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Adrenaline, Acceleration, Accomplishment

December 13, 2018 by Jason P. Samp 2 Comments

The sun begins to sink below the grandstands giving the sky a unique pink tint as the last few racers back their speed machines off of the trailers. The couple hundred trailers in the pits would soon be accompanied by over 1,500 show cars and countless spectators. It is Friday evening before a massive joint event at the Auto Club Raceway in Pomona.

Two southern California iconic companies, In-N-Out Burger and Hot Rod Magazine, have come together to celebrate their shared 70th anniversary. There was an open dragstrip for registered racers, a massive display of show cars, In-N-Out Burger trucks, dozens of vendors, Hot Rod Magazine cover cars of the past, and celebrity meet and greets. 

Being a car enthusiast and gearhead with very limited experience in racing culture, I wanted to break into the scene and find out what it takes to become a part of this community. This event served as the perfect opportunity for me to learn through the process and reflection of doing.

Pulling into the pits where the racers set up their camps to have space to work on their cars before and in-between races was an intimidating experience. Cars louder than a thunderstorm were backing out of their enclosed trailers accompanied by crews of multiple people as I pulled in with my car on a rented U-Haul trailer with just me and my father.

 

There were no friendly neighborhood greetings from those around us, just a couple staredowns and head nods. The nerves and fear of judgment came on strong that night and carried well into Saturday morning. When it came time to line up for the race, I was so anxious it was difficult to enjoy the event and talk to those around me.

Though I had six months to ready myself and my car for just a fourteen-second race, I felt extremely uneasy. There is nothing that anyone could have told me to prepare me mentally for pulling up to the starting line.

Watch the 360-degree virtual reality video below and I will walk you through the experience first-hand.

Ride shotgun with me at 100 mph down the dragstrip starting at one minute into the video.

 

After the race was over and I was driving down the return lane passing the crowd in the grandstands, all my anxiety and adrenaline turned into serotonin, or whatever that chemical is that just brings you pure happiness and bliss.

At this point, I returned to the pits and something extraordinary happened. I realized that those around me were not all that intimidating. It was my nerves that kept me shielded and perhaps unapproachable. With my new found confidence and excitement, I began to wander through the event talking to racers, car enthusiasts, and racing celebrities alike to gather some invaluable conversations and experiences.

A car as a companion

Gary Szabo, a 55-year-old racer at the event, has been participating in racing for a long time and has a lot of experience. He drives a 1964 Plymouth Sport Fury, which is one year younger than he is, very regularly on the streets and around town as well as on the race track.

It was my father who first started talking to Gary while I was in the line waiting for my first race. After that race, he introduced me to Gary and from there we started talking about all sorts of things regarding racing.

He had a alot to say about his car and I could tell it really meant alot to him. To him, it was far more than a mode of transportation from point A to point B.

This car may not look like the drag cars you might see on tv. However, Szabo’s Sport Fury is home to a custom built motor and is capable of running the quarter mile in under 12 seconds.

Many car junkies think of their cars as companions with distinct characteristics and personalities.

“It’s like a best friend. I have had it for 34 years,” Szabo said while chuckling. “I’ll go home now and sit in the garage and pat on it and thank it for not breaking.”

I nodded in agreement and found it comforting that I am not the only person who likes to hang out with and talk to their cars.

We sat around for the next half hour or so telling stories about our cars and experiences we have had with them before parting ways.

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Grandfather and grandson

While heading back to my car I ran into a grandfather and grandson who were out at the track racing a 2016 Dodge Challenger R/T. They were in the staging lanes with me before my first race and I was curious to see what their time was and compare it to mine before potentially challenging them to a race.

77-year-old Don Harrison and his 23-year-old grandson, Justin Harrison, spoke almost as if they were the same person only divided by 54 years and offered perspectives on both the older and modern cultures of racing.

Don started racing in 1957 with match racing and progressed into higher levels of drag racing, the Super Stock and Stock Eliminator classes. In 1968 Don almost became a professional driver for Dodge but did not mention what held him back.

“Back in my day, we had a drag strip practically on every corner. We very seldom did any street racing,” says Don and laments that there are not enough drag strips. Illegal street racing can be dangerous and is becoming more of a problem, yet they are closing down more and more drag strips due to noise complaints and other troubles initiated by nearby developers.

