The worlds quickest and fastest octogenarian.

Chris "the Greek" Karamesines, Pomona CA 11-12-09 (photo by Cole Coonce)

Godspeed to Darryl Jackman of Fast News Network and Drag Race Central. Besides being a vital resource and a reporter who did exemplary work, he was just a nice guy — an absolute mensch. The word I got is that he passed on Wednesday from pancreatic cancer.

I will remember him this way, posed next to the portrait of LA Times motorsports reporter, Shav Glick. Glick was obsequiously courted by the NHRA, who couldn’t go down on him fast enough, even though he sometimes got many things completely wrong, including confusing cubic inches with cubic centimeters. Regardless, besides a permanent parking space next to the tower, NHRA named the media center after him and hung his portrait next to Darryl’s spot in the press room. I guess the joke is how much Darryl was beginning to resemble the portrait.

Darryl Jackman, Godspeed

The epochal full-length feature film American Nitro has been digitally remastered and released on dvd. Finally. I mean, it is really about time, because although many have tried to capture  the hellzapoppin’ , explosive and dramatic essence of drag racing on celluloid — most have failed. This documentary is perhaps the sole exception.

American Nitro

After a successful theatrical run in 1979 (where it grossed over a million dollars — a rather unheard of and lucrative take for a documentary film), American Nitro was mothballed until VHS cassettes entered American living room and home entertainment centers. At that time (circa 1994), Steve Collison, editor of Super Stock & Drag Illustrated, enjoined yours truly to write an essay about the history of drag racing as portrayed in cinema. So I did, hosting a series of beer-and-popcorn catered parties made up equally of gearheads, pseudo-intellectuals and film buffs. The resulting story ran with the rather obvious headline of “Lights! Camera! Nitro!” Some of the thoughts on American Nitro, as commented on by the intelligentsia gathered in my Silver Lake living room, ran as follows:

Despite the Professor’s neuroses I sensed we were in a groove, the vibrations were positive, Ikky asked for more Cafe Gavina (a brand of bean juice that is particularly hard to find in Death Valley). “Don’t waste time with Hollywood Productions,” I told myself, “stick with the documentaries — they are far more surreal than anything the Film Studios could offer.”

I jammed in something called American Nitro into the VCR and hoped for the best. And I got it. This guy was not unlike Funny Car Summer, but ultimately more successful i.e., no maudlin folk music obnoxiously underscoring the plight of the independent drag racer, and no gratuitous sandstorm footage. Shot mostly at Fremont Raceway, this gem contained plenty of mid-70’s era funny car racing. Also included in this work, however, is an extremely chilling interview with engine builder Ed Pink who discusses the horrors of oil fires in the early days of drag racing, particularly the incident which claimed the life of Top Fuel hero John “the Zookeeper” Mulligan at the U.S. Nationals in 1969. That was a dark day for drag racing, and the footage from this segment rattled the collective soul and psyche of the race fans and film buffs gathered in my living room.

“This too was the ‘Spirit of America,’” Zukovic solemnly intoned.

“His passing was as tragic to the drag racing community as the school teacher’s who died in the Space Shuttle was to Middle America,” replied Sean Vigle.

“Beebe & Mulligan were the #1 qualifiers at that race with a 6.43, they had the rest of the dragsters covered by 2/10ths of a second,” Ikky mentioned.

He then whispered, “It was perhaps our Hindenburg crash.”

It got pretty quiet for a few moments.

“Wow, you guys really take this stuff seriously. Do any of you remember where you were when you heard about the news about his death?” Professor Prina wondered.

“Yeah…I do,” I said softly.

Yes, the “Zookeeper” pushed the parameters of a Top Fuel car in the 60’s and did not survive. His clutch exploded, a not-uncommon phenomena at the time, perhaps due to strain from the massive horsepower. But a lot of envelopes were subjected to stress tests during that era, both on and off the ol’1320. The racing movie that embodied the social chaos of that time would have to be Two Lane Blacktop. If Mulligan’s demise was symbolic of the end of drag racing’s innocence, then Two Lane Blacktop seemed to be a fitting segue out of American Nitro.

