It was bound to happen, sooner or later
- Thread starter Mike
- Start date
Francis Blake
Active Member
WOW, strange things happen. The fuel had to be getting through somehow.
fordsbyjay
Active Member
Why do you say it was bound to happen Mike?
jimbo01
Member
Melanie also lost her main sponcer so she had that going for her too in this interview. Lee Beard got the axe from DSR but kind of seen that coming when they pulled him from the tuning position in the spring. Al-Anabi Racing is rumored to be all done!! Del Worsham will be going to the Kalitta Racing team to become the tuner for Alexis DeJoria and her Patrόn funny car, Larry Dixon will be driving for the Lucus team along with Alan Johnson as tuner I believe. The Copart crew was released and if any of you fellas would like to buy your own team, this can be yours. Kenny Bernstein Racing is getting out and all his toys are for sale.
Mike
Well-Known Member
The clutch packs in those cars weld, they get so hot. Leave a taste of fuel in the system and as you're pushing the car off the track, the fuel finds a hot valve and you've got a runaway. Gordon Mineo crashed into Eddie Hill's tow truck at Columbus one year, when the same thing happened.
The Mineo crash takes place somewhere around 29:00.
(If you watch the entire video, the Whit Bazemore explosion/crash was spectacular. The motor spit the front half of the crank out and it took a 4" divot out of the track. Comp was always pitted up on the hill, at the end of the track and they had just called us to the lanes. I heard the explosion and saw it was "Blazemore", so I didn't even bother getting things ready. By the time they had patched the track and repaired the guardrail, nearly 4 hours had passed.)
Jimbo, it looks as if a Pro Stock team will benefit from the In-N-Out money, next year.
As for Lee Beard, well, the guy can tune a car and that's only whilst his supplicants are kissing his backside. I'm impressed his ego and the Don's ego could fit in the same shop as long as they did. Beard can tune a car, but he has a personality like a chapped ass. And he did a masterful job of losing the handle on the Johnny Gray car, didn't he?
When I look at Al-Anabi, I think Evan Knoll. It was the typical, I have endless dollars, I will sponsor everyone and everything. And whilst I am not pointing any fingers at anyone, the fact remains there were a lot of bottom-feeders flocking to the money. And we've seen a lot of them weeded out, over the last 4-5 months. I'm of the opinion Sheikh Khalid is getting himself lean and mean, in preparation for the 2012 Winternationals. Speaking of Evan Knoll, he was in court a week ago, asking for a court-appointed attorney. When things look too good to be true, they usually are. And when someone tried to lever the federal government off $106 million vial illegal means, that's someone that is going down.
As for the Agent 1320 rumors about AJR and MLR, let me pass you a block of salt. Sunday afternoon, Alan Johnson was asked if Del would still be part of his team in 2012 and Johnson said that was up to Del. So don't go writing Del out of the picture just yet. For every Agent 1320 report saying Al-Anabi is gone, I can offer you twice as many reports there is a new two-year deal in place. Welcome to the Silly Season.
Can you really imagine Johnson hooking up with Morgan Lucas? More to the point, can you imagine Morgan Lucas trying to fire Alan Johnson? I respect Forrest Lucas for the money he's stuck into the sport, but buying your son a Top Fuel team to play with is a little different than buying him a Tonka truck or a bicycle.
As for Bernstein, he was spoiled by having AA/Dale as part of his team for so many years. There aren't many tuners out there who have the ability to think as far out of the box as Armstrong did. The rule book wasn't nearly as restrictive in that era, either. Now that everyone is playing on the same field, it's much harder to develop an edge. It takes an Austin Coil, an Alan Johnson, a Tim Richards or someone of that caliber to have that kind of edge. Bernstein has been spending as much as anyone else in the sport, but when you're trying to out-spend a Sheikh Khalid, a Don Schumacher, a Johnny Gray, etc., you're always going to be racing for second-place. And when you have two cars capable of going down the track on each pass, you're collecting data at twice the rate of a single-car team. No real surprise Bernstein's leaving. After the recent Don Schumacher comments, I've been wondering if that might be the last straw for Bernstein.
jimbo01
Member
Mike,
I can't for the life of me fathom Dixon on the Lucas team let alone Johnson. That team has had the talent and I would be willing to go as far to say that some have had more then daddy's boy in my opinion. Shawn Langdon's RT's were some of the best out there and in Top Fuel many of the races are won right there on the line.