California's remaining dragstrips
Operational dragstrips are highlighted
Alameda “Drag Strip” (1931)
Goleta Airport (Santa Barbara) (1948)
Buchanan Field Airport (Concord) (1949)
Salinas Municipal Airport (1949)
Sky Park Airport (Scott’s Valley) (1949)
Maricopa “Drag Strip” (1950)
Santa Ana Blimp Base (Tustin) (1950)
Santa Ana Drag Strip (1950)
Tracy “Drag Strip” (1950)
Bakersfield Drag Strip/Famoso (1951)
Fontana Airstrip/Airport (1951)
Hammer Airfield/Fresno Air Terminal (1951)
Kingdon Drag Strip (Lodi) (1951)
Paradise Mesa Drag Strip (San Diego) (1951)
Redding Dragstrip (1951)
San Jose Speedway (1951)
Santa Maria Dragway (1951)
Saugus Field (Newhall) (1951)
Oakland Stadium Speedway (San Leandro) (1952)
Pomona Drag Strip (1952)
Samoa Drag Strip (Eureka) (1952)
Tidelands Circuit (San Carlos) (1952)
Colton/Morrow Drag Strip (1954)
Inyokern Drag Strip (1954)
Lincoln Airport (1954)
Madera Airport (1954)
Visalia Airport (1954)
Willow Springs Race Course (1954)
Winters Airstrip (1954)
Little Bonneville Drag Strip (San Jose) (1955)
Long Beach Associated/Lions Drag Strip (1955)
Minter Field Air Base (Bakersfield) (1955)
San Fernando Drag Strip/Raceway (1955)
Ventura “Drag Strip” (1955)
San Gabriel Valley Drag Strip (Baldwin Park) (1956)
Santa Rosa/Cotati Drag Strip (1956)
Vacaville Drag Strip (1956)
Half Moon Bay Drag Strip (1957)
Holtville Airstrip (1957)
Riverside International Motor Raceway (1957)
San Luis Obispo “Drag Strip” (1957)
California State Fairgrounds (Sacramento) (1958)
Gardner Field/Taft Drag Strip (1958)
Vaca Valley Raceway (Vacaville) (1958)
Antelope Valley Drag Strip (Palmdale) (1959)
Dinuba “Drag Strip” (1959)
Fremont Drag Strip (1959)
Hourglass Field (San Diego) (1959)
Reid-Hillview Airport (San Jose) (1950s)
Fontana Raceway (1960)
Mojave Airport (1960)
Oroville Drag Strip (1960)
San Gabriel Drag Strip (Irwindale) (1961)
Fresno Dragways (Raisin City) (1962)
Marchbanks Speedway (Hanford) (1962)
Bishop Drag Strip (1963)
Ramona Drag Strip/San Diego Raceway (1963)
Vina Raceway (1963)
Carlsbad Raceway (1964)
Palmdale International Raceway/Los Angeles County Raceway (1964)
Sacramento Raceway Park (1964)
Irwindale Raceway (1965)
Orange County International Raceway (Irvine) (1967)
Porterville Municipal Airport (1968)
Golden State Raceway (Santa Maria) (1969)
Sears Point International Raceway/Infineon Raceway/Sonoma Raceway (1969)
Indio Drag Strip (1960s)
Marysville Drag Strip (Yuba City) (1960s)
Santa Ynez Airport (1960s)
Champion Speedway (Brisbane) (1970)
Ontario Motor Speedway (1970)
Coachella Valley Drag Strip (Thermal) (1971)
Oxnard Air Force Base (1971)
Vernalis Speedway (1971)
Manzanar Drag Strip (Lone Pine) (1972)
High Desert Raceway (Adelanto) (1975)
Brotherhood Raceway Park (Terminal Island) (1976)
Norton Drags (1993)
Rialto Raceway (1995)
Irwindale Drag Strip (2001)
California Dragway/Auto Club Dragway (Fontana) (2002)
Eagle Field (Firebaugh) (2009)
Team Possibilities Raceway (San Diego) (2016?)

Courtesy of dragstriplist.com/
“Everybody thinks you’re just a bunch of thugs out there on the street racing, and some people are, which is the bad part,” Don said.

With little experience in racing and the nearest dragstrip in Fontana being over an hour away, Don’s grandson, Justin, would resort to racing his friends in the outskirts of town which is considered to be a more dangerous approach as city streets are not prepared and well maintained as dragstrips. Also, there is a greater risk of getting into an accident or getting arrested by the police.

Justin has grown up in this new era where breaking into the racing scene is challenging. From a young age, cars were always a part of Justin’s life. “I have always had a passion for cars since I was little,” Justin said. “I liked the sounds and different shapes, but when I bought my first car I really started to consider racing.”

It was not until this year that he would begin attending a new event at Fontana Raceway called Wednesday Night Lights that invites people to race their personal cars on a professional drag strip. This entirely changed the game for Justin.

