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Hemi Heaven – the Shootout at Indy
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The gathering of the “big dogs” of Super Stock
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By Steve Reasbeck Photos by Steve Reasbeck and Roger Richards |
The first Hemi I ever saw was in 1964. My cousin was wrenching on what was then a brand-new aluminum-nosed Dodge sedan, one of the hundred or so race-only A990 packages produced by Chrysler. The first evening after I saw it, I was invited to accompany the group to Quaker City Dragway in Salem , Ohio , to witness the car and others like it compete. That began a love affair that has lasted to this day. Over the years I watched the pachyderm come of age. I was privileged to witness the birth of the street version, and every time I attended a drag race I made a bee line for the area where the Hemi doorslammers congregated. I was even able to eventually obtain a B body Hemi of my own, which I still own today.
Hemi production reached its zenith when, in 1968, Chrysler announced that a limited number of Hemi A-bodied cars, Darts and Barracudas, would be produced for sanctioned drag racing. No street use was intended, and the initial cars were designed and built in the famous Woodward Garage, which acted as the Chrysler "skunk works." It was an old warehouse - an industrial garage in a back alley, and no one really knew what went on there. There were no computers or other ways of designing back then - it was just cut and weld and hack and move until you made it work. Production was then actually subcontracted to Hurst Corporation, and, to be frank, the cars wound up being rather shoddily assembled. This was of no issue, though, Chrysler expected the serious racers to take them apart and make them right, anyway. Color was limited to white, with the fiberglass fenders and hood were flat black. NHRA first placed the cars in SS/B, allowing for a class above them for the next outrageous combination from Detroit . There were rumors of an all-aluminum big block Camaro coming to fit into SS/A, but that car was never produced, so the Hemi A bodies wound up at the top of the heap, and eventually moved up into A. It wound up being appropriate, because nothing produced, before or since, has ever had the power-to-weight ratio of the compact Mopars. Although factory rated at 425hp, that was widely considered to be a joke. It was common knowledge that a cross rammed Hemi delivered well over 530 hp upon delivery. The big names of the day all received theirs first, Sox & Martin, Dick Landy, Don Grotheer, Ed Miller, and the rest. Where Chrysler had figured the cars would be good for low eleven second time slips, the first cars astonished everyone with mid ten second ETs, right off the bat. They literally hit the ground running, took the Super Stock wars by storm, and never looked back. At their very first Indy Nationals, they did not disappoint, as "Akron" Arlen Vanke won Super Stock eliminator in his Akron, Ohio (hence the name Akron Arlen) Barracuda. Arlen Vanke would go on to dominate the rival American Hot Rod Association that year, becoming its National Champion.
In 1969 Indy was again the stomping grounds of the Hemi cars, but the famous event, however, was not without its controversy, as that was the year of the infamous "Chrysler Nationals". NHRA, at that time, had two means of allowing SS cars to qualify for the eliminator. First, there were class eliminations. All class winners were in. Then, as there was not an index system, they used the National Record system. Those that ran the most under their National Records would also qualify for the eliminator to complete and fill the field. So, Chrysler, noting that the heavy hitters Sox, et al, could run under the National Record at will, decided to rent nearby Muncie Dragway the Wednesday before the event, and conduct their own little event to decide who would get into the big show. They not only did this in SS/A, as in those days Chrysler cars owned Super Stock A through D. The factory drivers were, in essence, ordered to take a dive in class eliminations, allowing one of the slower cars to get into the eliminator, while the “biggies” qualified for the eliminator by virtue of their sub-record qualifying passes. This allowed for the maximum number of Mopars to qualify, which caused great controversy. For weeks and months afterwards, the drag racing media and other sportsman competitors criticized and lamented. This arrangement had also incensed some of the factory drivers, most notably Ronnie Sox. In class eliminations, Sox left on the second yellow of what was then a five yellow tree, just to make it apparent, and allowed Wiley Cossey's California-based Hemi Cuda to win class. The drag racing media of the day had a field day, with editorials and commentary's being written with various opinions of the pros or cons of this arrangement. However, Sox made it all right with the brass by winning the eliminator on Labor Day, defeating the ‘64 Plymouth of Dave Wren. What would Indy be without some controversy?
By 1970, NHRA had seen the writing on the wall and decided to create Pro Stock, a class specifically for heads up, match race doorslammers, and the Hemi A bodies were the natural building platform for many teams to make that transition. By the late 70's, we had the gas crunch, and factory performance stuff was persona non gratta in the real world. Chrysler had pretty much exhausted its factory supply of Hemi parts, and was producing no more. By the eighties, collectors were buying parts as part of their "portfolio", paying big dollars, and the wave of the future was to be turbocharged four cylinders. Automotive thinking of the day considered the Hemi to be as passé' as paisley Nehru shirts and Polyester leisure suits. Considered "dinosaurs", it seemed that interest in the Hemis was on the wane. No one was interested, except the racers. They continued to repair, dig, scratch, and do what was necessary to obtain parts, many times competing with some collector and paying excessive amounts for parts long since "all raced out." Through it all, die hard Hemi Super Stock racers continued to pound the pavement. Racers like Rick Johnson, Jerry Daily, Dean Nicopolis, the ageless Harry Holton, and others continued to carry the torch for the big elephant, pushing the performance envelope further while in many instances racing with parts deemed long worn out by others. A Canadian engine builder, Ray Barton, had continued his R&D on SS Hemi engines, and was becoming closer and closer to cracking the mythical eight-second barrier with his engines. Finally, on a November night in 1998, the deed was done, and the reverberations shocked through the drag racing community. Others quickly followed suit, and other veteran Hemi builders, including Modesto , California 's long-time Hemi ace Harry Holton, continued to compete with Barton and others to push this combination deep into the eights. A production automobile out of production for thirty years and racing with technology that many considered antique, had, over all these years, continued to prove itself as the fastest, quickest, and baddest Detroit hot rod ever built.
