weekend trip to race in Muncie, Indiana

I left Sunrise Drive in Holland at 1 PM on Friday, June 7, in Poppy's Van, pulling the Cookie Monster Charger on a trailer, going south on the M-40 highway. My objective was to get the Charger down a quarter-mile track in Muncie, Indiana that evening.

My racing season for 2009 is focused on Drag Week, a street-car racing-tour sponsored by Hot Rod Magazine in September. The Drag Week events will begin at Muncie Dragway in Indiana, more than 200 miles away from Holland, Michigan, and continue in Martin, MI - Norwalk, OH - Hebron, OH - Albany, IN, covering 1200 miles in a week, racing at a track in each town, driving only the racecar.

To get a feel for the roads between the tracks, I kept to county and state routes, so it took 5 hours driving through towns (Main Street) and around detours (bridge out and summer construction) with a gas & food stop before arriving at Muncie Dragway at 8 PM. Friday night featured a Fast & Furious Street Racing event that started at 7, and I had the Charger off the trailer, changed the oil and added gas, just after the first break in the action, practice time runs were done.

I pulled into the lane for a Trophy Race and dialed 12.50 as an uneducated guess, with no time run, this would be the first time down the quarter-mile in 2009. At the start line, my opponent in a Toyota Celica was dialed 15.20 so he left first, .605 seconds after the green light. A few seconds later I rolled across the line, .043 seconds after the green light. With more than half-a-second advantage, I caught the competition at the eighth-mile mark and let off the throttle, staying less than a foot ahead of the other car, finishing at 93 miles per hour (opponent was going 91 mph) and winning the round by .003 seconds. Although the Charger had slowed to an elapsed time of 13.2 seconds, the incremental times showed a possible 12.7 second E.T.

The Fast & Furious Street Race event included practice runs or grudge matches, Trophy races for two-wheelers (motorcycles and scooters), street cars (registered & insured), and full-race-slick-tire cars as well as a burnout contest and a dancing girl (bikini) contest, so the second round of the Trophy Race started two hours later.

This round I dialed 12.70 and came to the start opposite a new Pontiac dialed at 11.40, obviously a serious racer. My reaction (.068) was better than the driver who followed me (.096) and I got to the finish line first by .05 seconds, but we both went quicker than the dial. My 12.59 finish was worse than his 11.32 so I lost the round. When I went back to the lane to congratulate the winner, I learned that he and his buddy were also practicing for Drag Week, so I expect to see him again in September.

Two hours later, after midnight, I made a final, fastest run at Muncie Dragway, 12.42 seconds at 109 mph.

I put the Charger back on the trailer and headed toward Kalamazoo, on Interstate highways going north, to meet Mia and Dan at the Epilepsy Foundation Stroll in the Park. I parked the van and trailer at 6 AM and manned a prize table for the event, after an hour nap at a rest stop, no bed for me that Friday night.

Saturday at 2 PM, I passed Martin Dragway on US-131 heading to Grand Rapids. I hope the tour in September goes this well.