As far as Beard goes, he's been around many moons and knows the in's and out's of the sport. In Beards defense, I didn't see Gray DNQ once and Beard had 3 other cars on his team to collect data from. Two of those cars were contenders and points leaders. It wasn't until Richards' popped up that brought the Napa car back to life. Pretty impressive to me that after a few years off, Tim & Kim can collect enough data in only a few races to have that car in the finals. As far as Don and Lee being in the same shop, I couldn't agree more. But to say the race is won by the tuner alone is a bit much. Capp's went through tuners like I go through socks and it didn't improve his game until Richards stepped in. I always wondered as cut throat as Don is why he kept Capps on?
If tuners win races, what happened to Tony this year and his DSR car? It's my guess that when Cory got the axe and Spencer got the job, Don switched rides with Tony to work out the bugs that he refused to believe were happening while Cory was driving. Kind of strange how someone that is in the finals or walking away with a wally every other weekend can't win a single race isn't it? What's stranger is the Fram car that couldn't win a race for how many seasons was a points leader the first year after Cory got the boot. Also kind of funny how anyone that had worked for DSR that gets the axe has a hard time getting into back into the sport isn't it?
I wouldn't be at all surprised to see Coil back in 2012. I'll also bet that if that were the case, it wouldn't be for the Force camp. I'd also be willing to bet that if Coil does come back he is going to be willing to go the extra mile to put force's team back on the trailer and signing autographs for old time sake. If Del does become a tuner, he went out on his terms and on a high note. Who Knows, maybe he will become the next LaHaie.
Bernstein didn't stand a chance. Single car teams can throw all the money that they want at a multi car teams and get nowhere fast. I would almost think that NHRA should restrict the size of teams because of the unfair advantage. The new single car teams or current teams that would like to get into the sport don't stand much of a chance and that's a fact. Kenny was a draw for the sport much like the Earnhardt name. DSR & JFR dump tons of money in their teams and they own the tracks. I'd also be willing to say they the amount of money that those two teams shell out have influences beyond NHRA. Funny how DSR cries foul when NHRA steps in and makes DSR pull the deflector off his dragsters saying unfair advantage. I have to agree with Don that it was BS that he went through the steps of getting NHRA to approve it and then 2 years later they make him pull them late in the season. Don did make a public statement that he felt picked on (again) and he should just pull out of NHRA. I did see that he and NHRA kissed and made up and was allowed to run with them again with some minor change. You know as well as I do that no team owner is going to do anything if their isn't an advantage.
I can't for the life of me fathom Dixon on the Lucas team let alone Johnson. That team has had the talent and I would be willing to go as far to say that some have had more then daddy's boy in my opinion. Shawn Langdon's RT's were some of the best out there and in Top Fuel many of the races are won right there on the line.
As far as Beard goes, he's been around many moons and knows the in's and out's of the sport. In Beards defense, I didn't see Gray DNQ once and Beard had 3 other cars on his team to collect data from. Two of those cars were contenders and points leaders. It wasn't until Richards' popped up that brought the Napa car back to life. Pretty impressive to me that after a few years off, Tim & Kim can collect enough data in only a few races to have that car in the finals. As far as Don and Lee being in the same shop, I couldn't agree more. But to say the race is won by the tuner alone is a bit much. Capp's went through tuners like I go through socks and it didn't improve his game until Richards stepped in. I always wondered as cut throat as Don is why he kept Capps on?