I have to be honest: I haven’t watched that film in over fifteeen years. Until…. After having been sent a “screener” copy, I popped in the new dvd of American Nitro a few nights ago, and was once again moved by the sequence about John Mulligan. But I also realized what a time capsule this film has become. Besides “Zookeeper” Mulligan after his passing, nitro-addled 1970s Americana is also something that is never coming back. And because that zeitgeist was captured by American Nitro’s filmmakers so eloquently, their film has been become not only a crucial document, but a eulogy for the passing of drag racing itself, which, in my opinion, is basically moribund, if not just dead. – Cole Coonce

More about the dvd release of the digitally-remastered American Nitro can be found here: http://americannitro.com/

(Look for the entire transcript of “Lights! Camera! Nitro!” to run in Volume 2 of Top Fuel Wormhole: The Cole Coonce Drag Strip Reader.)

“Wild Bill” Alexander, Ernie Alvarado,  their Shudder Bug crew and trophy girl, San Fernando Raceway, 1963. (photog unknown)

More of the Shudder Bug at Fernando: “Wild Bill” Alexander leaving the line at “The Pond,” 1963. (photo by Dave Wallace, Sr.)

photo by Dave Wallace, Sr.

John Force pointing fingers (photo by Cole Coonce)

This photograph of John Force  is culled from the shoot for the WIRED Magazine feature “War of the Wheels.” The article set out to explain the technological differences between import racers and modern Top Fuel cars. This story did not make it into Vol. 1 of Top Fuel Wormhole: The Cole Coonce Drag Strip Reader, but will run in Volume 2.

That John Andretti thang yesterday was a REAL piece of theatre… just before he went out the last time he had Rutherford sitting on the car pod giving him advice… WTF, is Lone Star JR Dorian Grey’s younger brother?

Scott “Lucky” Hudson, the co-host of the “Speed Scene Live” webcast, has gracefully invited yours truly to discuss my new collection of drag strip journalism, Top Fuel Wormhole, on his show tomorrow night.

As Hudson hisself writes, “Author and nitro junkie, Cole Coonce, on Speed Scene Live TV tomorrow talking about his great new book! Check out “Top Fuel Wormhole” at www.SpeedSceneRacing.com“

Show time is: 6 pm PST, Tuesday, May 5th. To hear the show, point your browser to: www.SpeedSceneRacing.com

There will be call-in segments also. The number is 1-800-809-0802.  Feel free to  phone the show and discuss anything from The Surfers AA/Fuel Dragster to Thrust SSC’s Mach One land speed record to “Jocko” Johnson’s streamliners to “Wild Willie” Borsch driving around opposing guardrails to “Nitro Neil” Bisciglia’s behind-the-wheel asphalt poetry to Arley Langlo’s political acts in a Top Fuel dragster… My hope is that the tenor of the broadcast will be nitromaniacal equivalent of the nights talk jock Art Bell would shoot the cosmic bullbutter with Terence McKenna. Or thereabouts. – Cole Coonce

Photos from 2009 Drag Fest, Famoso Raceway, Bakersfield, California.

#1 Qualifier Dennis Taylor and the Future Flash Funny Car

Marc Gewertz, Mendy Fry and Paolo Galli (photo by Cole Coonce)

Funny Car Runner-up Mendy Fry boiling the hides (photo by Cole Coonce)

Drag Fest Funny Car champ Ed Dougan & the Fighting Irish (photo by Cole Coonce)

Nitro Kitty kicks out the sand (photo by Cole Coonce)

Future Flash back-up vixen (photo by Cole Coonce)

DragFest back-up girl wardrobe malfunction (photo by Cole Coonce)

(photos by Cole Coonce)

Drag Racing Online: Where The Pavement Ends

“But through all of that, the biggest story was the turnout: Yes, in a scene reminiscent of a Steinbeck novel or a dusty Henry Fonda movie, hordes of racers and race fans fired up their rust-buckets, rail-jobs and stripped-down coupes, took to the highway and made the migration to Bakersfield and its drag strip out by the oil fields, Famoso Raceway. More than 500 race cars entered. Twenty-nine Funny Cars slugged it for eight slots on the Elimination ladder. On Saturday morning, it took an hour to crawl five miles from the exit off of Highway 99 to the track’s parking lots and entrances. Bill Groak, the event’s publicist, marveled, “What recession?” in reference to the legions of go-cat-wild gearheads that overran the facility.”

