, but the gamble was astronomical.

Still, it was one that Tony Pedregon believed he had to take, and the early
returns show that his decision four seasons ago to leave arguably the top team
in motorsports to form his own operation has proven to be the right one.

Pedregon, a championship contender in each of his eight seasons driving for
John Force Racing during the late 1990s and early 2000s, has come full circle.
After a year or two of on-the-job training, he has built his own championship
contender.

"It's been every bit as challenging as I thought it would be, and then
some," Pedregon said. "The work is
non-stop. I took a perfectly good-paying job (four years ago driving) for Force
and I took a gamble. But if we all wanted to be drivers, there would be a
shortage of cars and owners. The challenge for me was making the transition
from a driver to an owner-driver and knowing what I had to compete against, and
that's John and his army of cars; Don Schumacher and his multi-car team, and
Don Prudhomme, and that's not to mention all the Tim Wilkersons, Del Worshams,
and Jim Heads.

"Given those circumstances, people couldn't understand why I really wanted
to do it. But I think at this stage, looking back, we've proven ourselves to
some degree."

The NHRA's liaison for
fuel racing Dan Olson says he's in limbo as to whether he would like to see the
85% nitromethane percentage increased. Yes he would love to see anything that
would lower the cost of nitro racing but only if it doesn't upset the
proverbial apple cart.

“I think when we ran 90% that our parts life was a lot
better," Olson said. "There’s no doubt the crank life and the rod
life was better. We are looking into it and talking to a lot of people. It’s
open for discussion.”

There's no doubt the 85% rule drove up the cost of
nitromethane racing. Torco’s CompetitionPlus.com discussed the issue with
crewchiefs on both ends of the financial spectrum and at the top end with a
financially sound, competitive team the increase in spending has measured $300K
on parts (not due to cost increase, but breakage) while on the other end that
figure is $70K.

If you thrive on blistering speeds and scintillating elapsed
times, don’t come to the Mopar Mile-High Nationals at Bandimere Speedway in Morrison, Colorado. If
your idea of a drag racing good time is a qualifying session in which every Pro
Stock car is quicker than 6.70, this isn’t the race for you. If you yawn
at speeds under 335 MPH, don’t come up to the rarified air of Bandimere.

But, If you’re nuts for drag racing, this is the race for
you. This is the event at which elapsed times and speeds take a back seat
to straightforward, all-out drag racing. It’s the event when tire smoking
pedaling contests may not happen with every pair of cars, but you can bet your
last dollar that there’s going to be least one or two in the early going.

There is no other track like Bandimere Speedway. While Thunder Valley
– Bristol – is built on the side of a mountain,
it pales in comparison to Thunder
Mountain. Those
hills in Tennessee are gentle slopes compared
to the massive wall of rock out of which the drag strip in Colorado has been carved. The spectator
seating is arguably the best in the sport. No matter what side of the
track you’re on there isn’t a bad seat in the house.

IN THE HEAT OF THE DAY

How much is eight thousandths of a second? Not much, admittedly, but
under the right circumstances it can be huge. In two recent races, the
Pro Care Rx Nationals at Englishtown and the Mopar Mil-High Nationals
in Denver, heat may have played a pivotal role in the
outcome of Pro Stock Motorcycle competition.

Old Bridge Township Raceway Park and Bandimere Speedway are similarly
configured in that the competitors approach the starting line by
rolling under the control/VIP suite towers. When the weather’s hot as
it was at both races, the shade afforded by the tower can be
unbelievably important to the motorcycle competitors. If the lines are
long, the racers whose motorcycles are in the shade ultimately end up
with a considerable advantage over those who remain out in full
sunlight.

Racing kicked off Thursday at the NHRA O’Reilly Auto Parts Jr. Drag
Racing League Eastern Conference Finals with close to 700 kids from 20
states and eastern Canada taking the track at Bristol Dragway. Racers,
ranging in age from 8 to 17, completed two rounds of time trials in
preparation for eliminations that will begin Friday.

Ever
seen the 2001 movie Rock Star? 
The plot revolves around Pittsburgh native and vocalist Izzy Cole
(played by Mark Wahlberg) who fronts a hard-rock band performing cover tunes of
his favorite group, mega-superstars Steel Dragon. To make a long movie script
short, the band’s vocalist suddenly leaves the group, and Izzy is chosen as his
replacement.  Days later, Izzy is
transformed from fan to group frontman, performing to crowds in excess of
20,000 every night, while telling the fans, “I’m living proof that if you work
hard enough and want it bad enough, dreams do come true.” 

So,
you’re thinking, “Sure, it’s a great movie plot.  It’s also a fairy tale.  A story of that kind could only originate in
Hollywood.”  Well, it’s true that Steel
Dragon doesn’t exist, and on occasion, California filmmakers have been known to
stretch the boundaries of reality just a bit. 
However, some real-life folks get out of bed each morning realizing that
their dreams have become reality, not because of a movie script, but because
they wanted them bad enough and worked hard to achieve them.  Just ask Top Alcohol Driver “Diamond” Dave
DeAngelis, for his success story is no fairy tale.

Growing
up in Hillsborough, New Jersey, about 35 minutes from Raceway Park in
Englishtown, DeAngelis, nicknamed “Diamond” after racer “Diamond Dave” Miller
(courtesy of fellow photojournalist Tracy Waters), made the track his home at
an early age.

Don Schumacher. The mention of the name invokes
talk of master promoter and the perfection of multi-car teams. A former drag
racer, Schumacher blazed trails in the early years of the sport with his
legendary teams, and when match race demands pulled him in different directions
he merely expanded to multiple drivers to fill the need.

A successful businessman, Schumacher built the
Schumacher Electric brand into a huge business. He’s done the same since his
return to the sport a little over a decade ago.

In our latest installment of The World According
to, we asked Schumacher his opinion on some of today’s issues.