If tuners win races, what happened to Tony this year and his DSR car? It's my guess that when Cory got the axe and Spencer got the job, Don switched rides with Tony to work out the bugs that he refused to believe were happening while Cory was driving. Kind of strange how someone that is in the finals or walking away with a wally every other weekend can't win a single race isn't it? What's stranger is the Fram car that couldn't win a race for how many seasons was a points leader the first year after Cory got the boot. Also kind of funny how anyone that had worked for DSR that gets the axe has a hard time getting into back into the sport isn't it?
I wouldn't be at all surprised to see Coil back in 2012. I'll also bet that if that were the case, it wouldn't be for the Force camp. I'd also be willing to bet that if Coil does come back he is going to be willing to go the extra mile to put force's team back on the trailer and signing autographs for old time sake. If Del does become a tuner, he went out on his terms and on a high note. Who Knows, maybe he will become the next LaHaie.
Bernstein didn't stand a chance. Single car teams can throw all the money that they want at a multi car teams and get nowhere fast. I would almost think that NHRA should restrict the size of teams because of the unfair advantage. The new single car teams or current teams that would like to get into the sport don't stand much of a chance and that's a fact. Kenny was a draw for the sport much like the Earnhardt name. DSR & JFR dump tons of money in their teams and they own the tracks. I'd also be willing to say they the amount of money that those two teams shell out have influences beyond NHRA. Funny how DSR cries foul when NHRA steps in and makes DSR pull the deflector off his dragsters saying unfair advantage. I have to agree with Don that it was BS that he went through the steps of getting NHRA to approve it and then 2 years later they make him pull them late in the season. Don did make a public statement that he felt picked on (again) and he should just pull out of NHRA. I did see that he and NHRA kissed and made up and was allowed to run with them again with some minor change. You know as well as I do that no team owner is going to do anything if their isn't an advantage.
If you really wanted to put all the teams on a level playing field. Just simply add No Data recorders to the rule as well as no electronic management of any kind.
My brother inlaws new pro mod, heads up car is unbelievable in electronics. I am sure he does not have everything the pro teams have. He has an air electric clutch. Pull to the line, push the clutch in, then pus a button and the clutch stays down. It has a air cylinder holding it that has the release controlled by a very fancy delay box. It has a double chance leave off your bulb or the other guys bulb or both. Depends on what kind of racing you are doing. Air shifted Lenco all automatic. Then there is the data recorder. counts all wheels revolutions, and counts drive shaft to engine RPMs. This tells how much clutch slippage you got and it compares all the data for for tire slippage, etc. A very sophisticated system. Then it also monitors all engine functions, air fuel mixture on every cylinder, and records all that. That is all done with one computer in the car. The second computer monitors and records, then also controls the rear shocks. Very important for todays race cars.
It is in the paint shop and should be ready in a couple of weeks. I'll get some pics of it then.
My brother inlaws new pro mod, heads up car is unbelievable in electronics. I am sure he does not have everything the pro teams have. He has an air electric clutch. Pull to the line, push the clutch in, then pus a button and the clutch stays down. It has a air cylinder holding it that has the release controlled by a very fancy delay box. It has a double chance leave off your bulb or the other guys bulb or both. Depends on what kind of racing you are doing. Air shifted Lenco all automatic. Then there is the data recorder. counts all wheels revolutions, and counts drive shaft to engine RPMs. This tells how much clutch slippage you got and it compares all the data for for tire slippage, etc. A very sophisticated system. Then it also monitors all engine functions, air fuel mixture on every cylinder, and records all that. That is all done with one computer in the car. The second computer monitors and records, then also controls the rear shocks. Very important for todays race cars.
It is in the paint shop and should be ready in a couple of weeks. I'll get some pics of it then.
jimbo01
Member
Ron,
I agree with and like the idea of no electronic management idea. Let the crews collect all the data they want and make their changes based on their finding and or results. Then put the pilot in the cockpit and see just how good they really are without computer assist or auto correction. Probably see more oil downs, blower loss and peddle fests but that's the way the sport started. I also think that would give some of the single car teams a real shot at meaningful victory's. Please put pictures up of the car when you can. Always nice to look at.
