Bobby Tapia’s Low ET Double of ‘64

By Mark Hendon

One of the early great racers of the ‘60s pulled a rare double in 1964. This superb racer was one Bobby Tapia. For those of you who say “who is Bobby Tapia?” He was one of "the" top dogs in the nation’s toughest Top Fuel region, southern California. Just a little background on Bobby but not too in depth: In 1957, he had a 57 Chevy 2-door that won 13 weeks in a row at Lions. That’s 13 weeks in a row, folks. In 1958, in his second stint in dragsters, he won 50 out of 52 middle eliminator races at Lions. He made the “Standard 1320" list of record holders three times in 1958. In 1961 thru 1963, he served his country; then in ‘64 he was back burning rubber in an AA/FD.

Here comes the story of the "double." In October of 1964, the most famous and "the" greatest drag strip of all time, Lions Drag Strip, held their anniversary race. At around 10:00 a.m., Bobby Tapia, driving the famous "PEGASUS" dragster, ran an 8:10 ET. The track that day was slick as snot and greasy. Sometimes the bite was difficult. Bobby and crew said, “Let's bail” and loaded up and drove the 40 miles or so to Fontana Drag City to run the car. They set low ET at Fontana at 7.54. They made it through a tough 16-car field at Fontana to race the awesome digger of Bob Downey in the A&W Root Beer car. They lost the final to Downey and while doing it, Tapia lost the clutch and hurt his foot. No big deal for Bobby; no hospital trip needed. After the race, he called over to Lions and found that his 8.10 had held up for low ET. Nobody got even close to it.

It was one of those "duel in the dew" races at lions. Tapia was one of the first guys to run two tracks in one day and set quick times at two tracks.

Then in a race my dad and I would never forget, Bobby was the winner of the first race at Orange County International Raceway in Larry Stellings’ super looking fueler. Bobby Tapia and the "PEGASUS" were very, very tough to beat at San Fernando Raceway and Lions at the time. Just another story of some great Southern Cal racing action. Can you just picture that there were "that" many racing options in California back then? One of my first races at San Fernando was watching Bobby Tapia just work over a quality field of cars on a Sunday afternoon at "the Pond."

Great times indeed in the "golden era" of drag racing. Dad really loved watching this fine driver burn rubber. Dang good stuff.

Mark Hendon