Jon Asher

[Jon Asher]

Wow! Randy, it KILLED the guy? I never heard that one. Did it make the newspapers? Something like that MUST have been covered by the news. Was anyone charged with manslaughter?

I also remember the night at the County some guy on a Go-kart was going to do a ramp-to-ramp jump, and they kept stalling and stalling, so I left. Right after I beat it out the gate the guy did the jump and "failed" as one of my more morbid friends put it. He ran right into the front of the landing ramp and it killed him.

Now look what's happened. We've gone from a nice discussion of topless women, drunk fans and the cops, and here we are, bringing up stories of death and destruction.

Jon Asher

 

[Super Mod]

I was at the '77 Moroso Indy "tea". Remember the T-shirt contest,and Clarence "the big man" Clemons doing a special guest appearance on the sax with some local group. Awesome! Not to mention the "Gilded Cage" warm-up

 

[nick name]

We've gone from a nice discussion of topless women, drunk fans and the cops, and here we are, bringing up stories of death and destruction.

Jon Asher

And thus the plot of every 50s and 60s hot rod movie.

 

[Toejam]

Jon and RG, I bet stories similar to what you described happened at several tracks back in those days! You may have seen a news report in local papers, but you can bet National Dragster would have NEVER mentioned it!

 

[clutchflite]

1968 was my first trip to Indy, and the Moroso contest was my first introduction to Dave as an announcer. I remember thinking this guy is a real professional, how'd they get him for this rowdy gig? Anyway, in the next couple of days I came to realize who he was and have enjoyed his work throughout the years. Thanks, Dave

 

[unclebob]

Ahhh...., the Indy memories ! I've been to 36 or 37 of 'em, and have CRS pretty bad, so I can't remember the years, but have seen some crazy stuff !
Moroso party in the infield of the circle track, the T shirt contest went way out of control with an entourage entered by Chip Woodall. It became very, uh, "competitive" and soon was "clothing optional".
Another year, after a bottle attack on a police crusier parked right behind the grandstand, when the above patrons ran out of bottles, about 50 guys started to jump on it. Along with that "oil down entertainment" was another type, again more competition from each side of the track stands with the "show us your ---s" signs, I never found out if it was staged or not (Beadle or Woodall again) where a player on each side would try to outdo the other. Much more fun than Alan trying to get the crowd louder, or certainly better than shooting T shirts !
Then of course Mike will remember the great racer "non-qualifier/ 1st rd. loser parties on Sunday night hosted by the late Larry "Jetfuel" Lay !

 

[ex-nsp]

What an outstandingly great thread! Asher, Mac, Meyer, and new guy Reinhardt posting.

The worrisome part is we're all entertaining ourselves with quips from the DAY, and there's not much traffic about a MAJOR drag event just ended.

 

[Randy]

Wow! Randy, it KILLED the guy? I never heard that one. Did it make the newspapers? Something like that MUST have been covered by the news. Was anyone charged with manslaughter?

I also remember the night at the County some guy on a Go-kart was going to do a ramp-to-ramp jump, and they kept stalling and stalling, so I left. Right after I beat it out the gate the guy did the jump and "failed" as one of my more morbid friends put it. He ran right into the front of the landing ramp and it killed him.

Now look what's happened. We've gone from a nice discussion of topless women, drunk fans and the cops, and here we are, bringing up stories of death and destruction.

Jon Asher

John:

It made ALL the papers. Times, OC Register, etc. That incident was the beginning of the fox hunt riots that broke out at the 'county and nearly closed it.

NITROFC posted this on the Bang Shift board.

"You forgot the "Fox Hunts".

Oh yea ..The "Fox Hunts" where they let the girls in free, (more girls, draws more guys), simple marketing right? Trouble is, it got a little out of hand a couple of times (few to many beers in the crowd) riots insued. I was at one where I remember some girl running across the strip past the finish line, just before a funny car start. She didn't see the barbed wire fence on the other side, OUCH. Then the sheriffs and the K9's showed up, then the idiots set fire to the concession stand, then some guy got hit in the head with a flying beer bottle,(he died the next day), needless to say that was the end of the fox hunts."

From another web site: "Bill Doner became the owner of Orange county raceway in May 1975 and they hired a guy called "Leapin" Larry McMenamy who "Leapt" 60 feet in a go kart. His first appearance at Irwindale (owned by Doner managed by Evans) sent him to the hospital, his second at OCIR sent him to his death."

And I admit...I was there!

RG

 

[Randy]

Ahhh...., the Indy memories ! I've been to 36 or 37 of 'em, and have CRS pretty bad, so I can't remember the years, but have seen some crazy stuff !
Moroso party in the infield of the circle track, the T shirt contest went way out of control with an entourage entered by Chip Woodall. It became very, uh, "competitive" and soon was "clothing optional".
Another year, after a bottle attack on a police crusier parked right behind the grandstand, when the above patrons ran out of bottles, about 50 guys started to jump on it. Along with that "oil down entertainment" was another type, again more competition from each side of the track stands with the "show us your ---s" signs, I never found out if it was staged or not (Beadle or Woodall again) where a player on each side would try to outdo the other. Much more fun than Alan trying to get the crowd louder, or certainly better than shooting T shirts !
Then of course Mike will remember the great racer "non-qualifier/ 1st rd. loser parties on Sunday night hosted by the late Larry "Jetfuel" Lay !

