PAUL SMITH – STANDING THE TEST OF TIME
Drag racing is a cutthroat
sport. It always has been. That's not to say that it isn't filled with
wonderful, honest, hard working people. There are plenty of folks like that in
drag racing. But come race day, everyone becomes chum in the water waiting for
the shark to come and feast. And you better be ready to race. It doesn't matter
what class you're in. You race to win. You win to survive.
There is a man from
Paul Smith is a racing
legend in the southeast. He's a proud member of the NHRA Southeast Division 2
Hall of Fame; having driven Top Fuel dragsters and Funny Cars down almost every
track on the east coast. He's won in Top Fuel and Funny Car as a driver and a
crew chief. That's what makes the savvy
tuner, who is a master of not abusing his equipment, so dangerous to other
competitors. Smith's years of experience along with his ability to negotiate
the trickiest of racing surfaces always makes him a threat to win.
The
Florida Nitro Wizard tunes, teaches and wins independently in the
corporate-dominated world
There is a man from
Paul Smith is a racing
legend in the southeast. He's a proud member of the NHRA Southeast Division 2
Hall of Fame; having driven Top Fuel dragsters and Funny Cars down almost every
track on the east coast. He's won in Top Fuel and Funny Car as a driver and a
crew chief. That's what makes the savvy
tuner, who is a master of not abusing his equipment, so dangerous to other
competitors. Smith's years of experience along with his ability to negotiate
the trickiest of racing surfaces always makes him a threat to win.
"I have wanted to get
in the car for about a year," said Smith afterward. "We changed a few
things and I wanted to check it out. I expect to do it again. I'm going to do
some testing on Monday's after a few races to figure out how we can make the
car run better. I don't really miss driving, because I think it's for the
younger generation, myself."
Smith, who decades ago
made a name for himself as an independent racer behind the wheel the of the
extremely popular 'Entertainer' Funny Car, is the perfect person to help
understand the differences of Funny Car racing in the past compared to racing
against the multiple car corporate teams of today.
a d v e r t i s e m e n t
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Smith finished No. 2 in
the world driving the 'Fireball' Vega in 1974. When he failed to qualify for
the final race of the season in
After the 1974 season,
Smith teamed up with a friend in
Besides evolving into a
precision tuner, Smith is also a versatile driver. "One year I drove four
different Funny Cars," said Smith with a laugh. "I drove for four
different teams. At that point I would drive anything that rolled. As long as
the money was there and we could race, we'd go racing you understand? I ended
up in the Custom Body Enterprises Dodge owned by Fred Castronova and we won
several IHRA races with that car."
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In 1987, Smith hooked up
with Chuck Etchells and they formed a formidable pair. "When we started
racing, he drove sometimes and I drove sometimes," said Smith. Eventually
Smith bought his own Top Fuel car for his son Mike to drive. "Back then
Funny Cars were blowing up and experiencing a rash of serious fires so I
thought he'd be safer in a Top Fuel car. So we bought a used Top Fuel dragster
and ran it at both IHRA and NHRA races. When Chuck and I finally teamed up we
actually earned best appearing crew and cars at the U.S. Nationals in 1990. We
did well with that car."
Smith raced successfully
with Etchells until the end of 1991, winning several IHRA national events.
Smith pulled off a rare feat in 1992 when both of his cars finished in the Top
10 in the IHRA point standings. Smith finished second in the Nitro Funny Car
point's battle to Del Worsham and he tuned his son Mike to seventh in the Top
Fuel standings, including a victory at the Summer Nationals at
"Don Schumacher has
the ability to hire people for four or five years and gets big money for them
to learn how to become top notch crew chiefs.
"You can't become a
big time crew chief going from race to race, running a couple of IHRA races
then a couple of NHRA events, and sitting out the rest of the year and not
learning how to run the new tires," Smith observed. "It's always been
an up and down battle for a guy that doesn't have a major sponsor. It's
difficult to run and be successful for years if you don't have any money behind
you.
"Drag racing's a
business. When you start a business constructing buildings and renting them
out, it takes years to make a profit and years to make it better. A Funny Car
deal is the same way. You hire people and you don't fire them when things are
down, you only make changes to make them better or the team better. It takes
big money to do that. One multiple car team owner told me it takes $80,000 to
$100,000 per race to field a competitive race car. It takes approximately three
and a half million dollars a year to field a Funny Car today."
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Of course, one or both of
his sons, John and Mike, are at the starting line with Paul every time he runs.