“It is a good way to relieve stress,” Justin said, “Just being able to get out and focus on yourself and your car is a good escape from everyday life.”

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After this enlightening discussion with Justin and his Grandpa, we decided to head out for one final race before the event ended.

It may not seem as fast from an outside perspective, but going from zero to 100 mph in 13 seconds is an intense adrenaline rush.

Though the late model Challenger beat my Mustang by .3 seconds, I had run my fastest time ever and impressed myself that my self-built car was capable of what it accomplished.

This is a time slip. At the bottom there is the E.T., or elapsed time, followed by MPH which is how fast you were going at the quarter mile mark. Justin is on the left and I am on the right.

 

It became clear to me after these encounters at Pomona that the myth of needing popularity and really expensive cars to break into the racing culture was completely self-fabricated. This culture is actually very welcoming of newcomers.

Racing is a sport that encourages equal participation. Most sports split up among cities, states, countries, genders, ect., but racing is racing regardless of who gets behind the wheel. I cannot say this as a universal statement, but for this one weekend spent in Pomona, it appeared to me that the racing culture is blind to the many forms of discrimination that plague other activities.

Shauna and Roxy: Q & A

Shauna Jellison is a 24-year-old woman from San Luis Obispo with a passion for American muscle cars, fabricating, and racing. She has been hard at work transforming her daily driven 1966 Mustang coupe, named Roxanne, into a fine-tuned race car.

 
 
 
 
 
View this post on Instagram
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

A post shared by Project Roxy (@thatblack66) on Dec 4, 2018 at 3:55pm PST

 
 
 
 
 
View this post on Instagram
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

A post shared by Project Roxy (@thatblack66) on Sep 9, 2018 at 4:39pm PDT

Q: Tell me a bit about your history with cars and racing.

A: So every Tuesday night growing up we would go to the drag strip at Qualcomm stadium to watch the drag races. I was raised in that environment. I would take my friends with me but they were just there to watch while I was more interested in what went into the cars. I became specifically fascinated with the builds of older muscle cars.

Q: Why do you want to take your car to the next level?

A: When I bought my car I had a goal in mind from day one. I wanted to drive it daily while I was in college. However, after graduation I wanted to transform it into a track built car that I can still drive comfortably on the street with luxuries like air conditioning and just have it be really driver friendly.

Q: How are you and your car alike or different?

A: Well, I feel like I am a bit more nurturing than my car is, but honestly, we are both pretty stubborn and hard headed at times.

Q: How would you compare car culture to other cultures?

A: Car culture is way different than other cultures. Everyone that is in it is just on this grind. People put so much of their heart and soul into it that you just need to respect it. You may have different styles and tastes in cars, but you will always have this common appreciation in the community.

Q: How does society view you as a woman that is involved with racing?

A: If you’re good at racing, and you are a chick, you are put on this pedestal, which is awesome. It makes you feel good that you can compete with guys in their own field. A lot of people view it like that and they give girls mad respect which is what I have mostly experienced.

 
 
 
 
 
View this post on Instagram
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

A post shared by Project Roxy (@thatblack66) on Jun 16, 2017 at 6:49am PDT

 
 
 
 
 
View this post on Instagram
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

A post shared by Project Roxy (@thatblack66) on May 1, 2018 at 11:26pm PDT

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I think Shauna explained car culture perfectly with just the two words, “common appreciation.”

We come from so many different backgrounds with different perspectives, values, approaches, and tastes when it comes to cars. Some people are like Gary Szabo. A simple man by nature with a cool old car, a big motor, and an insanely good reaction time.

Then you have Justin Harrison, a young guy full of excitement inspired by his grandfather’s stories and past accomplishments. He’s a guy who will find every possible modification offered to his car to improve his performance. 

I even know a lot of people like myself, working those extra shifts for the overtime to afford your next car part and spending late nights after college in the garage torquing down some head bolts instead of going out to party with friends.

Shauna completely tore apart her perfectly running and driving 1966 Mustang in a barn in order to build it into a racecar packed with the latest modern technologies.

Everything we do comes down to events like this one in Pomona. We set out to reach that adrenaline rush, accomplish our goals, be better and faster than we were before, and revel in the company of so many fascinating people and their equally captivating cars.

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Filed Under: Features

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Blaine Park says

    January 24, 2019 at 7:58 PM

    Good to see you put effort into your story.

    Reply
  2. John says

    December 21, 2018 at 11:00 AM

    Love car shows like this, since I was a kid.

    Reply

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