Hey Bob, you might remember this.

One night I noticed Billy Meyer driving throught the pits at Irwindale Raceway in a rental car and he barely hit some guys Pro Stocker and about knocked it off the jack stands. The guy with the Pro Stocker chased him through the pits with the handle off his floor jack and threw it through the back window of Meyers rental car. I was telling Steve Plueger the story about 15-20 years ago and he said. "Hell ya I remember it. I was in the d@m car with him (Meyer's) when it happened!"

RG

 

[unclebob]

Hey Bob, you might remember this.

One night I noticed Billy Meyer driving throught the pits at Irwindale Raceway in a rental car and he barely hit some guys Pro Stocker and about knocked it off the jack stands. The guy with the Pro Stocker chased him through the pits with the handle off his floor jack and threw it through the back window of Meyers rental car. I was telling Steve Plueger the story about 15-20 years ago and he said. "Hell ya I remember it. I was in the d@m car with him (Meyer's) when it happened!"

RG

Yes, I do remember, as do many others after last year's Comp Plus story competition where it was one of the rounds.

Back to Indy: A story I told after the passing of Don Woosly on ITA........
In the late hours of one of Larry Lays parties, Woosly's crew enlisted help from everybody to help look for Don, as they had been looking for half hour and wanted to head for the hotel. Probably 50 people hunted for another half hour before they decided he must have caught a ride with someone else.
They returned in the morning and still had not seen him. They started pack up for the trip home and when they opened the back trailer door, out comes Don rolling out the door all wrapped up both parachutes and shroud lines, very hung over and flailing vigorously trying to get out of the shroud lines.
It turns out he crawled into the back of the trailer for a quick nap, got cold and covered up with the chutes It was one of those "you had to be there!"

 

[Toejam]

Hey Bob, you might remember this.

One night I noticed Billy Meyer driving throught the pits at Irwindale Raceway in a rental car and he barely hit some guys Pro Stocker and about knocked it off the jack stands. The guy with the Pro Stocker chased him through the pits with the handle off his floor jack and threw it through the back window of Meyers rental car. I was telling Steve Plueger the story about 15-20 years ago and he said. "Hell ya I remember it. I was in the d@m car with him (Meyer's) when it happened!"

RG

Randy, were you at Pomona when Billy Meyer's FC came off the Jackstands while it was running and took off?

 

[robslob]

" Like sands through the Hourglass, so goes the threads of our NitroMater"

 

[Rat]

This thread is outrageous lol. There should be a best of section on mater.

 

[Huge]

Hehe, sorry if I came across as an @ss.

Thing is that the only way I get to see NHRA racing is by travelling to the US from Sweden or watch short clips on YouTube. In that, it's inconceivable that I'd turn down watching a full NHRA TV broadcast due to the commentary.

Regards
PiPPi
http://HarleyDrags.com

You have to realize that some can't see just how good they have it here , and would whine if someone give them tickets in a suite. It isn't even close to being as bad as some of the fans, and racers portray it to be.

 

[Rat]

You have to realize that some can't see just how good they have it here , and would whine if someone give them tickets in a suite. It isn't even close to being as bad as some of the fans, and racers portray it to be.

Are you kidding?

 

[Paul]

This thread is outrageous lol. There should be a best of section on mater.

I agree, c'mon fellas dig some more stories out, this is a great thread.

 

[Huge]

Are you kidding?

Not at all.
Could it be better....of course it could.
Could it be worse....a whole lot worse.
Would I quit watching because of the way it is commentated....not a chance in hell.
You have to remember that there are a lot of fans like "Par Willen" in other countries that can't watch it like we can. So yes I feel we have it pretty good with what we get.

 

[Jon Asher]

I definitely remember the Billy Meyer/Irwindale incident. Ya know, in some respects it's a darn shame that Billy grew up and became a serious track owner. If he was still as crazed as he was back then I wouldn't be at all surprised to hear him suggesting not a four-lane track at the Motorplex, but rather one guy starting at each end and racing to the middle.

Here's something about Billy that you probably don't know: He's an exceptionally talented underwater photographer. His works are legendary in that field.

In the era of "Leapin' Larry" (I remembered the name the second Randy wrote it), he was far from the only determined-to-kill-himself showman out there. I saw guys driving rocket-powered Go-karts, people like E.J. Potter's insane motorcycle, and far too many others to even try to list. I remember "The Colonel," Gene Shumpert (undoubtedly the wrong spelling), who drove his wheelstander back towards the starting line at New York National with a stuck throttle. The wheelstanding van ran through a few cars near the starting line and then through a fence. Shumpert jumped out and yelled, "Don't worry about a thing. The Colonel will pay for everything!" Then there were cars like (I think this is his name) Tommy Stringfield's "Triple Trouble" (three engines) wheelstander.

