Hey! I’m so glad IHRA brought back the blogs for us! This is a great way to keep up…and well gives me a reason to s-l-o-w d-o-w-n for a moment. (If that is even possible lately!)

Since it’s been a while, I’ll try to just pick up from the present and go from here. Last time I talked about getting my TAD license…and running in the five’s. With as busy as I have been since then…I still feel like I’m going that fast. (ha)

It has been a decent start to the season. I really have no complaints other than I wish I could have about 20 more weekends a year so I could race more than I do, (or have planned).

The next several weekends…no racing for me, just TV work. Tomorrow I head to TN for a Lokar Car Show TV shoot @ Borla (will air on Fox Sports Net). I am really looking forward to seeing their new facility in Johnson City. Borla has a fantatic product line for street and strip…(love my headers, of course!)

This month sure has just flown by. It started off at the DBL @ Thompson, then I flew to Philly for a TV shoot….then had my one weekend “off”. After that I flew to Philly again (I could write a WHOLE blog on just my trips to Philly and the Philly airport…sigh) to head over to Atco, NJ for an “Inside Drag Racing” shoot and last weekend was Martin DBL.

I always love running Martin and thank heavens the weather cooporated. Saturday I went out 2nd round…but seemed to pull it together a little better for Sunday. (Semi’s) If I only would have TRUSTED what to put in the delay…I think I would have given myself a better chance. All day I was only .005 different in “my” reaction time. Now if I would have just bought into that a little earlier and taken more time out…it may have been different in the semifinal round.  I knew Ledford was going to be a tough cookie…and it was a good round. Took stripe by .0008….yes that’s the right amount of “0’s” Just had me on the tree by 10…and that’s all she wrote. I broke out by seven thou.

It was a pretty good weekend though and really glad we went. It wasn’t on our schedule to start with as we were going to run Richmond this coming weekend…but work changed plans for us.

I know the “girls” were happy to get to go to the track…they were having a good ‘ol time as usual! They were in “Race Dog Mode”!

I’m not real sure what Kevin and John (Farr) were doing here..I think they liked the sunset…um….maybe we can come up with a caption for it or something….lol…I really don’t know what to say!

Kevin’s new TD is off getting powder coating as I type this and we can’t WAIT to get it on the track. OK…I know Kevin is more anxious than I am. It’s been a long time coming…but is it getting closer.

I don’t know which part he is more excited about…the new car or the 615 BBC from Ohio Crankshaft. I know…I cannot wait to hear this motor, myself. Sure am glad the car is adjustable….I just may have to drive it a time or two…you know, just to make sure it’s OK and everything. (lol)

So that’s all for this time. Hopefully by next update…more cool pics of new TD!

xxoo

Well gang welcome to the New IHRA Blog Central. I personally like this a whole bunch and plan to bring you all sorts of stuff from my life. If any of you have been reading my old blog on Racingjunk.com then you know I always kind of stray away from the normal straight and narrow. I really hope everyone enjoys and leave me a comment and let me know.

Well it has been a while yes I know but man have I been busy. Between keeping the cars going, the wrecker service, and the track it just never seems to stop. One thing is for sure though, I am not complaining.

We loaded up all of our junk and made the trip to Rockingham for the Spring Nationals. Things did not go as planned for sure, we had a problem with Angel’s Hot Rod car as I will explain later on, I went red first round of Q/R and I missed the setup on Angel’s Q/R run so we loaded our junk back up and headed for the HOH to do some testing. We thought maybe we had found our problems and rolled on out to the neatest little track in North Carolina, Piedmont Dragway. I really like Piedmont because it is a pretty easy ride and with it being a one day race we figured what the heck.

We rolled into the track around 8pm and found a CROWD of cars so we had to pit right outside the gate which turns out I really liked. We unloaded the H/R car to make a couple shots to see if our problems were fixed. Angel unloads with a 7.01 and a .026 light. We came right back to staging and got 1 more run before calling it a night and she was .015 and 7.001. I will take it for sure! Well that was about the last highlight for H/R as things went down hill from there. Time runs were good 6.99 and 6.99 lane to lane so I am thinking we are good. Well the reaction problem is still rearing it’s ugly head. I added 10 pounds of air to the front tires and rolled more numbers out of the delay box to no avail. She was late first round and breaked to a 7.002 for the loss! We changed the button in the car and will test this week to see if that fixes it.

