Draglist.com Drag Racing

New England Dragway BP..(Epping, NH)

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The last run was good enough to enable us to win the event. Received a nice big trophy, and had our picture taken in the winners circle.

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Congrats!!

EDB

Thanks everyone, it sure felt great!

After I settle down, I'll post an official report. For now I can tell you all the car ran beautiful after sorting out a couple of things. I ended up, like Gator said, a new personal best ET of 8.134. The MPH best has yet to be broken of 171, but I was only 2 digits away from tieing it.

The next outing is on Sept. 8th.

Mike I just signed on, CONGRATULATIONS MAN!!!!!

Those are some fantastic passes!! And the win,,,,How cool is that!!

Rapid

Thanks, Mike and Gator! Draglist is updated! bp

Cool deal Mike

Congrats on the good passes and the win!

The weekend of October 25th and 26th proved to be the one we've been waiting for. Finding the "correct" tune-up for one of these beasts can be a bit tricky, and costly, as we proved last season. With the new Robinson's Racing Engine powering the car this year, along with some very good advice from some seasoned veterans, things have been heading in the right direction for us.

The Outlaw 10.5 class was running on Saturday the 25th, and after taking a month off from racing, it was time to finally get a chance to see what the big yellow car would do on a full 1/4 mile track.

Our last race was at the Draglist Nationals out in Eddyville, Iowa. It is a track that has the ability to make the 10.5 tires stick to the starting line no matter what we throw at it. On that day we were able to hit both stages right on the starting line with no tire slippage. At our home track in Epping, New Hampshire the track conditions are a bit different.

After a warm up session to make sure we were ready to let loose, we headed to the staging lanes. It's 10.45am, and the air temps are already in the high 80's. That was to be the last time we were going to see temps in that area as they just went up from there. Made the normal burnout, backed up, purged, nudged into the beams and set the brake. As soon as I saw a yellow light, I let her rip. Whoops, we forgot to reset the nitrous timer from Iowa, and both stages hit blowing the tires off and sending me in the wrong direction and the abort signal was sent from the brain to the foot.

Back to the pits for some maintenance, and we were ready for our second try. The only change to the set-up, was to delay the second stage for 1 second. We headed back to the staging lanes at 12:00 for our second qualifying pass of the day. A check of the starting line temperature read 120 degrees! Air temperature was now in the mid 90's. Another normal burnout, for me, and it was time. With the brake all set, and the RPM sitting at 4000, a flash of yellow is all I needed to see. I let the brake go and the car took off like a bullet! One second later the second stage hit like gang busters stuffing me back in the seat like I have never felt before. When the ignition box sensed 7000 RPM it slammed the shifter into second gear, and I was on my way. Somewhere around the 1000' mark, something happened and both stages of nitrous shut down. That run turned out to be the best pass for the day, stopping the clocks at 8.370 at 164.17. Good enough to get us under the index of 8.49 for the class.

I checked in with the front desk and found out that we were the only car running in Outlaw 10.5 so this was going to be an easy win for us. With that in mind, we decided to treat this day as a test and tune, because no matter what we ran, we were going to be in the winners circle.

Another trip back to the pits for another once over. I suspected that the nitrous relay's may have been the culprit, so that was the only change made, and we headed back for another pass. While checking the information downloaded from the Data Logger, my crew chief noticed an abnormal amount of voltage drop when the nitrous solenoids were on, and suggested we install a second battery I had in the trailer. Unfortunately I didn't have any cables or the hardware needed to hold the second battery in the car, so I had to hope that the problem was in fact the relays.

Our final pass of the day at 4:30 was a repeat of the previous run. This time the solenoids shut down even quicker into the run, and we ended up with a 8.73 at 152.93. The normal altitude for this track is 90' above sea level. With the temps in the high 90's, the corrected altitude was over 4000'! It was time to shut things down, and head over to the winners circle for a photo session. Truth be told, in all my years of racing, I have never been in the winners circle. Even though the win was a given, it still felt great being there in front of that big board.

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Sunday.... Nostalgia Day

We got hit with a rule change as soon as we got thru the gate. No Electronics! No Transmission Brakes! Uh oh. We had a decision to make pretty quickly. Do we re-wire the car to be able to turn on the nitrous timer, or just run test and tune.

We decided on just doing a test and tune.

Thankfully the temps were going to be kind to us today maybe reaching the mid 80's, which also brought the starting line temps down to 102 degrees. Our plan of attack today was to mount that second battery in the car, no matter what. With that completed, we were ready for our assault. After the burnout, and purge, I went into the beams and got ready. The launch was picture perfect, the second stage hit, and everything stayed on!! That pass felt great!! When my crew came up to get me, they asked me how that run felt, did it feel like a 8.13 at 169.83? WOOHOO!! A new personal best ET!!!

Back in the pits, I placed a call to my long distance telephone tuner, as I have done after every pass I make for a little tip. Thanks to Wally Bell for being there. We made one little adjustment as per his suggestion. The car was given the normal between round maintenance, and we sat and waited for our second call.

When the call came out, we were as ready as could be, and headed for the staging lanes. Burnout, purge, ready, set, GO! With that little change in the ignition system the car woke up on the launch. Unfortunately when the second stage hit the car had other ideas and headed in the wrong direction, so the abort signal was once again sent to my foot, and I rode it out. We all agreed that if there were time for one more pass, it would have been the one I've been looking for, that 7 second zone is well within reach.

We have a week off, to do the "at home" maintenance, and have this thing ready for what could possibly be a new personal best on Sept 8th.

A big thank you for the performance to date;

Mike Casella (crew chief)
Mike Rowell (crew member)
Margie Casella (the boss)
Wally Bell (telephone tuner)
Vicky the dog (barking at me when I go to make a run)

Sure was fun!!

Mike

Congrats again Mike. Well done. Here come the seven's.

Mike,

Fantastic report. Congratulations again as well!! There is nothing like standing there in the winners circle for the 1st time,,,Greatest feeling in the world to a racer!

I bet you can't guess which one is Mike. Good Lord, I look like I'm pregnant!!