Before someone starts bemoaning the so-called "good old days" of 32-car shows and the like, that was then and this is now, and we're not going back. But there were a lot of regional cars that most of us never got to see in person. When I was at Car Craft Magazine we'd regularly do features on the obscure cars, and we'd turn to freelancers for the photos. I will never forget Tim Marshall bringing in shots of (I couldn't make this up!) the "30-Below Vega." I'm certainly not trying to insult whoever owned that car, but I do know not many people ever saw it outside of its home territory (somewhere in the northern regions of Division V, I think). There were many, MANY of those cars around.

Someone just mentioned that the first time they heard Dave McClelland was at the Moroso party at Indy. I first heard Dave calling an NHRA Divisional race at a place called Shreveport Ole Gator Dragway in Louisiana in the summer of 1964. I was stationed at Ft. Polk at the time, and four or five of us took our Army gear, loaded it into one of the guy's very cool mid-Fifties Chevy pickup, and off we went. We camped out at the track because we certainly didn't have any money for a motel.

The track was brand new and the oil was coming up through the asphalt like the BP spill in the Gulf. It was so bad that Top Fuel was determined by a series of single runs, with Low E.T. being declared the winner. Someone will certainly correct me, but I think that Jerry Baltes in the Baltes, Crozier & Lovato entry (and yeah, I probably spelled all of those names wrong, too).

What I also remember vividly was seeing Don and Roy Gay arriving with their cars on a regular car-carrier, along with an altered wheelbase car belonging to a young guy named Hank Taylor (yes, I could easily be wrong again, so sue me!). It was the first time I'd ever seen anything even remotely like a big rig in drag racing.

I'd like to go back to Steve Evans one more time. When I moved to New Mexico the first thing Steve wanted to know was, "How far is the airport?"

"It's 85 miles from my front door to the parking lot."

"I could never be that far from an airport."

"But Steve, the speed limit's 75 and everyone goes closer to 90 until you get into Albuquerque. It takes an hour to get there."

"Nope. I couldn't deal with that."

I don't think anyone traveled as much as he and Mac did. Considering just the NHRA races, after an event they had to fly to (I think) Nashville for post-production work, and then they might have to do some voiceovers before they were finished. TV is so efficient now that everything's done right at the track, which means more timely broadcasts and the like (I am not talking content here, as that's what started this thread in the first place).

I'll await the story and spelling corrections!

Jon Asher

 

[onfire]

Asher...........YOU were stationed at Ft. Puke???????? No wonder you turned out the way you did!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! LOL


Mitch

 

[MaC]

Jon...you never told me!!!!!!!!!!! at least that I remember.......that you were at Old Gator in 64. Jerry Baltes (you were correct) and I talk about that all the time....to my knowledge, it was the only NHRA race, National or Divisional that was decided on single runs. Jerry had low e.t. thus, he was first, 2nd quickest R.U. etc.

In addition to the fresh asphalt and it's oil problems, the builder ran out of funds before the pits got paved...so he used oiled dirt. Mixed together then rolled with a BIG roller, it was quite hard...almost like paving...TILL IT GOT HOT!!! The oil came to the surface, and along with the dirt, stuck to the tires coming up to the paved staging lanes. They tried everything to get it clean...but nothing worked.

Add to those problems, an underground spring showed up when they put the roller on the asphalt to compact the racing surface during construction. When the multi ton roller hit the section with the subsurface spring, the asphalt sank...making a perfect ski jump at about half track.

Combine no traction, with the serious bump, and you had cars going everywhere. Rather than pull the plug, Div. 4 Director Dale Ham made the call for singles only.

It was an interested couple of days to say the least...and the problem with the track never did get totally resolved. They came back in and dug very deep into the spring area...packed in new soil brought in from another location...packed it some more and finally repaved. Guess what happened when the roller hit it...the bump was back, though much less severe. Just part of the problems building and running race tracks. And it looks so easy!!!!!!!!!!!

This track lasted for a few more years, fell into disrepair and the racing surface is currently used as a pipe yard for the oil industry. I saw it personally about 4 years ago and was flooded with memories.

There is a public road, Stagecoach Road, that was used as a drag strip prior to the building of Old Gator. It was O.G. 1...closed down to the public on race days...and complete with flagman and no clocks at the start, street cars in side by side action over a few hundred feet. Just another example of racing at something other than a quarter mile. You can see both the street and the racing surface if you go to Google Earth and search for Stagecoach Rd. I think that will get you there. The race track crosses the street in the shutdown area, near the railroad tracks. I have some old footage I took (I was a TV newsman at the time) and you would not believe what took place. Fortunately, tragedy was avoided!!! My good friend Jere Grice, "Lefty", retired from the NHRA Safety Safari, was at the original Old Gator track numerous times. He and I have been friends since 1957.

This tale is, of course, done by memory and I fully expect a host of folks pointing out my errors...but you have to agree, it makes for great story telling!!!!!!!!!!

MaC