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Saturday's Report

10:00 AM

After sort of solving our internet access problems by using the "steam-powered" computer (or coal burning, not sure which) in the lobby of the hotel, you should be able to see all the pics and a report from yesterday. In truth, it was pretty much of a nothing day, other than to allow me to get acquainted with the Race City facility, meet the players in this continuing drama, and see a few prairie dogs, a (fake) dead owl and a duck taking a swim beside the track.

But what a difference a day makes, as the track crew got to work right after the street drags finished at 11:00 pm last night and by 2:00 am had the track scraped, sprayed and tire-dragged to an acceptable condition. By the time I arrived this morning, the crew was busy mowing the long grass that surrounds the track and generally tidying things up for the weekend's race. The pit area had changed dramatically too with a sea of race cars, trailers and trucks filling the formerly empty gravel "parking lot".

Before I move on, I've got to mention my reception when I entered the track this morning, and was so pleasantly surprised to receive a very friendly greeting, a fist bump, high five, etc and was made to actually feel welcome, unlike at some facilities where it appears they are doing you a favour by allowing you to enter. Welcoming not. But Race City is definitely different in that regard.

Starting my activities by taking a pit tour brought forth the tally of six members of the Rocky Mountain Nostalgia Funny Car association, three or four (still up in the air) blown renegades, two diesel trucks (refugees from the oval track), no bio-diesel jet funny car (yet, but he's on his way) and no Gordie Bonin yet (but he's also on his way). Other cars in attendance are a pretty fast top sportsman '63 Corvette, a blown alky '80's (or 90's) Camaro and a few other serious looking race cars.

As it turns out though, that few cars theme carries through the pits and in total, less than 100 cars are here. It's going to make for some long gaps in the program as the feature cars don't start running until 6:00 pm. Oh well, the sun is out and it looks like a nice day to be out here soaking it up.


1:00 pm

I've finished touring the pits and set up in the drag strip tower, with a front row seat of the action, it's time to start processing photos from the morning, filling in the captions and start writing this report. We'll add to it throughout the day and post the newest stuff last. But let's backtrack to yesterday first, as some random notes from Friday keep coming to the top of my to-do list.

As I landed at Calgary airport, I was watching the video display in the seatback in front of me, and as we neared the ground I wondered why the altimeter was still reading nearly 5000 ft. When we touched down, it was still around 3500 ft., then it dawned on me that the altitude in Calgary is 3500 ft, not zero like at Vancouver airport. (All together now: Doh! Welcome to the thin(ber) air up here Bob, hope your brain can get enough oxygen to keep hitting on all eight).

Driving through the city on the way to the track I dubbed Calgary "The City of Railways" as nearly every mile of road brought another level crossing, with varying degrees of use. The worst I enountered was when trying to cross the transit system's l.r.t. railway to enter the freeway and a queue of 20 cars took nearly ten minutes to complete the manouever as one train after another kept us from making the turn. Crazy. Thank god Vancouver hasn't gone to such a system. Ours is bad enough, but at least it doesn't keep cars from using the roads.

Another possible description for Calgary could be "city of lakes" as everywhere you looked in anything even remotely low-lying there were large puddles, small lakes and generally more water than you'd ever wish to see that close to your home or business. And it doesn't appear to be going away any time soon. Watching the late news at the hotel and seeing the flooding in the southern part of the province and next door in Saskatchewan just confirmed that they've had a bucketload of rain here lately.


Finally, the Pit Report

First stop was at Cory Kincaid's pit area where they were preparing his '55 Chev funny car at a fairly leisurely pace with quite a few hours to go before they have to appear in the staging lanes. Cory's got time to tell me a bit about the car, telling us it was an ex-Whit Bazemore car, built by Al Swindahl and finished by Dave Jeffers after Swindahl's unfortunate passing.

He's also got some cachet with his truck and trailer combo too, it being an ex-Darrell Gwynn unit. Yes, he does have ambitions to rise above the nostalgia funny car group, with top alcohol or nostalgia nitro as his goal. That may start happening before the end of the season as he has tentative plans to license at Mission Raceway in September.