Well I set up for a low .00 light first round because I drew my Engine Builder Brett Nesbitt, he is normally good on the tree and drives the other end well so I knew I would have my hands full. I staged perfectly and smashed the tree to a .001 redlight! Well in the other lane Brett is .000 so my thoughts were correct he would be good. I talked to him afterwards and we agreed it was a respect thing for each other so we both setup to go close to .000 on the tree.

Well on this trip we decided to take the kids with us to let them race in the Jr. Dragster division. Boy am I glad I did! I must say though Allison Hall kind of talked me into it because I text her and asked her what the entry was for Jr.s and she said $125, I said are you sure and she told me the look on her kids face when they won an Ironman was priceless so we said ok you are right we will take them.

Their time runs went good Shelby was .029 on the tree and Russell was .032 first hit so things were looking good for at least some of our team. Shelby drew the bye run first round and Russell picked up a W as well. We make it to the semis and tried our best to stay away from each other and it worked great, both kids got the W and we are headed to an all Carolina Crew final round! Now I am dancing on the starting line because I NEVER expected to get them both in the finals, I felt one of them could have made it but never both in my wildest dreams.

Well I guess the good lord didn’t want them to run just yet because the biggest downpour I have seen in some time came through and dropped about an inch of rain in 30 minutes. Bob Harris got on the P.A. and said we were going to finish this race regardless tonight so the waiting game began.

Both kids were as nervous as could be and you could look at them and tell. The time had come and here we go to the starting line, I fired Shelby up and got her ready, idled her up and sent her to the line and went to take care of Russell, I did the same to him and sent him forward to pre stage also, now it is in there hands I can’t help them anymore. They both pre staged and just sat there! I started thinking why are they having a burndown between family members? Welll then I noticed the problem, after the rain came and the track was dried, the staff at Piedmont reprepped the track and I must say it was good, well actually too good. Both cars were stuck and wouldn’t move! I looked at Russell and he was shaking his car trying to get it to move and Shelby was doing the same, finally Russell stages and Shelby was still stuck. She finally touched the gas a little and the belt grabbed and shot her through the lights, autostart took over from there and redlighted her so the race is done and Josh Peake, IHRA Starter, sent both kids on down the track. I feel horrible at this point but there is nothing I can do, Angie and Morgan are crying and when I get to the E.T. Shack Shelby is balling her eyes out. Russell looks at me and said I am sorry I don’t want to win this way. I told him that a win is a win no matter who it is against. I told Shelby we will learn ten million ways to lose and only a handful of ways to win but of course she was still upset. She said she only wanted a chance. Life is hard for sure but I must say that the good Lord had decided that maybe it just wasn’t her time to win a Ironman. There will be more chances for sure and I am so Proud of both of them for keeping their cool and making it into the finals together. Russell is now the proud owner of 2 Ironmen as he won his first in a Ironman classic last year. It makes me proud to know that I work on both cars and they are good enough to take them out and win with them.

Our good friend Robbie Salsgiver has done most all the work on the cars and has taught me most all I know about keeping the cars good between runs. Robbie just rebuilt the motor on Russells car and redone Shelby’s as well over the winter so I owe a big thanks to him. The only other problem I see is we have created a couple of monsters that want to go racing everytime we go on the road now!

Ok to change the subject just a little, one of our sponsors and good friends from the track Holley Tractor, invited me and my brother Jason to go out deep sea fishing again. Of course we jumped at the chance and left on a Tuesday afternoon. We got a good supper and spent the night at their beach house in Murrells Inlet. We set out about 4:30 am and headed 75 miles out to troll for some Dolphin. I told Dewayne I wanted to get some pics of the Sunrise when it started peaking over the water so we stopped along the way to take some pics. Man there is nothing more beautiful than a sunrise over the ocean with all the worlds problems back at shore!

We had a great day of fishing once we got on the fish, it took us a little while to find them but when we did boy it was on. We put 14 in the boat and missed about ten more. I actually hooked something that I never really slowed down. Jason could see him comoing through the water to hit the line and when he hit I fought about 5 seconds and bam he was gone with all my tackle with him. It was fun for sure and we are gonna go back out in a couple weeks to try again.

This is a 35 pound Amber Jack I caught the first time we went out.

