Since people have been building cars, people have been racing cars. Drag racing is the purest way of finding out who has the faster car. From a standstill, cars have to travel a set distance, in a straight line in the shortest amount of time.
It’s a really big sport in the U.S. It has some prevalence here in Europe but only one track in the U.K called Santa Pod. I’ve only been there once for a ‘Drift What Ya Brung’ day, I’ve never actually been drag racing there. Maybe that will change in 2024.
Following the Second World War, drag racing really took off in the United States with hotrodders flocking to decommissioned military airstrips to make use of the runways.
In 1951 Wally Parks formed the National Hot Rod Association (NHRA), which to this day hosts events all across the United States and Canada.
The NHRA events are for purpose built drag cars rather than modified road cars these days. The fastest of which are Top Fuel dragsters – named as such because they run a 90% nitromethane fuel mixture. These will launch from 0-100mph in as little as 0.8 seconds!
Summit had a top fuel engine on display at their stand.
Funny Cars are the next class. These have fiberglass or carbon fiber shells that open up like a clam. They are space framed, purpose built race cars but the bodies are meant to (vaguely) look like a road going car.
Here’s a C3 Corvette funny car with its body up.
The next two classes are Pro Stock and Pro Mod. These are tube chassis’d cars with a fiberglass or carbon fiber shell like the funny cars, but they have an offset driving position rather than a central seating position and have to have functional doors.
I think this car is Pro Stock which are naturally aspirated. Pro Mods are typically and have the big blower coming out of the hood.
Most drag racing is done with modified production cars though. American muscle cars from the 1960s through to the present day are mostly used as they are V8 powered, rear driven and relatively light.
This Chevrolet Bel-Air on the Summit stand was stunning!
Hot rods were an integral part of early drag racing. In the late 1940s through the 1950s people would buy old pre-war cars and stuff big motors into them to take racing. The little truck was really, really cool!
All sorts of cars get built into drag cars. This is Tom Bailey of Sick The Mag’s Durango is a good example. This things a bit of a beast.
This hearse ‘Death Trap’ was wicked! I’d love to see this run some day.
Of course it’s not just American cars that are used in drag racing. The R35 GTR has proven itself to be a competitive car in, both in 1/4 mile and 1/2 mile drag racing and in both rear wheel and four wheel drive configurations. It’s twin turbo VR38DETT V6 is more than capable of producing four figure horsepower.
From Benny’s Custom Works in Australia comes this Toyota Cresta powered by a Ford Barra straight 6 – The Australian answer to Toyota’s 2JZGTE.
A Subaru Impreza all wheel drive drag car:
Whilst I’ve done a dedicated RC car post, which you can read through here: https://motorsportformentalhealth.com/2023/11/25/rc-cars-at-sema-2023/ I did want to shine a little spot light on the RC dragsters dotted about the show.
Thanks for reading!
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By Richard Francis