I agree with and like the idea of no electronic management idea. Let the crews collect all the data they want and make their changes based on their finding and or results. Then put the pilot in the cockpit and see just how good they really are without computer assist or auto correction. Probably see more oil downs, blower loss and peddle fests but that's the way the sport started. I also think that would give some of the single car teams a real shot at meaningful victory's. Please put pictures up of the car when you can. Always nice to look at.
Mike
Well-Known Member
Jimbo, some of what you've pointed out is more down to the political games NHRA plays, more than anything else. The Don has ruffled more than his share of feathers, which means he gets more than his share of static back. He needs to learn to get as good as he gives, but when he's spending the dollars he is, he feels he should be held above reproach.
Remember Schumacher's 4th qualifying pass at the 2006 World Finals? The car was leaking fluid, Rick Stewart signaled him to shut it off and Schumacher ignored him. Rick is a really friendly guy. He once paid me a compliment on the starting line and I'll never forget it. But there's the difference between Rick Stewart and Buster Couch. Buster was a great guy too (I called him my grandpa, if you can imagine), but when you took a car to Buster's starting line, you damn well better know that was Buster's starting line. If he told you to shut off, you shut off, else he would reach into the car and drag you out of it.
How about Schumacher's wee rant when he got dumped from the Shootout, for not stopping to weigh?
I've got news for the Schumachers - if you win a round, you stop at the scales. If you pick up during qualifying, you stop at the scales. if you decide not to stop, you need to live with your decision. In all the years I raced, we were waved past the scales once. One time. And it really made no difference to me, because we were running in mineshaft conditions at Baytown, it was a qualifying pass and I had told Brian to stick the car in 5th and lift. I was planning to drive by anyway, since we hadn't picked up. But that single instance is the only time I ever remember NHRA waving people past the scales.
Those cars are fickle women, believe me. What might look like very minor occurrences can have dramatic effect on the cars. Look what the normalized tubing did for the cars. It gave the tuners a much wider window, until the day the car decided it had shook one too many times. Shake the tires on a T/F car and you better start checking the forward wing struts, because they have likely banana'ed. Get the front end up in the air and strike the tires, you better start checking everything forward of the driver's box. In the mid to late 90's, before the cars were using wheelie bars, I could watch a race on Sunday and know exactly how many nose wings, A-arms, steering boxes and tie rods I would be selling the next day. A wheelstand was worth $4,500 in replacement parts, if you can believe it. I'll not name names, but a rather eccentric Championship-winning crew chief I have a lot of respect for watched his driver get the front end up on a pass, so they came back and started checking the upper and lower rails. Sure enough, they were tweaked. So they towed the car to another trailer, where they could place the car perpendicular to the trailer, raised the trailer to get the front end under it and then used floor jacks to try to straighten the tubing. :blink:
But little things like that can drastically change how the car works. A car that might have loved a particular clutch combination might suddenly start spinning or shaking. A tuner might develop a heckuva tune-up, based on a particular combination of clutch disc hardness. Roll through that batch of discs and you're back to square one, trying to find the sweet spot on discs with a different Rockwell. Back when Bernstein was still driving, they lost the handle on the car. Bernstein let the crew chief go (can't recall who it was) and hired Lee Beard. After the first race, the car came back to the shop, where we back-halved it. They were using a new cannon design and Beard wanted the rear end closer to the motor and driver. It was a change of just 2", but it woke the car right up.
Not taking anything away from Mike Green, but I do have to wonder how much of the Alan Johnson tune-up they still have in that car. You could see Schumacher was suddenly vulnerable to tire smoke, in the latter part of the season. When I see a capable crew chief suddenly fighting tire smoke, I'm wondering about the pipe and the clutch disc recipe. The restriction on testing has gone a long way toward bringing parity to the fields, because the endless dollar teams can no longer test 20-30 times a year.
Actually, Johnny Gray did have a DNQ during the Lee Beard era. He was 18th at Baytown.
