colecoonce’s NITRONIC RESEARCH

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

Top Fuel Wormhole, a feature-length book of motorsport-themed essays and articles subtitled The Cole Coonce Drag Strip Reader,Vol. 1,  is on the galleys and almost off to the printer.

Coming in at nearly 300 pages, this anthology is comprised of work that first ran a plehtora of drag racing, automotive and pop culture magazines and websites, including Full Throttle News, Super Stock & Drag Illustrated, Bikini, Grand Royal, Gearhead, Nitronic Research and others.

Despite the fervent efforts of its imprint, KeroseneBomb Publishing, hopes of having copies of the book in hand this week for distribution at the upcoming March Meet are remote, however. A more like release date is March 21st, 2009.

Since the March Meet publication deadline wil be missed, we thought it would be ono to offer up a tasty sample of the book in the online form, ith the uploading of the book’s cover story, “THE CHAMPION SPEED SHOP’S TOP FUEL WORMHOLE: A Concentric History of the World’s Quickest and Fastest Chevy on Nitro…”

The story’s illustration is this pic of the Champion Speed Shop fueler, taken ten years ago at the starting of Famoso Raceway.

Champion Speed Shop's Top Fuel Wormhole

Further to that end, we would like to share the book’s Table of Content. It is as follows:

PART ONE: THE HORIZON

FOREWORD by Robert C. Post
1. DEATH ON A SUNDAY AFTERNOON & THE WHINE OF BLOWERS OVER THE PACOIMA ARROYO
2. SMIRNOFF VODKA AND THE SPIRIT(S) OF THE 60s
3. BOOK REVIEW: HIGH PERFORMANCE
4. THE DRAG STRIP DIARIES, PART 1
5. WHO’S AFRAID OF ARLEY LANGLO?
6. THE DRAG STRIP DIARIES, PT. 2
7. TAYLOR STORMS TO 6.17
8. THE DRAG STRIP DIARIES, PT. 3
9. OVER, UNDER, SIDEWAYS, DOWN: THE STORY OF “WILD WILLIE” BORSCH
10. THE DRAG STRIP DIARIES, PT. 4
11. BAKERSFIELD BE HERE NOW
12. HAVE NITRO, WILL TRAVEL
13. SHIRLEY MULDOWNEY: ORIGINAL BLAST-OFF GIRL AND DRAG STRIP GRAND DAME
14. DUNLAP TASTES VICTORY
15. RITTER TURNS 5.98, 242 – WITH HIS EYES CLOSED!
16. BURY MY HEART AT EDWARDS AFB
17. BLAINE JOHNSON 1962-1996

PART TWO: THE CENTER OF THE SHADOW

18. HESITATION KILLS
19. MISHAP AT BLACK ROCK!
20. BISCIGLIA CRASHES ‘48 FIAT FUELER
21. TARGET SPEED: TWENTY NINE PALMS: JOCKO JOHNSON’S GUERILLA RENAISSANCE IS NOW
22. THE UNIVERSE IS EXPANDING: MACH ONE AS THE BIG BANG
23. THE EPIC SAGA OF THE SURFERS: THE SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA EXPLODING INEVITABLE
24. DRAG RACING IS MUCH MORE PUNK ROCK THAN ANY SLACKER GEN X SHITHEAD WITH AN OUT-OF-TUNE GUITAR
25. MURPHY MAKES MARCH MEET HISTORY
26. JIM HERBERT, R.I.P
27. W.W. TWO STARS IN BAKERSFIELD TEAR-JERKER
28. CHAMPION SPEED SHOP’S TOP FUEL WORMHOLE
29. THE CRASH, BURN AND RESURRECTION OF A WORKING CLASS HERO: THE “WILD BILL” ALEXANDER INTERVIEW
30. 1999: NOTES FROM THE HEART (LAND HOT ROD REUNION)
31. “SWINGIN’ SAMMY” HALE EXITS COCKPIT
32. MIGRANT APES IN THE GASOLINE CRACK OF HISTORY
33. THE MAD! ROCKET SCIENTIST

PART THREE: COLLAPSE

34. THE PASSING OF STEVE COLLISON AND THE DEATH OF DRAG STRIP JOURNALISM
35. “VIVA LA NITRO!”
36. FRYING THE BALONEYS OFF OF DANICA PATRICK AT THE SMOG CUTTER
37. DRAG PRINCESS
38. BUCK OWENS, TOP FUEL AND THE DEATH OF THE BAKERSFIELD SOUND
39. TOMMY JOHNSON’S DIPPITY-DO AND A MODEST PROPOSAL TO SPIKE DRAG RACING’S BAD HAIR DAY
40. SMOKIN’ DON SCHUMACHER’S, INTERNET WORM FOOD AND WHO KILLED MARK TWAIN?
41. THE DAY OF THE DELUGE AND SURVIVAL OF THE UNFITTEST

Upon publication, copies of Top Fuel Wormhole will be available at amazon.com, HotRodNostalgia.com and Drag Racing Online and KeroseneBomb.com. –30

The new “Where The Pavement Ends” column is up on Drag Racing Online: “The Day of the Deluge, and Survival of the Unfittest.”

If the Winternationals at Pomona are any indication, drag racing is in a world of hurt….

An excerpt of the piece: “Is it just the economy and the weather? Or is part of the problem that those nitromaniacs who once lived for Top Fuel have found less and less to relate to? In the interest of safety when it comes to Top Fuel dragsters and Funny Cars, there has been a neutering of nitro percentages the last few years and now an emasculation of the distance of the drag strip from 1/4 mile to 1000 feet.”

More here:   “The Day of the Deluge, and Survival of the Unfittest” — CC