#Funny Car

[gribnayamt]

Does 2D even have a chance to win?....

[wheelsgoroundincircles]

Hawaii's Winningest Drag Racer, Roland Leong, Inducted into Hawaii Sports Hall of Fame

[eugenesisland]

[misforgotten2]

Car Craft November 1967

[redvampirerose]

Art by  PuffyGator

[theflyingcircus384]

[smorbee]

learning hand sewing and just finished our first plushy making attempt…………funny car

[turtlecat1440]

Been a fun day today. Although I believe in public transportation, and walkable cities, I still love cars.

Something about their complexity, commonality, and necessity in the American life. Also, cool cars are cool. What can I say?

The fun part of today has been making progress on fixing my 95 Toyota Corolla. The end goal is to set it up for my sibling, since they're working on getting their license.

"That's not a cool car!" I hear the person in the back, who definitely removed the muffler and catalytic converter from his first Honda Civic for an extra two horsepower, and a fuckton of noise say.

I agree. It's a beater. But I love beater cars. I have a nice car, but they're expensive to fix, and usually require a ton of whacky tools. Beater cars are the vehicles of the people (besides busses). They're still marvels of engineering, but they're focus isn't on speed, acceleration, torque or even balance. The focus is on fuel efficiency, user convenience, and finally on a low price point. Beater cars are an art in it of themselves, and I love their crappiness for it. In any case, I did something I think is funny.

So, for context, a valve cover is a piece of metal that covers the valve train. Keeps the oil from spraying everywhere. And such. They're usually front and center.

Here's the Corolla without the valve cover, something most non-car people don't see, despite it being cool:

(ignore my shotty craftsmanship)

People with project cars sometimes paint valve covers fun colors to distinguish their cars. I've been planning on painting the ones in my nice car pink, because car people tend to be very toxically masculine, and this would confuse them. More importantly, I like the color pink. But I haven't done it before, so I needed practice. What better practice than my hunk o' junk Corolla that has to have the valve cover removed anyways?

So that's what I did. I didn't take pictures of the whole process, but I took one of the cover post-paint:

And here it is with the masking tape removed and partially installed:

It adds so much life to the car! And it's funny to me every time. I know it's cringe, etc, but it really does tickle my fancy that if I were ever to bring this car to a mechanic, they would scratch their chin, maybe even laugh at a beater car with too much love poured into it.

[blackros78]

[terezisexbuttpyrope]

wonder if the ppl driving behind me are as entertained by my car as i am

[cannithebear]

FUNNY CAR MEME THE SEQUEL

[og-bad-dogg]

yep

[wheelsgoroundincircles]

Don Prudhomme, Funny Car, 1976

Consecutive event wins: 5 | Consecutive round-wins: 22

How could Prudhomme possibly top his six-of-eight 1975 season? By winning seven of eight, of course, which he did in the most dominant season in Funny Car history.

Prudhomme won the first five consecutively: Winternationals, Gattornationals, Springnationals, Summernationals, and Le Grandnational with respective final-round defeats of McCulloch, Greer, McEwen (back-to-back), and Prock.

The Winternationals win was his second of what would be four in a row, and the Gators triumph was his third in a row there. He’d never won the Summernationals before 1976, but then went on to win it five times over the next seven years, and his win in Montreal was his second straight in a string of six wins in eight years north of the border.

How dominant was he in those first five events? He had low e.t. and top speed at all five and qualified No. 1 at four of the five, outdone only by Gary Burgin at the Gatornationals, where Prudhomme’s 6.31 was behind only Burgin’s 6.29.

Burgin also ended Prudhomme’s bid for a perfect season, stopping him in the Indy final as Beadle had done the year before. Prudhomme had qualified No. 1 in the quickest field in history (6.26 bump) with a national record 5.97, a full tenth ahead of Beadle’s second-ranked 6.07, then raced past Tom Hoover, Gordie Bonin, and Ron O’Donnell with runs of 6.05, 6.13, and 6.15 before shaking the tires to a 6.46 loss against Burgin’s 6.25, ending “the Snake’s” winning streak at 22 rounds.

