On Sunday, two days ago I took the opportunity to visit the track for a final time for this year. It is mid fall. Soon the temps will fall, warm days will become a memory. Drag racing is a fair weather activity, ideal for summertime. Direct sunlight, heat, make asphalt lanes treated with traction compound maximally effective, sticky for fast racing.

I arrived at Great Lakes Dragaway for the announced Nitrous Shootout event. As always within hearing distance of the starting line, the sound of a screaming engine powering a smoky burnout provokes an involuntary shiver. It’s simply primal, and American — the aspiration to design and build an automobile that accelerates from a standstill to the timing lights at distance of a quarter mile as quickly as possible.

The principles of physics are used to seemingly collapse time. Anyway that is how it seems especially if you are a driver. I have heard owner/drivers take many minutes to tell the story of what he remembers over the span just a few seconds from start to finish line. And not to be forgotten is the social element in all of this. The intent of a car owner/driver is to cross the finish line ahead of one’s competitor.

And to what end you possibly would ask. What is the purpose of such an obviously expensive hobby-activity? Does drag racing have a useful outcome, like most work related activities? I am satisfied that it does not. I’ve taken note, devotees of the quarter mile spend lavish sums of income, and countless hours of hands-on physical and mental labor. All for the exhilarating rush of the violent starting line launch, the heart pounding fender to fender competition, driver melding into machine as the car flashes past the finish-line timing lights. Drag racers do what they do for the shear hell of it!

On Sunday I had approximately 45 minutes at the track before the rains came. Rain is a sign that all track activity ends on account of safety concerns. As it happened in my walk around the pits I came upon a race car which captured my imagination. The owner/driver was seated, relaxing in opening of his transporter. He invited picture taking which was my intention.  A race car is a work of art, a many layered, physical and visual expression of meaning, an object of beauty and function. 

The car owner made comment as I took these photos, “King’s Ransom” is an apt description of the financial demands of this sport.

Fortunately I found a youtube video of Bob King’s 1956 Chevrolet, King’s Ransom drag car in action. The video gives a hint of the adrenaline rush of piloting a 900+ horsepower drag racer…

Enjoy the video. Make no mistake, the danger is real. After all, that is the point…