As for Austin Coil coming back, I question it. He claims he's having problems trying to keep up with doing nothing these days. My guess is he'll end up with a state-of-the-art Nostalgia Funny Car for Lisa to drive. I can't blame guys like Coil and Bernstein for wanting to get away. From the outside looking in, being on the road with a race car looks glamorous. But it really isn't. It's a tremendous amount of work and everyone gets to a point where they would like to get their clothes out of a closet, rather than a suitcase. The road wears everyone down, sooner or later. And then you get trapped. You spend one year's sponsorship dollars on a new home, so you have to knuckle under and spend every dime trying to make up for the year you lost. You know if you don't perform, you'll lose your gravy train. After a couple years of spending every dime you have, you get tired of racing and want to quit, but you don't have any cash left. So you sign the deal for another 3 years and take that first year's money to try to recoup. Which means come year 2, you're back to the grind, trying to make the car perform again, so you can keep your deal alive. Glidden once told me he couldn't quit, because he had wrapped a fortune up in the race team and if he were to try and sell it, he was going to take a bath. So he had no real option, other than to keep playing the game. You see Fram splashed down the side of Spencer Massey's car and you wonder what the Don gets from Fram. But what you're missing is how much Massey is paying the Don to drive that car. The only thing you know for sure is that Massey was willing to pay more than Cory Mac. Everybody gets trapped in the money machine.
I think a lot of people will scream at the thought, but I would really like to see NHRA turn the time machine back to 1970. Let's get all the cars back to using an 6-71 blower, a maximum 20% overdrive, a single, 21 gallon fuel pump with no overdrive, a single, point-type mag, a 3.90 rear gear, a 2-speed trans, allow data loggers but no computer control of any function and keep rear spoilers below the roofline. Yes, it would slow the cars down considerably, but it would let them return to 1320 foot racing. And are fans there to see John Force run 4.10 1000 foot times, or are the fans there to see John Force race a competitor to the finish line? I'm betting the average fan would be excited to hear one of those cars run on a full load, rather than the 90% they have to run today. And make no mistake, there are some scary racetracks out there, so slowing the cars down would increase the safety factor by a bunch.
But NHRA being NHRA, they'll never consider it. Why try to save everyone a bit of money, when they are clear off the tracks with their own money train?
Remember Schumacher's 4th qualifying pass at the 2006 World Finals? The car was leaking fluid, Rick Stewart signaled him to shut it off and Schumacher ignored him. Rick is a really friendly guy. He once paid me a compliment on the starting line and I'll never forget it. But there's the difference between Rick Stewart and Buster Couch. Buster was a great guy too (I called him my grandpa, if you can imagine), but when you took a car to Buster's starting line, you damn well better know that was Buster's starting line. If he told you to shut off, you shut off, else he would reach into the car and drag you out of it.
How about Schumacher's wee rant when he got dumped from the Shootout, for not stopping to weigh?
I've got news for the Schumachers - if you win a round, you stop at the scales. If you pick up during qualifying, you stop at the scales. if you decide not to stop, you need to live with your decision. In all the years I raced, we were waved past the scales once. One time. And it really made no difference to me, because we were running in mineshaft conditions at Baytown, it was a qualifying pass and I had told Brian to stick the car in 5th and lift. I was planning to drive by anyway, since we hadn't picked up. But that single instance is the only time I ever remember NHRA waving people past the scales.