I thought this was a cool picture as well so I included it in the blog. This was from the first time we went.

Thanks for reading my blog and I will be back soon with another one, maybe next time I can talk about how the big cars did good. Never the less I will take any kind of final round the Carolina Crew can get to.

Dragwayman Out!

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October 26, 2008

The Drag Racing community has got to be one of the neatest groups of people on this earth. I’m not just talking about one sanctioning body or another….all of Drag Racing. We see examples of this all the time…fellow racers helping racers. Families helping families, because after all….that’s what we are…one big family. Sometimes it may just be lending a hand…tools…parts, even to a racer that you may be paired up with for the next round. The help that Drag Racers offer to others seems to have no boundaries. Nothing is too small or to big. If they have it…they will share it.

I can’t even begin to explain how I feel about what recently happened to me. I’ll try to explain what took place the best I can without getting TOO wordy!

During an ADRL event in Norwalk this past August, I got a chance to “hang out” at the top end with my buddy Roger Richards. I was doing the on-camera work for the show and Roger was the event photographer. We were waiting for the finals to run and got to talking. One thing led to another and he found out that we didn’t plan on racing at the fall Rockingham event – The World Finals. After the season we had….or didn’t have (lol)…it just wasn’t in the budget.

Roger came up with the idea that he would get my friends to sponsor me and write about it in his column on Comp Plus. I was really flattered that he would even think about doing something like that for ME…and well a little concerned that…well….did I have THAT many friends!?!?!

I almost forgot about it as we were on our way to the Amalie North American Nationals in Epping until I received a call that Roger had put the story up and I needed to call him. When I did….I was absolutely FLOORED! Within just a short amount of time…I not only had the money we needed to race Rockingham…but T-shirts for all the friends who were donating and the vinyl to put everyone’s name on my car. By the time Epping was over….we have 3x’s the amount Roger asked for!

WOW!

I wanted to do a little something on this before the event…and well…just not enough time to go around. I want to THANK EACH AND EVERY PERSON….for what they did for me, out of the kindness of their hearts…and for their love of our sport. Some gave much-much more than they needed to….and I don’t know how I can ever thank everyone enough. Some folks…I have never met…and I hope to be able to thank in person someday!

We had plans to get as many out on the starting line when I made a qualifying pass at The Rock…with their “Kathy’s Friend” T-Shirt on….but Mother Nature really messed up the whole weekend.

TO ALL – THANK YOU for making it possible for my husband Kevin and I to attend and race the last IHRA event of the 2008 season. YOU ARE ALL WONDERFUL FOLKS….and I hope I am able to return the favor to each of you someday!

Allen Cook

Bob Unkefer

Bobby – Comp Plus

Brian Spink

Brian Wood

Dale & Laurie Cannister Plus all Vinyl!

Daphne Hague – MOM

Derek Dahl

Doc Riley

Edith Lamonds (Billy Weeks)

Frank Gugliotta

John Farr

John Mason

Kevin & Wendy Sims

Larry Smiley

Larry Sullivan and Rick Green – Fastnews

Mark Madelizzi – Flatout Gaskets

Mike & Kim Buckner

Mike Janis and Crew

Pete DeVita

Roger Richards

Spiro Kontos

Steve Earwood

Steve Hall Plus all T-shirts

Susan Wade – 1320TV.com

Tami Powers

Terry & Rhonda McMillen

Two Anonymous Friends!

Vern Christy

Laurie drove up to Lima…and helped me put all the vinyl on the car

The finished product!

(Below – Just an example of what I will give to each FRIEND + their T-Shirt if they were unable to attend!!)

THANK YOU TO ALL!

….and…THANK YOU as ALWAYS to the fine companies who make all of our racing possible!!

Amalie Oil Company, K&N Engineering, Ohio Crankshaft, Vintage Trailers, Coan Engineering, Moser Engineering, Biondo Racing Products, Hoosier Tire Company, Advertising Edge, Inc, CSR Performance Products, Milodon, Borla Exhaust, Borla Headers, Jet-Hot Coatings, Weld Racing, ARP, Auto Meter, Cannister Motorsports Welding & Fabricating, American Racing Wheels, Performance by Fisher, Inc, Snap-On Dealer Tom “The Tool Man” Hirt Lima, Ohio and Frank Hawley’s NHRA Drag Racing School!