| HARD TIMES RACING OWASSO, OKLAHOMA 1974 CAMARO NHRA/IHRA No Electronics Bracket Racer Hi: I'm Merle Grabhorn and I own and race the Hard Times Camaro. It's a serious (well, semi-serious anyway), racecar that I race at dragstrips across the Great Plains states. It is not a street driven car so it spends most of its time on the trailer, waiting to go to the next race. I race the car in "money" classes, which, by definition, makes it a "Professional" car. However, since I don't do this for a living, I have to call it a Semi-Professional racecar. It races in a "class" or "bracket" known as No Electronics or No/E. You can read more on bracket racing and the No/E class on some of the links below. For now, I'd like to talk about drag racing. Drag racing seems a pretty straight forward sport to most people who have never done it. Once the green light comes on you floor the gas pedal and go as fast as you can until you pass the finish line, then you hit the brakes. What's the big deal? Drag racing is a sport measured only in seconds. If your car is capable of running in the 11s, you will use an entire day's worth of practice runs to get a minute's worth of racing. You may spend eight hours at the track in preparation only to loose in the first 11 seconds of the race. Experience is paramount in drag racing, yet it's difficult to accumulate the time behind the wheel to become genuinely accustomed to all the things that can happen in a drag car. Things happen fast and one mistake, no matter how small, is usually the difference between winning and loosing. Because things happen so fast, the decision-making and judgment call capability of a Pro football quarterback is not good enough insure that you'll be first across the finish line. The quarterback has another down if a play doesn't work. The drag racer has no more chances. It's over. | |
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