Drag racing memories, nitro induce tears
Today is the first day of April, and a special day at that.
Happy April Fool's Day from the biggest fool in racing.
I pondered sharing some great funnies I had come up with before realizing how often these "gotchas" backfire like a poorly tuned engine.
The first was to proclaim a news conference today at Las Vegas Motor Speedway in which the speedway would announce plans to expand its dragstrip from two lanes to four to match its counterpart in Concord, N.C., where a four-wide NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series event will take place in two weeks for the second straight year.
Sounded funny to me, but LVMS president Chris Powell saw little humor in it. That's probably the only time Powell won't smile during a week when his track is hosting an NHRA national event.
Maybe he didn't laugh because his boss, Bruton Smith, still might want the dragstrip expansion.
My other option for a belly laugh was to "leak" that old-time, drag racing stars Don Schumacher, Connie Kalitta and Kenny Bernstein would add to their team ownership roles by driving nitro-fueled cars to salute the NHRA's 60th anniversary when the series returns to Las Vegas in October.
That frivolity was nixed because I was afraid Schumacher would take it seriously and kick one of his four Funny Car drivers to the curb, Kalitta would punch me and Bernstein would make me feel guilty that I implied he is too old to drive.
It isn't easy being funny -- as I've proven many times.
It's just that I'm in such a good mood this week. I'm giddy knowing that I'll be smelling nitromethane fumes today during the opening day of the SummitRacing.com NHRA Nationals.
Just the thought of those heavenly vapors brings tears to my eyes.
Another reason for my upbeat mood is the Review-Journal, with NHRA support, produced its first special news section devoted to a drag racing event. It was in Wednesday's printed edition and can be found at lvrj.com/nhra.
The main story in the section, titled "Racing through history at 320 mph," is devoted to Southern Nevada drag racing history, complementing the NHRA's diamond anniversary season.
I had some cherished conversations while reliving the "American Graffiti" era with some of the valley's drag racing founders. Their camaraderie lives on, and I got to share a bit of it.
Their memories of countless hours scouring junkyards for go-faster parts, trailblazing technology and enduring hundreds, if not thousands, of scraped knuckles working on cars made them drag racing blood brothers.
One of those men, Randy Connell, has a website (vegas-rides.com) with a YouTube.com link (http://is.gd/xQpAof) to video from 1960s drag racing at Henderson's Thunderbird Raceway.
I received some history updates Wednesday when Larry Horten, former manager of Stardust Raceway, called to talk about the past, and Norm Willey, 79, told me the Nevada Highway Patrol shut down parts of Boulder Highway for drag races in the 1940s.
(Read more about their stories at lvrj.com/motorsports.)
The passion in the eyes of those I met and in the voices of those I spoke with by phone when sharing their drag racing memories almost made me cry.
And if I had, I couldn't have blamed those tears on sniffing nitro.
Jeff Wolf's motor sports column is published Friday in the Las Vegas Review-Journal. He can be reached at jwolf@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0247. Visit lvrj.com/motorsports for more news and commentary. Follow Wolf on Twitter: @lvrjwolf.
