Let's Get Funny Car Circuit Racing Going Again

By James Morgan and Bill Pratt

Jim Libby launches his awesome Camaro alky burner. He needs a wild name and tour to race on!
Photo by James Morgan

All the great nostalgia photos seen online lately have me thinking about the current state of Funny Car racing. Up here in the New England area, we still see some match racing, just alky cars instead of the nitro burners. The current state of NE alky racing is reminiscent of the early '70s nitro shows. It would seem to me that a well-organized alky circuit could keep its members pretty busy. That's if they could get tracks like MIR, E-Town, Atco, Maple Grove, Lebanon Valley, and New England to book a couple of shows a year. Along with those, smaller tracks like Numidia, Oxford Plains, and Island could sign up for one show a year. Throw in a circuit newsletter/newspaper to help build the star names, and it would be 1970 all over again. 

I find it hard to believe that with a little time to build the interest, fans wouldn't flock to see some of the great racing that I'm sure would happen. Oh well, I'm just a dreamer I guess. Here is a shot of one of the many really clean cars we see at New England. I now return you to your regular nostalgia program.

James
james@motorsportunderground.com
www.motorsportunderground.com

We definitely agree with James at the Drag Racing List. The right promotional mag to talk up these guys and gals and this thing could be awesome. How do I know? It's because I would have climbed Mt Everest to see funny cars when I was a kid -- based only on the car names and the mags and the radio commercials -- EVEN BEFORE I ever saw one! I can honestly say that an alky funny would blow me away if I never saw anything else, and many of the folks who would come to these shows may not have seen fuel cars up close. In the mid-seventies, we were blown away by the cars approaching the fives. All the good NE match race funnies can do that. With the right promotion, a circuit could rock! 

I think the Cavalcade of Stars had about ten cars or so... maybe eight. That would be an awesome and very do-able show. There are enough quality cars on this coast (and throughout the country, for that matter) to have a great series. There are enough cars where racers wouldn't have to travel far from home if they didn't want to, but would allow guys who want to travel from Maine to MIR to do it, if they DID want to. I think it would be great. Jim Maher promotes the CIFCA with a lot of success on the West Coast, and he's promoting a 7.50 index class! I think it can be done... I was playing our MRM computer game the other night, racing as an alky funny car. HOLY COW! The number of good alky cars in the country really blew my mind. We would just need to slap some wild names on 'em and get things going again... Who's in?

Bill Naves of Shooting Star alky FC fame wrote an article for us on a similar topic some time ago. Click HERE to read Bill's thoughts...

Bill Pratt
bilden@draglist.com