More here: DRO: WHERE THE PAVEMENT ENDS — Metallic Crab Salad and Crushed Toes in Bakersfield

Plueger & Gyger (file photo)

Funny Car Fever, Sacramento Raceway, April 24-25, 2009 – (Filed in absentia from a debris-laden desk in SoCal; cobbled from tweets and phone calls from the track) According to twitter.com/nitrokitty, Mendy Fry and McCain’s Bomb Squad ‘73 Duster is #1 qualifier at Funny Car Fever by 5/1000ths of a second; they turned a 6.003 @ 235 mph. #2 is Kris Krabill in Gary Turner’s Pedaler, at 6.008… After “Fast Jack” Beckman’s crash in the American Revolution Camaro Friday night, there are fourteen cars left to compete in the first round of eliminations….

Opening results: (via a cell phone conversation, dictated from the back of a time slip as the tower had run out of xerox paper (!)) The first round featured an improvised a 14-car eliminator of which, twelve cars actually made the call: Jim Adolph didn’t make it to the lanes, so Kris Krabill soloed to a 6.005, 242 mph. Leah Pruett got a bye in the Holy Toledo Jeep (she staged and then shut it off) after the Jeff Gaynor-tuned Mike Halstead machine failed to show; Mike Savage in the Candies & Hughes tribute car beat Bucky Austin, who got loose at half-track in the left lane; Garrett Bateman set low ET thus far, with 5.87 @ 237 mph in the Plueger & Gyger Mustang and beat Steve Nichols, who turned a respectable 6.24 in the notoriously-bumpy left lane.

Mark Sander and his Mr. Explosive Nova posted a victorious 6.04, 237 and beat newly-licensed Josh Crawford in his ‘69 Mustang, who ran 8.04, 122. Next up, John Powers’ 6.27, 230 beat Sean Dale’s 10.08. And finally, Mendy Fry clocked her first five-second elapsed time in a Funny Car: 5.96, 239 mph and dispatched Dennis La Charite in the first round (I didn’t get his time; the phone went dead). McCain’s Bomb Squad has a bye-run in the 2nd round. Mendy will face the winner of next round’s Bateman vs. Savage contest.

Second round results: Garrett Bateman defeats Mike Savage, with a 5.81 (wow!) and a top end speed of 239 mph for the Plueger & Gyger entry to Savage’s valiant 6.20. Kris Krabill posts a 5.94 at a scintillating 243 mph to defuse Mr. Explosive, who trailed with a 6.45 at 215 mph. John Powers beat Leah Pruett. Powers’ 6.03, 231 was more-or-less unopposed, as her Holy Toledo Jeep was wounded, and limped down the track in 21 seconds.

By virtue of her low qualifier status, Mendy Fry got a single and swung for lane choice, posting her second-consecutive 5, this time a 5.94 at a simmering 241 mph. Practically speaking, these numbers, while impressive, are for naught as her semi-final opponent is Bateman, who ran the aforementioned .81.

The other semi-final pair is Krabill vs. Powers, with Krabill picking his lane.

Third round results: The last report I recieved says that Krabill beat Powers, but I didn’t get the times. Krabill hurt it in the lights (hydralicked it, even); the damage was insurmountable, as least as per returning for the final round.

In the other semi-final pairing, Bateman blithely recorded another 5.80-something, disposing of Mendy and McCain’s Bomb Squad, who got got out of shape and out of the groove in the lefty-loosey lane and clicked it.

Final round results: The final was a solo effort by Bateman and the badass Plueger & Gyger machine. He was on and off the throttle for the win. Your indisputable 2009 Funny Car Fever Champion: Garrett Bateman and Plueger & Gyger. – Cole Coonce