Surprise Record at San Fernando 67

By Mark Hendon

It was just a few weeks after the 67 March Meet when dad and I did another doubleheader drag weekend. We had gone to Lions the night before and decided on Sunday morning to go to San Fernando for some more drag action. Do you get the idea my dad was into the drags? We left our Van Nuys home and went to have breakfast at a classic old diner in the city of San Fernando then from there we drove the 10 minutes to the track. It was your typical race at the "pond." The stockers ran like crazy from 9 to noon and then it was three hours of "hot car" action from 12 to 3.

Getting to the point of all this, a milestone was set. Burbank's Phil Tadlock driving the Tadlock & Vann "unblown" single-engine Chevy dragster raced to an 8.05 at 200.44. The 1st unblown pass over 200. Pretty impressive stuff. Then if my memory is right it was somewhere about 2:45 with just 15 minutes left to run and the Top Fuel final set to go, Tadlock backed it up with a 198 run. Did not sink in to me until my dad pointed out the significance of the run. I think "Wild" Bill Alexander won Top Fuel that day. On the way home we stopped at Bob's Big Boy for some double-decker burgers and those malts in the "silver" goblets. Another sweet memory of the good ole days.