Combined with his wins at the final two events of 1975, Prudhomme racked up 30 straight round-wins over the two seasons, which still stands as the longest winning streak in Funny Car history.

Prudhomme would go on to win in Seattle and Ontario to finish 1976 with seven wins in eight starts and a 30-1 round-win record.

[dylannitroblog]

NHRA Gatornationals Recap

The start of the 2024 NHRA Drag Racing Season is here, and with that, it's also the start of the Mission Foods era of professional drag racing. This 2024 season has kicked off the same way as the last few seasons, pushing the traditional opener of the Pomona Winternationals back a few weeks in favor of starting in the Sunshine State of Florida. It was not all sunshine however as rain delays and oil down became the theme of the weekend leading to the appearance of the elusive Top Fuel night run which is not too common here in Florida. But enough intro, let's look at the results of the historic 55th Annual Gatornationals:

In Pro-Stock Motorcycle the #1 Qualifier of Gaige Herrera took on the #2 qualifier and multi-time champion rival Matt Smith. Gaige and Matt had dominated all weekend however, none were surprised when Gaige Herrera turned on his fourth win light on during Sunday earning him his 12th National Event win in only his second full-time season.

Pro-Stock car saw a race between teammates and once again the number 1 and 2 qualifiers stage up being Erica Enders and Cristan Cuadra respectively. There was a lot on the line as despite being one of the most successful active Pro-Stock drivers Erica had never hoisted a wally at the Gators and after several heartbreaking losses here in years past Enders knew she had to lock in and win the round. However, the burning desire was also there for Christan Cuadra who was in his first ever 2-wide final round and had his first opportunity at an NHRA race victory. They staged and went but early tire shake for Cuadra signaled that yes indeed, Erica Enders would host her first-ever Gatornationals Wally.

Nitro Funny Car saw one of the best drivers in the class win in the strangest ways possible. #1 Qualifier Austin Prock was making his first official start in the Mission NHRA Drag Racing series and was on a tear. Just a few weeks before in Bradenton he won 250,000 in dominating fashion beating the reigning champion Matt Hegan in the final round. Now in Gainsville, Prock looks poised for an easy victory against JR. Todd in the DHL Kalitta Funny Car. Todd hadn't run in the three-second range or anywhere near 300 mph all weekend, he spun and smoked the tires every round before this and yet somehow continued to turn on win light after win light. The Yellow Fellas knew that to beat the best and most consistent car on the property this weekend they would have to put in not a blazingly fast tune-up, but one that could get them safely down track under power and hope that the John Force Racing Funny Car of Austin Prock had issues. Prock Prestages, then Todd, they both full stage, the lights flash yellow then green, Todd is first off the line by 0.004 seconds and by the 60-foot mark Austin Prock goes into tire shake. Making his best run of the weekend JR. Todd goes 3.889 at 329 MPH making the unlikeliest win of his NHRA Drag Racing Career.

Top Fuel Had a bit more of a straightforward narrative, the #1 Qualifier of Shawn Langdon raced the #6 Qualifier of Billy Torrence. Don't let those numbers have you make up your mind about this final, Billy Torrences teammate and son Steve Torrence was the number two qualifier, and with Steve out both crews were working in tandem to give Billy the best possible car. However, in the other land was Shawn Langdon in the second Kalitta Motorsports top fuel dragster, having seen his teammate JR, win his final, there was immense pressure to deliver the first-ever Kalitta motorsports double up 17 times it had been tried but never to be as both cars would make it to the finals only for one or both of them to lose. Billy reacts quicker on the tree by 6 one thasounths of a second however not to be denied was Shawn Langdon who surged ahead and completed the illustrious Kalitta Motorsports double up having a car of the same team win in both nitro categories.

Overall the 55th Annual NHRA Gatornationals was worth the wait and despite a huge amount of tire spin from all the rain reducing the grip of the track, it was an amazing event with some crazy storylines. Thanks for reading and I'lll see you in Pamona for the NHRA Winternationals.

[misforgotten2]

Car Craft - November 1967