GoneDragRacing.com

Let's liven the place up a bit and post some some of your old stories. I'll start it off. Summer of '84, I was on my way down to front street in my 68 el camino. I was following a buddy with a 72 nova and he had little hottie with him. I got stuck with her friend. We made the right hand turn onto woodhaven road and the nova took off, about as fast as a 307 with a q-jet could go. Of course, not to be out done, I did the same. The el had a bone stock 300 horse/327 with a q-jet, saggy tits 4 speed, headers, and a 3.08 rear. I nailed the gas to the floor of the el and we took off in pursuit of the nova. I pulled second gear and the car nose dived into the ground. Spittin' and sputterin' along I could barely keep up speed. I managed to get down to JFK and park the car along side the stadium and let her cool down. The lot was full. As far as the eye could see was nothing but american made muscle. We watched the activities for quite a while, until the gal I was stuck with started whining and wanted to leave. I didn't care at that point. I was more concerned with my el than I was about her. I just hoped the el would run well enough to make the ride back to ricboro. It spitted and sputtered up 95 and barely got up the old off ramp at woodhaven road. She complanied the whole ride home. "Is this a truck"? "What's wrong with this thing"? "What's that noise"? OMG, I can remember it like it was yeaterday. We finally got back to Richboro mickey d's and off she went. Amen. We had figured the el suffered a jumped tooth on the chain. During the week, I did a top end job on the el. Freshened up the fuelie heads, slid in a small isky stick, new chain, rebuilt the carb and that 327 purred like a kitten. All just in time for next ride down front street. This time, without the chick!!


Rich

It was the summer of 95, a sunday night so as usual we decided to go down to hang out at red lion on the blvd. We got word that there was some racing going on up by the bud plant so we headed in that direction. So we watched a few races and there was a iroc that had beat a few cars, it turned out it was a kid that I worked with a few years earlier. I watched him beat a mustang, a red cuda conv, and a brand new 94 camaro. So he asked me if I wanted to race and of course I said yes. We lined and he heated up his street slicks while I passed on my dunlap radials. So we took off and my 79 t/a was so bad off the line he got me by two cars easy, but once I hit about the eighth mile I blew by him so bad and beat him by at least 5 cars. I couldn't beleive I beat him. Apparently he had a bunch of bolt ons, a 4.10:1 rear, and some sqeeze. My 79 ta had a 455, performer intake, 3310 holley, cheapo headers, flowmasters, t 350, 3.23:1 rear, with a comp 280h cam. When I turned around and went back I was inundated with 10-15 other people wanting to know what I had in there. I never popped my hood and the only thing I told them was that it was pontiac powered and there was no sqeeze. The other racer(johnny) shook my hand. It was a fun night!!!!

Well, too many races back then. I raced from mid 70's - early 80's down at

Meadows
Del ave
little Del Ave
11th st
Front st
Decator ave

And a few others

I first ran my 69 Chevelle, Mid blue with a flake design on the sail panels, sbc, 4 spd, 3:55 gears. Ran only up here, Meadows area

next i ran my 65 Chevy II, Army drab green, sbc, 4 speed, 4:88 rear, Ran this one all over.

next my 67 GTO, White, 400, 400 trans, 3:90 gears. Ran this alot down Front st area

I had many more, but these 3 ran the most back then.

I do remeber some races here are a few.

GTO> I was running against a Burgany vette on 11th st, we got about top end, i was well ahead and saw a cop come around the corner. i got out of it and the vette got back on it, just intime to t-bone a kid in a Duster that decided to make a U turn in front of us. The vette hood went about 25 feet in the air and pieces of fg went all over the place,.

GTO>, Andother night on Front st, I was winning all night and I got put up against a 70 Chevelle, When it pulled up next to me the friggin ground shook. It had a BBC with a tunnelram. the car had a Motion stripe down the side. We took off and i had him by a fender, only because his car wouldn't hook and i was off. We hit 3/4 the way down front
and he was gone. But he didn't past me, I slowed and looked back and it was wrapped around the light pole on it's side, I ran back and then the crowd gathered and we helped to get everyone out and then i was told to get out of there before the cop showed. He hit anitfrez left behind by the 68 dart i ran the run before, I heard this later that night.

A better run was in the Chevy II against a 68 Gold Camaro. I was running this car with a set of old snow tires because nothing else would hook with the 88's. These guys in a Camaro towed this car in right from the track, we ran and i got them, then they wanted to re-run back around the junkyards the next week, i showed and so did they, we lined up and the cops came around the corner, so we were both off and gone and never saw that car again.

There was always tons of people and cars back then, shit, we even ran the cops once and a while. But we had to let them win,, lol

I have more but i'll wait to see what other stories pop up.

1987 was the year, Hugger Orange Z/28, 1973 model, had a 427BBC, a 4 speed, 4:56 12 bolt, etc. Bolted on a set of McCreary dirt track stickies, did an awesome burn out on the street, and promptly bent both the cheap chrome Lakewood traction bars to the point they dug into the pavement...

