NHRA - National Hot Rod Association

Welcome to the day-late-and-a-topic-short DRAGSTER Insider for this week. I’m a day behind, like most of you are, after Memorial Day, and with travel Thursday to Englishtown for one of the greatest events on the tour precluding any chance…

(Above) Me, in 1985. Sharp-eyed readers will note the typewriter (electric at the time, but I started on a manual), the photo-sizing wheel (Photoshop? Ha!) and the pica-pole ruler by my left hand, and pen-and-paper method of…

It was more than two years between Shelly Anderson’s blowover at the 1996 Brainerd event and the next one to befall a racer, but Pat Dakin won’t soon forget when his number came up in Topeka in the fall of 1998. Racing Doug…

Like a Top Fueler flipping overbackward and returning to earth pointed in the wrong direction, I’m back for part three of the blowover chronicles, beginning with a little historical tidying up before we continue the chronological account of all…

At first blush, the twin blowovers in June 1986 and August 1987 by Don Garlits’ similarly enclosed front-end Swamp Rat XXX and 31 dragsters may have seemed to be a plague upon his streamliner design, but within a few years, it became clear that…

The streamliner series was, predictably, well-received, as I think we all have a soft spot in our hearts for experimentation and oddball efforts. As you may recall, very few of the streamliners or other aero-influenced Top…

Harry Schmidt, right, with Raymond Beadle (RayMar photo; Marc Bruederle collection) Surprise. Bet you didn’t expect to see me this week, let alone on Thursday. Then again, I didn’t expect us to…

Last Thursday, a strong turnout of the NHRA family came together at the Wally Parks NHRA Motorsports Museum presented by Automobile Club of Southern California to honor our longtime friend Bernie Partridge, who died a week…

After Top Fuel’s streamlining experimentation phase in the mid-1960s burned out after just a few years, the conventional slingshot didn’t change much beyond the standard addition of a body to cover the frame of the “rail…

With all of the talk about aero trickery that has been the natural byproduct of the wheel-pants thread, I’ve received quite a few requests for a more full accounting of Top Fuel streamlining efforts in the sport’s history.…

Even a week later, it’s hard to believe that Bill “Grumpy” Jenkins is gone. His loss still resonates from garage to pit area, felt by anyone who called himself or herself a longtime race fan, and even among the racers…

(Above) Craig Breedlove, left, and engine builder Dave Carpenter with the new and still unpainted Spirit II outside of Quinn Epperly's shop (Left) Breedlove held a model of Spirit of…

Everyone loved Bill Jenkins, but perhaps none more so than Linda Vaughn. I had a whole other column ready to go – ahead of schedule even – when I got the news via text yesterday morning that we’d…

Today’s history lesson on wheel pants comes out – literally -- of the clear blue sky from fellow drag racing history freak Bret Kepner, who pointed out that, “It was the airplane racers of the 1920s who, while competing in one of the top spectator…

In the early 1970s, I was a newly minted teenager in junior high, trying to impress the girls by styling in bell-bottom pants. Meanwhile, miles away geographically but never far from my brain, Top Fuel was going through its…

Two weeks from today will mark the 20th anniversary of the breaking of one of drag racing’s great barriers, Kenny Bernstein’s shattering of the 300-mph plateau at the 1992 Gatornationals. While it took 15 years – 1960 to…

In the last two weeks, in addition to the normal writing that the National DRAGSTER editorial staff has been doing – Sportsman stories from Phoenix, previews for the Tire Kingdom NHRA Gatornationals presented by…

In May 2010, I reached the big 5-0, a milestone age for most males who begin to realize that maybe the ride they’ve been on has well passed its halfway mark. I’m more a glass-half-full guy and never thought much of it and…

In 1974, I made my first trip to Irwindale Raceway for a Funny Car show. I don’t remember much of the specifics of the event, but I remember leaving with a crooked little grin on my 14-year-old face after seeing Pete Everett’s Pete’s Lil Demon Funny…

Dean Court photo By basic appearance, today’s Top Fuelers haven’t changed much since “Big Daddy” Don Garlits debuted his successful rear-engine dragster at the 1971 Winternationals. The small…

The final buzzer had sounded on my weekly hockey game. It had been a hard-fought and heated battle with our longtime nemesis, each jockeying for the top spot in our division, that ended unsatisfyingly for both in a tie. Cross words (and crossed…

Photos by Jerry Foss Celebrity roasts are always good fun, where friends and acquaintances take turns skewering the object of their affection, regaling the assembled multitudes with sordid stories, amusing…

Well, well, well … turns out the Insider Nation is full of closet rocket-car fans. I’ve never really written much about our hydrogen-peroxide-fueled friends before, but now that I have, the fond memories are flooding in. The tale of “Capt. Jack”…

When you live in Southern California, you take for granted some sights not usually seen elsewhere. Movie stars in your local restaurants. Palm trees. Top-down convertibles in December. In-N-Out burgers. And, of course, NHRA Drag Racing in early…

Even for a fan who grew up watching them in the 1970s and early 1980s, there was a lot that I didn’t know about rocket cars, but after spending time on the phone last year with "Capt. Jack" McClure and yesterday with “the…

In the interest of full disclosure – and many of my longtime column readers know this already – the two-part story on “Capt. Jack” McClure’s rocket go-kart was a long time coming. I did the interview about a year ago and –…

Jack McClure went from successful fishing-boat captain to the cover of Drag Racing USA thanks to his unique rocket-powered go-kart. Of all the exhibition acts to grace the quarter-…

There have been a lot of weird and wild cars go down the dragstrip throughout the years. A wheelstanding tank. A jet-powered Kenworth truck. Chain-driven sidewinder dragsters and Funny Cars. But no bid for wildest drag…

Being a columnist ain’t easy. It wouldn’t even be easy if this was my only gig and there wasn’t some weekly content monster called National DRAGSTER. Don’t get me wrong; this column is still one of the most fun things I get to do each week…

It didn’t take much arm-twisting after I broke the sad news of the death of Tommy “T.C.” Lemons, Don Garlits’ most storied crew chief, first on Twitter and then on NHRA.com, to get the stories and plaudits pouring in for an…