Rounding the corner from Kincaid's pit area put me right in the middle of the Rocky Mountain Nostalgia Funny Car group, with it being time for a roll call, so here we go:

Next up in the pecking order and the program are the Blown Renegades, a loosely knit group of blown alky dragsters, altereds, and the occasional funny car. As long as they're neat, according to member Jim Attewell. While there's nearly 20 cars in the group, the late start at promoting and organizing this event caused many of them to not enter or be able to appear. At noon, there were only Attewell with his dragster, the blown alky '23 "T" altered of Dwayne Treleaven, a possible entry in the form of an injected alky altered, and one person possibly on his way.

Attewell's car is the jewel of the group today, as his 270" wheelbase rear-engine chassis, with a 588 cube Chev, 14-71 blower and big wing make it look like a real Top Alcohol Dragster. He has run as quick as 6.46 at Ashcroft and regularly runs in the 6's even at the higher altitude tracks in Alberta.

Getting a chance to talk to the owner/driver of the really nice looking '63 Corvette in the next trailer yields the information that it's an ex-Rickie Smith car that ran as quick as 3.80 at an 1/8-th mile ADRL race. After 32 runs, Smith sent the car back to Bickel for some updates and then sold it to current owner Gary Gummow of Calgary. He's only put two laps on the car at the end of last season in Edmonton and today is the first time he's had it out of the garage in 2010.

The 760 c.i.d. Steve Schmidt motor, with no nitrous (yet!) is capable of low 7-second times and 200 mph speeds in this car and Gummow plans to see how close he can come next weekend at Castrol Raceway's Rocky Mountain Nationals in Edmonton. We'll be there to see.

With our pit tour at an end, I head up to the top of the stands for a while to watch the sportsmen cars run, and notice them bouncing over the bumps on the second half of the 1/4-mile. While there are some people still thinking that the feature cars might try running the full distance, my opinion is that it would be nothing short of suicidal if they do. Oh, just saw a dragster run 8.62 at 157 mph and didn't appear to bounce too badly. Hmm. Still, let's keep it short and sweet for safety, eh?


2:30 PM

While finishing the photoshopping of this morning's photos, and writing this report, a local nostalgia guru, Dave Inglis, comes up in the tower and passes along some info about the cars on display on the concourse for the track announcer and the fans. The "Widowmaker" car is an ex-Paul Blaylock (Spokane) piece built by Romeo Palamides in 1961 and has an injected 392 Chrysler Hemi for power.

The orange flathead ford dragster is a Scotty Fenn chassis from probably '61 or '62 and the engine in it is currently a mockup while the parts to build a real racing engine are still being rounded up. Joining the two very early models later today will be the recreation of the Sinclair and Fjallman junior fueller, driven by Gordie Bonin in the early 70's. The car is just barely finished and was only fired up for the first time a few days ago. And what do you know? As I type this, the trailer comes through the gates and the car is unloaded and on display in short order.

That's all we've got for right now, and it's way past time for lunch so we're heading out to tour the pits, the BBQ stand and touch base with Bonin and check out his car. Maybe we'll even get some pics too. Until the next update, hang in there.


7:00 PM

The first round of "qualifying" for the Rocky Mountain Nostalgia Funny Car group is over and the other "feature" cars, the blown renegades have also run. Kevin Therres' Jet Car is still sitting in his pit area waiting to close out the show this evening. There's a new driver in the car at this event, and I'm embarassed to admit that I haven't got his name yet. Oh well, later. Update: Ross Crampton. More on that tomorrow.

I haven't seen the rocky mountain floppers run for a few years, and I always enjoyed their show in the past, but they've really stepped up their game since then. From the professional layout of their pit areas, to the in-unison fireup in front of the whole crowd at 5:00 pm, to the organized and choreographed show they put on, these folks have definitely all graduated from motorsport marketing college.

The connection between the race teams and the fans was obvious, as the crowd, which built to the better part of a thousand people (in total on the grounds) by the time the first round started at 6:00 pm, lapped up the show the funny cars put on. From the backup girls with cowbells and air horns, to the 1/4-mile burnout (before an 1/8-th mile race) by Cal Tebb, to the driving all the way back around the return road to the starting area with the chutes out (also by Tebb), to the very enthusiastic group of crew members for the Sekura brothers... you get the picture, don't you?