In the early nineties, someone at Chrysler looked around and found that despite all of the slick marketing, the turbocharged four cylinder and decal laden econo-boxes had never hit the mark. This same astute individual realized that the Hemi was still, after thirty years, the standard upon which all performance engines were held up to. The name was synonymous with Chrysler Corporation, and a rebirth of sorts took place, as Chrysler decided to reproduce the components needed to build and race this legendary piece. Over the past decade, Hemi pieces have become increasingly available, and even fully assembled "crate" engines became attainable direct from your Mopar dealer. Racers, who for many years had dug through old junk piles looking for parts that still showed signs of life, were now able to obtain virtually anything they needed, new and improved, direct from the original folks who made them. Outside vendors picked up on this rebirth, and Hemi racing now is as healthy as it was three decades ago.
Through it all, the biggest and baddest factory iron of them all continued to raise the bar for doorslammer racers. Despite efforts from the competition to steal the spotlight, the 426 Hemi continues to enjoy legendary status, and is still the standard against which all other production engines are measured. I have always wondered, if, when Tom Hoover and his gang developed the first late model Hemi in 1964 they had any clue of the status it would still enjoy decades later. Throughout the nineties, interest in Super Stock Hemi racing continued to grow at a rapid pace. SS/AA Darts and Barracudas were seemingly built in droves, and Indy, the Nationals, became the natural congregating point for them. Die-hard, old-time Hemi racers mingled with their affluent young protégés to decide who would be the real "National Champion". By the late nineties, a class once deemed dead was enjoying more entries than any other single class in Super Stock racing. The entries continued to grow, where now it is expected to have sixteen, eighteen, even twenty or more competitive Hemi A bodies in Indianapolis over Labor Day weekend.
This brings us to today, this, the Fiftieth Indy Nationals. Several years back, Chrysler Corporation (now DaimlerChrysler), recognizing the legendary status of these ferocious A bodies, decided to post 10K to the winner of SS/AA at Indy, further promoting the engine platform that has helped make the manufacturer famous. NHRA gave them prime time for class eliminations, and retired heroes of the past such as Ronnie Sox and Dick Landy made long journeys to see the latest versions of the cars they made famous compete. Big name Pro Stock and Fuel drivers dropped what they were doing to head to the stands and staging lanes to witness the crowning of the King of the Super Stocks. No, the Hemi is far from dead.
What drives those who race these cars to continue to develop them? What drives them to continue to push the now thirty five year old combination to new levels? To them, it is several things - the magic of racing a Hemi, the powerplant that has assisted drag racing in becoming the big-time sport of today, the notoriety of racing a legend. The simple fact is that the Hemi A bodies are the original macho machine - the bare-knuckled, no nonsense package that was the epitome of American production vehicles. For most, however, it is the chance to compete against other talented racers in equipment that is the biggest, baddest, and quickest that Detroit has ever produced. Most are die hard Mopar folks, but this drive is what has drawn long-time Chevrolet engine builder Charlie Westcott to the class, and pushed seventy plus year old Harry Holton to record setting 8.6, 150+mph time slips. The gathering of these cars each year at Indy is the most important event for these cars of the year, and just to underline its notoriety is the fact that it is the only, single, sportsman category that enjoys its own, exclusive, television coverage. Not even a particular Pro category enjoys its own program. The event is seen as so important that this year, when it seemed that NHRA rules technicality would keep the Harry Holton, Michael Ogburn California based record holders from participating, extraordinary measures were enacted to make sure the cars were there. Those measures included having Jeg Coughlin, Jr., obtain a release from his GM Pro Stock employer to drive Holton's record holding Barracuda at Indy.
The cars are the same, the engines are the same. There is nothing else that fits the class, (except the occasional aluminum-nosed ‘64 Plymouth Belvedere - also Hemi powered), so everyone works with the same combination. There are no horsepower factors, no lobbying to get your combination more favorably factored by the association. There is no Detroit offering ever produced that is quicker and faster. It is simply a meeting of the sharpest, racing the same elite equipment, truly a test to see which one is the baddest. Where will it end? Who knows? I know I speak for many of us, when, thinking back to the time that I saw my first Hemi A body, that I never would imagined that I would be sitting here, almost four decades later, penning a piece on how they still were the kings; still setting the standard; and still the crowd favorite as far as Super Stock racing was concerned. So, like all the rest, I think I will just sit down, relax, enjoy the show, and remember the time honored saying, "The more things change, the more they remain the same".
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