For the next three weeks, Torco’s CompetitionPlus.com will conduct its inaugural War Stories Showdown presented by Mach Series Accelerator. The veterans of yarn spinning are paired for what promises to be a series destined to produce the finest behind-the-scenes stories.

Here are the rules –

The field was seeded by reader vote. The participants are paired on the standard NHRA professional eliminations ladder. Each story represents an elimination run for the participant. The readers will judge each war story on the merits of (A) believability and (B) entertainment value. Please do not vote based on popularity. You are the judge and jury and vote accordingly.

Voting lasts for three days per elimination match. Once a driver advances to the next round, they must submit a new war story.

This is an event based on fun and entertainment value, so with that said we’re hoping that we don’t get letters of legal action and a black Crown Victoria in our office parking lot, the latter being directed at Pat Musi and Roy Hill.

This is drag racing with no red-lights, disqualifications and plenty of oil downs minus the clean-ups. Please enjoy as each of our competitors tell their own stories.

December 19, 2007

WINNER!

#2 Qualifier – Bob "Mad Dog" Glidden
WAR STORIES CLAIM TO FAME –Once Impersonated Wile E. Coyote with a Pro Stocker

Championships (from the 1970's) didn’t pay a lot back then, but neither did the races. I have to tell you that I was very fortunate that I finished runner-up in my very first Pro Stock event.

Every time we won a race, we’d buy a new machine for our business. That’s how we accumulated all of our equipment. We also did quite a bit of match races as well.

Thanks to Grumpy Jenkins, we afforded to do what we did by match racing him two or three times a week. That’s how we bought parts and had what we needed to be competitive.

When it came to our three runs, we were fierce competitors. I’ll never forget the first time, I had the chance to run Grumpy. My car was at Hooker Headers and they were making a set of headers. Jenkins walked in and looked at our car and grumbled and said it looked like an erector set. I came out at the next race and finished runner-up.

Over the years, we had all kinds of weird things happen – especially at those match races. I always had the special treat, when we were in our dominating years, of pulling the parachute against him early.

Winning a match race meant more to Jenkins than winning a national event. We were booked into U.S. 30 Dragway one weekend and I caught wind that he was going to bring a big block in that weekend.

I called my buddy Dean Hill, who owned H&H Gas, and told him that Jenkins was bringing in as big motor and I needed something that would make my car run faster.

He promised to mix me up five gallons of something, and gave me the formula on how to mix the stuff up and said, this and that much per gallon.

Who in the heck measures stuff like that?

I used my standard dump it in the tank method. I was free-pouring all the way. I figured everything was measured such that the more I put in, the stronger it will be. In this case, a little dab would have done better.

We went up there and sure enough he had that big block in there. I poured this s&^% in the tank and warmed it up. By the time all of that, whatever it was, got through the line to the carburetor, it sounded like a Top Fueler.

I looked around and thought to myself, ‘What am I going to do now?”

If you’re a drag racer, you accept the fact that some rides are going to be more exciting than others. I don’t think much could have prepared me for that first run.

I got up there with this thing, cackling and popping and do a burnout. By this time, the crew is telling me that I have fire coming out of the headers.

I just sat there and braced for the green light.

So, I dumped the clutch on this thing and it screams like a banshee and it goes every which way but straight. I’m holding on for dear life with this flame-throwing Ford. That was probably a 1970s impersonation of a Pro Modified because that car went out with the front wheels up, came down, driving it sideways – off the track and back on. There was no way I was lifting. It was like riding a bucking bronco.

I guarantee that crowd at U.S 30 got more than they paid for that night and Jenkins, probably got the $%^# scared out of him.

We went out there on that first run and when I let the clutch out, it absolutely smoked the tires on the car. Somehow or another, I ended up in Jenkins lane. He had to drive around me, get back in his lane and won the round.

But, I’ll promise you one thing, that was the most entertaining round he ever won.

#15 Qualifier – Steve "The Wood in Denswood" Earwood
WAR STORIES CLAIM TO FAME –  Been There Done That, Got The T-shirt (Lots of them)

 
Of all the promoters and track operators I have met and have worked with in my 35-year career , Norman “Moose” Pearah of Louisiana would by far be remembered as the most enterprising, if not entertaining. 

Of his numerous attempts to pull off that one big promotion we all dream of that will fill our racetracks and our pockets, the motorcycle jumper he promoted in the early seventies would be the most amusing. How ironic with the recent death of Evel Knievel that this particular show comes to mind. In order to protect the innocent and to keep the libel lawyers at bay, I’ll refrain from using the young man’s name who is the subject of this tale.

This fellow shows up at Moose’s State Capitol Dragway near Baton Rouge wearing a metal flake leisure suit and tells Moose, “I’m gonna break Knievel’s record for jumping cars.” 

Moose inquires, “What makes you think you can jump over 23 cars?” 

Leisure suit says, “We done an analysis by computer on the thing.”

Seeing an opportunity to make headlines and to draw a crowd, Moose booked the young man and influenced a local Ford dealer to provide 25 Mercury EXP sub-compact cars, a very narrow car made by Ford Motor Company that saw few sales.

The big day comes and Moose packs the joint, probably more folks on hand than we annually drew to the NHRA Cajun Nationals. Being the enterprising promoter he was, Moose opened a betting window at his main, and only, concession stand and took bets on which car our jumper would hit.

The jump was scheduled at 8 p.m. and by 9 p.m. the packed house, made up of mainly over- served Cajuns enjoying Moose’s $1.00 a can Schlitz beer, began to get a bit rowdy and were demanding to see "The Jump". The star of the show was holed-up in a little pull along camper trailer getting “psyched up” for the jump.  As the crowd became more demanding and intoxicated, Moose rather loudly beat on the camper door and yelled, “Son, this crowd’s gonna kill you, and worse, want their money back if you don’t come out and jump!”

