Santa Pod

Feckin excellent weekend watching the drag racing. Weather killed off
Saturday's fun but Sunday made up for it. Never been to a drag race before,
only ever seen it on TV.

The bikes are a tad on the quick side and gave the most 'oh ****' moments.
One threw a rod and the contents of its sump along the track so that made
for a nice lunch break without worrying about missing any action.

Some of the junior drag racers, powered by lawnmower engines, could be
passed by a decent sprint cyclist.

Weird to see a Ford 100E Popular, normally 30bhp, lifting its front wheels
and doing burnouts.

The jet car (Firestorm2) was the highlight of the event for me. When the jet
is winding up and the re-heat is banging on and off it's like being hit
repeatedly with a large pillow. Glad I brought the bike ear plugs with me.

There was even a few VW campers in the VW class and one Golf TDi leaving a
trail of black smoke.

My clothes smell of burning rubber, sweet-smelling track glue and various
fuels that make 95p-per-litre sound cheap.

I wanna go back!

 

I really must get there. It's only up the road from me.

 

PDannyD

Heh. Me too. Haven't been for years.

The first time I went, I wondered what on earth was interesting about
watching a vehicle travel just for a quarter of a mile in a straight
line.

That preconception lasted as long as it took a bike to do its first
quarter. Drag racing rocks.

 

On Mon, 28 Jun 2004 07:21:27 +0100,

Me neither

<AOL>

But for a real visceral experience, the cars are the thing. Watching
a top fueller or a funny car burnout and stage is unbelievable.

 

Typo corrected.

 

heh. Quite so. You do seem to 'hear' the noise through your stomach
rather than your ears.

And that viscious tick over, where you can see the individual flames
coming out each of the eight exhaust stacks. And the eye-watering
wafts of unburnt nitro-methane.

Reminds me of an email about the sheer awesomeness of top fuellers
<google> ah, it's all over the web, here's one version:
http://www.automobilemag.com/columns/0403_americandriver/

 

Cooooooooooooooooooooool

 

It was somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the

Hoyuss. From the end stand in direct line of fire of the exhausts.
That's at Avon Park, I don't know if there's an end stand at the Pod
now.

--

Dave

GS 850 x2 / SE 6a
SbS#6 DIAABTCOD#16 APOSTLE#6 FUB#3
FUB KotL OSOS#12? UKRMMA#19 COSOC#10

 

Yep. Still there despite Firestorm2's best attempts to blow it over. Funny
to see the entire area behind the start line disappear in a cloud of smoke
on the initial engine startup. The people in the rear stand soon dispersed
before the jet really wound up the power.

 

It was somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the
drugs began to take hold. I remember "PDannyD"
<>
saying something like:

Heh; I'll bet. My first proper feel of the funny cars' exhaust power was
on that stand. Made my organs shake, it did.

--

Dave

GS 850 x2 / SE 6a
SbS#6 DIAABTCOD#16 APOSTLE#6 FUB#3
FUB KotL OSOS#12? UKRMMA#19 COSOC#10

 

Yeah. I actually remmber feeling my innards vibrate......

 

http://www.world-sex-records.com/sex-118.htm