He has been blessed enough to have been able to provide his boys with careers
in motorsports as an offshoot of his own passion for racing. "John came to
me one day," recalls Smith. "It was after he married Rhonda and they
found out she was pregnant and they went to the Gatornationals and John drove
the car. Anyway, after they qualified he came to me and said 'I'm sure glad
you’re my father and I'm sure glad you brought me into racing or I wouldn't
have met Rhonda and I wouldn't have a baby coming. I'm sure glad you’re my
dad'." Both of Smith's son's could have gone their separate ways after
school but they chose to work with their father and it has kept their family
close.
"Usually money
talks," said Smith in his sometimes abrupt manner. "Nowadays, people
go testing after every race on Monday. Years ago, nobody tested. We all tried
to make a living with the parts we had. The only reason you ran a major event
was to try and get some sort of sponsorship. Then you would match race two or
three times a week to make money to feed your family.
"That doesn't go on
much anymore," continued Smith. "There aren't many tracks that can
afford to pay what it cost to run these cars. Now days, if you don't have the
money you can't even be there because of the cost of having six guys working.
You have to be able to provide a payroll.
"Years ago it would
be me and one other guy racing the car. He would help me drive the truck and
start the motor. I worked on the car. We didn't take the engine apart after
every run. You'd run it like you should run it, where it wouldn't blow up, and
you made money with it.
"Today with these
cars the clutch has to come out after every run, you have to seat the pistons,
fix the valves and the blower lasts just three runs and has to be stripped.”
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"They were $300 a
pair in the old days," says Smith, "but now it cost $1250 to $1500,
and sometimes they're only good for one run."
Smith summed up Funny
Car's old days compared with today's corporate environment at the track.
"Years ago it was a lot of fun to do it," said Smith with a smile.
"Now, its still fun and I would love to have a major sponsor and race full
time. But you got to have people. I mean you've got to have six to eight people
full time and a million dollars. It's a lot different nowadays."
Smith is definitely what
you could refer to as an 'old school' drag racer. He doesn't stay cooped up in
the transporter studying his computer all day. He is a hand's on crew chief
that prefers a little dirt under his nails at the end of the day.
"The computer to me
is just a data recorder," Smith elaborated. "I'm too busy looking
outside making sure everything is put together right and everything's safe. I'd
like to have someone like John or Mike (Smith) to be full time but it takes a
lot of money. My sons are computer smart and I'm not but I'm savvy. I'm a
common sense guy. The computer doesn't tell you when the rod bearings are too
wide or the pistons are snug or the wrist pins are loose. There's a lot the
computer doesn't tell you, it's just a recorder."
Smith's years of
quarter-mile involvement have helped produce plenty of other successful
competitors. Through his Top Fuel Drag Racing School, Smith has helped drivers
such as Jeff Arend, Cristen Powell, Johnny Gray, Clay Millican, Phil Burkart
and recently Jon Capps earn their nitro license. He's also had many mechanics
come through his week long nitro course. The Funny Car legend has developed a
keen instinct when it comes to preparing new fuel drivers and mechanics.
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Smith owes his longevity
in drag racing mainly to the care he takes with his equipment. "It all
comes out of my pocket," said Smith. "I'm paying the bills. Some guys
run a lot of lead in the car at the top end to run big mile per hour. I ran
326-mph in
"I could go out there
like some crew chiefs and run those big speeds and low 4.70's," said
Smith, "but the motor shows it and the crank shafts gone after four runs.
My cranks last 16 to 20 runs. I run the car to fit the budget. If the budget is
there then that's the way I run the car. If I had an eight or ten man crew, an
extra trailer full of parts and four or five spare race car bodies, I'd run the
same way as the high dollar teams."
So in reality, drag racing
eventually all comes down to the money. It's the major difference between Funny
Car racing in the 1970's and today. "It's not cubic inches it's cubic
dollars," said Smith. A sentiment heard many times from many racers.
So you have to wonder what
keeps this southern legend of the quarter-mile coming back to fight it out with
the big boys year after year. "I'm bored, that's why I race," says
Smith with a wry grin. "I could live off this building our shop is in. I
don't take any money out of the race car. My property pays for me and my wife's
stuff. I don't owe anything to anybody. When people ask me what I'm still doing
this for I tell them 'I got nothing better to do'."
Despite his consuming
seriousness over racing, the one thing that makes Smith smile every time is his
wife Sharon. "She's great," says Smith, who finally married his
girlfriend from
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