Those cars are fickle women, believe me. What might look like very minor occurrences can have dramatic effect on the cars. Look what the normalized tubing did for the cars. It gave the tuners a much wider window, until the day the car decided it had shook one too many times. Shake the tires on a T/F car and you better start checking the forward wing struts, because they have likely banana'ed. Get the front end up in the air and strike the tires, you better start checking everything forward of the driver's box. In the mid to late 90's, before the cars were using wheelie bars, I could watch a race on Sunday and know exactly how many nose wings, A-arms, steering boxes and tie rods I would be selling the next day. A wheelstand was worth $4,500 in replacement parts, if you can believe it. I'll not name names, but a rather eccentric Championship-winning crew chief I have a lot of respect for watched his driver get the front end up on a pass, so they came back and started checking the upper and lower rails. Sure enough, they were tweaked. So they towed the car to another trailer, where they could place the car perpendicular to the trailer, raised the trailer to get the front end under it and then used floor jacks to try to straighten the tubing. :blink:
But little things like that can drastically change how the car works. A car that might have loved a particular clutch combination might suddenly start spinning or shaking. A tuner might develop a heckuva tune-up, based on a particular combination of clutch disc hardness. Roll through that batch of discs and you're back to square one, trying to find the sweet spot on discs with a different Rockwell. Back when Bernstein was still driving, they lost the handle on the car. Bernstein let the crew chief go (can't recall who it was) and hired Lee Beard. After the first race, the car came back to the shop, where we back-halved it. They were using a new cannon design and Beard wanted the rear end closer to the motor and driver. It was a change of just 2", but it woke the car right up.
Not taking anything away from Mike Green, but I do have to wonder how much of the Alan Johnson tune-up they still have in that car. You could see Schumacher was suddenly vulnerable to tire smoke, in the latter part of the season. When I see a capable crew chief suddenly fighting tire smoke, I'm wondering about the pipe and the clutch disc recipe. The restriction on testing has gone a long way toward bringing parity to the fields, because the endless dollar teams can no longer test 20-30 times a year.
Actually, Johnny Gray did have a DNQ during the Lee Beard era. He was 18th at Baytown.
As for Austin Coil coming back, I question it. He claims he's having problems trying to keep up with doing nothing these days. My guess is he'll end up with a state-of-the-art Nostalgia Funny Car for Lisa to drive. I can't blame guys like Coil and Bernstein for wanting to get away. From the outside looking in, being on the road with a race car looks glamorous. But it really isn't. It's a tremendous amount of work and everyone gets to a point where they would like to get their clothes out of a closet, rather than a suitcase. The road wears everyone down, sooner or later. And then you get trapped. You spend one year's sponsorship dollars on a new home, so you have to knuckle under and spend every dime trying to make up for the year you lost. You know if you don't perform, you'll lose your gravy train. After a couple years of spending every dime you have, you get tired of racing and want to quit, but you don't have any cash left. So you sign the deal for another 3 years and take that first year's money to try to recoup. Which means come year 2, you're back to the grind, trying to make the car perform again, so you can keep your deal alive. Glidden once told me he couldn't quit, because he had wrapped a fortune up in the race team and if he were to try and sell it, he was going to take a bath. So he had no real option, other than to keep playing the game. You see Fram splashed down the side of Spencer Massey's car and you wonder what the Don gets from Fram. But what you're missing is how much Massey is paying the Don to drive that car. The only thing you know for sure is that Massey was willing to pay more than Cory Mac. Everybody gets trapped in the money machine.
I think a lot of people will scream at the thought, but I would really like to see NHRA turn the time machine back to 1970. Let's get all the cars back to using an 6-71 blower, a maximum 20% overdrive, a single, 21 gallon fuel pump with no overdrive, a single, point-type mag, a 3.90 rear gear, a 2-speed trans, allow data loggers but no computer control of any function and keep rear spoilers below the roofline. Yes, it would slow the cars down considerably, but it would let them return to 1320 foot racing. And are fans there to see John Force run 4.10 1000 foot times, or are the fans there to see John Force race a competitor to the finish line? I'm betting the average fan would be excited to hear one of those cars run on a full load, rather than the 90% they have to run today. And make no mistake, there are some scary racetracks out there, so slowing the cars down would increase the safety factor by a bunch.
But NHRA being NHRA, they'll never consider it. Why try to save everyone a bit of money, when they are clear off the tracks with their own money train?
madmike8
Member
I pretty much lost all my love have the NHRA Pro stuff years ago... I don't even know what speeds they are at today... Hell I just now learned they do a 1000ft now. I still love the local 1/8th mile drag racing... Mike I'd love if they would turn the dial back to the 70's too... It would be nice if the cars actually looked like something recognizable too...
