Things that happen to keep one feeling young ...
In round one of the truck class at St. Thomas Dragway, I paired
with an older style, white Ram which was not in the best of shape,
even on the parts that were not rusted.
He dialled in at 23.88 while I dialled in at 14.80 (dreamer ...
all over the map in t&t with a best of 14.90 on a slippery track,
sticking gear shift problems and a tree in which it and I had a
failure to communicate).
I was told later that people around the starting and staging area
were snickering and making snide remarks when they saw my dial-in.
Also was told that they had a good laugh while I sat staged for
the 9+ second. They said that he was half way down the track
(don't know ... could barely see him) before my tree went into
its blink, blink, blink. I had time to put out the cigarette
that I was still puffing (so much for my concentration on that
run) and close the ashtray (nothing like having ashes and butts
all over the place on a launch). I debated whether I should get
out and raise the hood to cool things off but thought it might
be interpreted as an arrogant move.
I took off in a looong pursuit (reaction time almost matched
the difference in our dial-in times) and I thought that he
edged me at the finish line. He broke out with a 22.24 @ 46.20
and I broke out at 14.76 @ 91.84 (even with a 2-3 shift that took
a bit long before completing). Computerized timer took awhile to put
up the winner as we probably confused it or it took it awhile to
quit laughing ... must have taken pity on a senior citizen and gave
the win to me.
BTW, Jim Knox ('91 4x4 318 auto., light bars, open headers, beautiful
Dak, etc.), who is as close to being a DMLer (does not have a home]
computer) without being one, won the Truck class trophy in the finals
when the Cherokee that he ran against broke out by 1/100s. Congrats,
Jim. He was in a zone all day with rts and consistent runs even with
spinning launches on the greasy track.
Pat Storey was there with his '97 hemi Dak. I did not think that he
was going to run. He did not do one t&t because he was at his vendor's
table. I saw his first run which he won with a time (in the 9's) that
was within 2/100s to his dial-in. Now, there's a pro!!!
Bob
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