Blake, I have to admit.......I never tried snow tires

Yep, i had a 68 Camaro rear in it and it was too wide, so i had to run the GTO Ralley 3 rim with a crazy pattern snow. It hooked. And it fit.

Another story with my 68 el. I remember hangin' at JFk all night, into the wee hours watching the activities on the street. There was a 68 or 69 convertible chevelle tearing up the concrete that night along with anyone who challenged him. Dude later said he had a 454 with an automatic and some gear. Things started thinning out a bit so I figured what the hell and fired up the el and went up to see if I could line up with this chevelle. I got out to the street and some dude started directing traffic around, next thing I know I'm front and center with the chevelle to my left. The starter dude runs out front, drops his arms and we're off!! The el took off pretty good for a little 327. I started rowing the gears, went for third and all the sudden the ground shook, my ears popped, and that chevelle went right on bye and I started laughing out loud. The dude was waiting for me up by pattison ave and I pulled up door to door. He saw the 307 badge on the fender and didn't think that much of it. I told him the 307 was long gone and it had a 327/300 camaro engine. He figured there was an upgrade done. No 307 runs like that. He went back in line and I headed home for the night, with the sun coming up over the river as I headed up 95. Another awesome night in south philly.......

So many times down to meadows and front street in the mid to late 70's was a blast we also use to take engine parts into the McDonald's in Hatboro mostly carbs and rebuild them at the table. The street i grew up on in Hatboro was like Atco east. Fun time back then wish the kids of today could have lived in the 50 60 and 70's greatest time that will never be duplicated.

Mike, Hatboro itself is a whole other saga. If we weren't headed downtown we were hangin' at the Hatboro mickey d's. Had to get there early though if you wanted a place to park. If not, just kept on cruizin' the circuit or catchin' a run up York road.

ok , staten island , back in the late 80,s

i had a transmission shop up on the north shore but lived down south , had to run down richmond ave (4lanes each way )every night to get home .
built an S10 shop truck , gold with black sides , healthy 400 chevy v8 and turbo 350 with 410 gears but ran the dual exhaust out the passenger side to clear the spare tire , rallye wheels all around , ultra sleeper

coming home late one night a trans am and a vette come flying by and catch the next light , i idled up behind , listening to them revving , waiting for the light . on the green they both dumped the clutch and started rowing gears , i hung on the vettes ass till he hit third then started flashing my headlights and tapping the horn , when he moved over i slid up between them , waved and floored it and just left them .

the vette took the exit for the expressway but the trans am chased me to the light at arthur kill road , he pulled up next to me and desperatly asked me to please tell him that it had a big motor , i laughed and told him it was a six with a cam in it and motored off laughing all the way home.

The one thing I wished I had done was try to pop a few instamatic shots during my days downtown. Tons of muscle cars, sunoco 94 for a 1.20 a gallon, eating at the doggy diner. Great memories......

1987, same 73 zwith the BBC, slung the driveshaft out the tranny and did the pole vault... Taught me the valuable lesson of even street cars needing driveshaft loops...

had a 65 plymouth fury , ran about 11 flat on juice , guy with a 55 chevy that i knew was a 10.99 car wanted to go at it , he was buggin about the juice so i told him he could have the wrench and disconnect the bottle himself and $500 heads up.
seen him having trouble out of the hole and i knew my big old beast would hook on ice if needed

had a 5lb bottle in behind the glove box , trunk bottle was a fake - had him by a fender out of the hole all the way down

Reminds me of a night down on front street. I had my silver 67 malibu so I'm thinking it's around summer of '82 or '83. Back then you just got in line and raced whoever or whatever was in the line next to you. I had a friend in the car with me at the time and this bigass ford 4x4 pickup is my match. As we roll toward the starter the 4x4 decides to do a holeshot. Must have been a stickshift or he just flat did a neutral drop because that rear driveshft u-joint went flying in all directions. Sparks everywhere and the sound of shredding steel. Scared the shit out of me and I remember my buddy ducking for cover while riding shotgun. All I could think was "What jackass would try that with 40 inch mudders" Unreal.................

I was in jfk parking lot 83/84 pretty busy night tons of cars racing for like close to 4 hrs ****cops show up thing got way outa hand, a drunk guys says (as im taking pics) you wanna see something cool? i said ok, he takes the 40 outa the bag walks up to cop car WHAM right in the winshield,didnt even run away was tackled that nite it took close to 3 hrs to get out of lot.Cops everywhere in the air,on foot,horses,cycles,paddy wagon never saw so many cops in my life it was like the president got shot or something.

In the 2 write ups in the news paper bulletine and enquire i was mentioned and interview( still got the papers some where) a tall skinny youth wearing a MOPAR HAT...........Had the greatest of times down there now its all memories......................................................

http://youtu.be/JPLFzG1RnAE probably one of the BEST days and last one i went to in video joe newsham VS harris boys wagon

http://youtu.be/l2uYN70-i6I one of the harris boys vs jim swarr

i REMEMBER the doggy dinner (where tony lukes is now) 2 cheese dogs for 1.29 awesome, also remember white castle waiting in line for ever, for a mouthful little burger