How about the blown renegades, Bob? Well, this is where things fall down a bit, as despite the best efforts of Jim Attwell with his blown alky dragster and Dwayne Treleaven with his altered, they were let down by the lack of any other cars to help put on a show. Shawn Belechowsky tried to help with his blown Corvette, but broke on the launch in the first round and is a probable no-show for the second round at 8:00 pm.

And that was it. From a group of nearly 20 cars, to have only three appear, despite the last minute aspect of the event, is a sad statement. To gain some credibility these guys have got to appear whenever and wherever they're needed, or the promoters will simply find another feature attraction. But I've got to salute Attwell and Treleaven for doing their best in a bad situation.

The other advertised attraction, the Diesel Hot Rod Association, consisted of two semis built for circle track racing, with so much camber on the front wheels that it was a wonder they could get straight down the track. While they did some extremely gnarly burnouts and ran very well for big rigs, it's hard to call two trucks, both owned by the same team, an association. Oh well, the fans loved them and the bottom line is what the fans like is what counts this weekend.

I never had a chance to do a complete tally of the cars in attendance, but the number 100 or so seemed like a safe estimate, and at times in the afternoon, before the 6:00 pm start of the feature, there were some slow stretches with little ontrack action. The track itself, despite one episode of peeling up on the starting line, held up pretty well and the water bubbling up through the cracks on the top end hasn't become an issue. Yet.

It's pretty rare to hear the announcer criticize his own track, but all the people involved in the event were quick to admit that the surface was far less than perfect, and were anxious to repave the track (and lay down a concrete pad too perhaps?) but until the track has some certainty in the form of an unbreakable lease, no one in their right mind would invest the money to do the updates/upgrades so sorely needed. Until something good happens in the political arena, it's a classic lose-lose situation.

Hey, let's get back to drag racing, and we'll start by listing the times for the funny car and renegade qualifying. There wasn't time to take photos, write down e.t.'s and make run notes, so I'll just list the numbers and make a general mention of the performances. All the cars tried hard, starting with big burnouts and runs that at times looked on the verge of disaster with the cars bouncing badly from the 300 ft. mark onwards. Hearing the engines going up and down as the rear tires became airborne at times and watching the cars dancing around was quite a show.

No one crashed, or even came close to doing so, and despite a few lopsided pairings, there were some pretty respectable numbers considering the conditions. They could have simply turned off the clocks and the fans still would have enjoyed the show, as the numbers didn't really matter. The cars and drivers and crews were the stars, not the scoreboards.

Here's the numbers though. By the way, I'm not sure how their qualifying positions will affect tomorrow's eliminations or the payouts. Late update: With this event being a NON-points race, the teams have decided to make two passes each day, with random pairings and nothing but bragging rights on the line. I understand that the group receives a lump sum from the track and how that's divvied up among the competitors is up to them.

The order after the first round of qualifying is as follows:

Here's the Blown Renegades numbers:

9:00 PM

Even though the funny cars were ready to run at least 15 minutes earlier than their scheduled 8:00 pm, they were held in the staging lanes while the King of The Hill sportsman eliminations continued, then brought out with the renegades running first, followed by the funny cars, and finally, the awesome biodiesel jet funny car of Kevin Therres. We haven't got all the information on why there were no shows in the second round, but will gather some info in the pits on Sunday morning. Anyways, here follows the numbers.

The order after the second (final) round of qualifying is as follows:

And again, the Blown Renegades:

Finally, closing out the show for the evening (except for a few more king of the hill and test and tune passes, is the jet funny car. They definitely didn't disappoint the fans, with lots of burner pops and a hard run on a pretty rough road. Good way to finish the evening.

And that's all we wrote for the qualifying day at the Classic. Eliminations and more exhibition runs tomorrow and we'll bring you the results as soon as we can, which will probably be when we get back to Vancouver very late on Sunday evening. To everyone out there, especially all the dads (and grandads, like Dean Murdoch) have a Happy Father's Day!



That's it from Race City; tomorrow we've got the final day of the Father's Day Funny Car Classic