The door finally opens and out of a heavy cloud of marijuana smoke staggers our hero and he mumbles, “Moose, I’m gonna do it”.

He jumps on his first pass up the ramp, and if you had bet on car number four you would have been a winner as he hit numbers 4, 5, 6, 7 and finally slid off number 8.

He got out of the hospital about nine months later and briefly considered Moose’s proposal to come back on a three-wheeled bike to attempt another record.  He considered it, but finally called one day and  said, “Moose, listen, I talked to the Lord and the Lord says ‘Don’t do it’.

A good piece of advice I always thought.

Shame he didn’t try an encore, as I am sure another performance would have outdrawn Moose’s “All The Crawdad Heads You Can Suck” contest, but that’s another story.

VOTING COMPETED - (W)Glidden (655) def. Earwood (504).

#7 Qualifier – Pat "I'll Take You Out" Musi
WAR STORIES CLAIM TO FAME – Once Reportedly Dropped An M-80 In A Porta-Pot Occupied By Bob Glidden

I’m starting out with this story because this kind of thing is what happens to me on a regular basis.

I go to Curacao because I had a best two out of three match race booked. I was racing this guy from Venezuala and I was warned ahead of time to watch him because he was crazy in the burnout.

Sure enough, I did my first burnout and there he comes over in my lane. Now I have to watch everything he does from this point on. I have to let the clutch out first because if I don’t and he gets out ahead of me, then he’s coming over into my lane. Getting the scenario here? I had to win the race, but I didn't really feel like getting killed that day by the car or otherwise. I had to win the event and do it convincingly.

I went up and had a .420-something light and he’s way late. Thank goodness I did my job. He was about a .520. I beat him with a 7.00 to a 7.50. A 7.00 was about as fast as that car would go. The track was real tricky. Everybody went crazy because Curacao beat Venezuala. That was good. It was especially good for me.

I had already made my game plan for the second run. If he went red, which they typically do when they are really late, then I’m pushing the clutch in. The guy had already sent a message that he’s beating me, he didn’t care what he had to do. But I didn’t learn about this until afterwards.

We go out there and he goes red. I was right on top of him and watching him from the corner of my eye. I ran for another few seconds and I lift. I don’t even see him. I get to the finish line, pull the parachutes and I am coasting at 1320 feet. At 1,600, I’m still coasting.

At 1,600 feet, this SOB comes by me, wide open throttle and nitrous blazing out of the headers. I said, Holy $%&(, his throttle is stuck!”

It wasn’t his throttle was stuck, he was running me from the finish line to the sand box. Now, I am in the right lane, here he comes by me and locks the brakes once he passes. All four wheels on his car are smoking. It’s pitch black in the shutdown area and I’m trying to get this car shutdown that I’m in. He’s in my lane now, directly in front of me. I went next to the wall and thankfully he went all the way to the other lane. Shot across my lane again, took the front end off of the car and this SOB is on fire and throwing off sparks from skidding. My car is stopped and I run over to make sure he is okay.

I get over to this SOB and he’s laughing at me and saying, “I beat you!”

I’ve been racing these cars for over thirty years, sometimes upside down and on fire but this is the first time that anyone had ever raced me from finish line to the sandbox.

I had taken Sonny Leonard with me for the first time to see this. He wanted to see the island and the racing. I went over to Sonny and asked him if he was ever coming back. This is his direct quote, “I’d rather wear a pork chop suit in a lion’s den than to mess with you guys ever again.”

 
WINNER!
#10 Qualifier - "Animal" Jim Fuerer
WAR STORIES CLAIM TO FAME – Once Drove World's Fastest Mercury Zephyr

Bill Kuhlmann and I were booked in to do a match race deal at Beaver Springs, Pennsylvania. We were running the Super Circuit back then, and had been at Maple Grove in Reading, Pennsylvania the night before.

Anyway, Kuhlmann and I are there to because that was in the formative days of Pro Mod and we were in big demand for match racing.

The track at Beaver Springs was a pristine little place – it was kinda old, you know, but they had it all painted up real nice and everything. Of course, it was surrounded by mountains and forests -being up there in that part of Pennsylvania. The track was real narrow, and right at the end there was a big bunch of huge trees and thick woods.

Kuhlmann and I made our run, and as we’re wrapping up our chutes at the top end, I see this guy come out of the timber and come walking kinda stiff-legged towards us from the very far end of the track. As he gets closer, I can see he’s a racer from his torn-up fire suit. He’s as white as a ghost, you know, all scratched up and shaking so much he can hardly talk. “Where the hell did you come from, “ I asked him. “He just turned and pointed to the forest out beyond the sand trap.

‘Out there,’ was all he said at first. He took a few deep breaths, looked at Bill and I and said, “I ran my Super Gas car down through here about half an hour ago, and I couldn’t get stopped at the end of the track. I didn’t want to put it in the sand trap, so I tried to steer around it, hit an embankment and the car went airborne.’ Seeing that he wasn’t hurt, Bill and I broke out laughing hysterically.

We just about died when we went down to have a look for ourselves a little later, though. There was this Mustang II totally wedged in the trees about head high – the poor guy launched himself up there and couldn’t get out. Nobody missed him, and they sent us down on our pass not knowing that he was up there, struggling to climb out the window between all the branches. As far as I know that car is still wedged up in that stand of trees – I don’t think that guy ever went back to get it – he probably never raced again. His Mustang is probably a condo for crows or something now.

VOTING COMPETED - (W)Fuerer (427) def. Musi (353).

TOMORROW'S COMPETITION: Tom McEwen versus Don Schumacher; Shirley Muldowney versus Roy Hill