Maybe the sportswriter at the Del Rio, Texas, newspaper was being facetious long ago when he typed the identification lines under the photograph of a father and his son.

It said: Buddy Bradshaw, 1972 Pro Stock world record holder, and Alan Bradshaw, future record-holder, 2002. 

Alan Bradshaw was four years old at the time.  “I had my dad’s helmet on my head and it was sitting on my shoulders,” Bradshaw says now.

Then again, maybe the sportswriter had an unobstructed view of the future. 

By 2003, Alan Bradshaw did record-setting one better.  He was NHRA’s Lucas Oil Top Alcohol Dragster world champion driving an A-Fuel dragster.  Five years later Bradshaw realized his ultimate goal – to contend for the Top Fuel championship. Maybe the sportswriter at the Del Rio, Texas, newspaper was being facetious long ago when he typed the identification lines under the photograph of a father and his son.

It said: Buddy Bradshaw, 1972 Pro Stock world record holder, and Alan Bradshaw, future record-holder, 2002. 

Alan Bradshaw was four years old at the time.  “I had my dad’s helmet on my head and it was sitting on my shoulders,” Bradshaw says now.

Then again, maybe the sportswriter had an unobstructed view of the future. 

By 2003, Alan Bradshaw did record-setting one better.  He was NHRA’s Lucas Oil Top Alcohol Dragster world champion driving an A-Fuel dragster.  Five years later Bradshaw realized his ultimate goal – to contend for the Top Fuel championship.

After driving partial seasons in 2006 and 2007 for Bill Miller, the racing chiropractor from Odessa, Texas, is at the controls of Dexter Tuttle’s Vis Viva Living Force Energy drink dragster for the full 24-race season. 

Now 39, Bradshaw can savor the experiences, the arduous march up the competitive ladder, with his eye never having left the eventual target.  Reaching the top rung “has been a learning process,” he said.  “I never thought in my life it would take this long to get this far.  I learned to never say never.”

He admits to inheriting his father’s racing genes and helping his dad work on his race cars from the time he learned how to walk and ride a tricycle.  The precocious youngster even persuaded his dad to let him do fire burnouts on his tricycle.  “I remembered seeing pictures of Tommy Ivo doing fire burnouts in his dragster and I finally talked my dad into pouring some Berryman’s B-12 on the back tires of my tricycle and setting them on fire. I’d do fire burnouts like Ivo did.

“I’ve been involved in drag racing since I was a very young child.  It literally has been an evolution all the way from tricyles to Top Fuel and everything in-between.  There’s a picture of me on my website (www.alanbradshaw.com) that shows me sitting in my dad’s lap next to his race car wearing high-top baby boots, a diaper and white t-shirt, covered in grease with a smile on my face as big as Texas.”

Ever mindful that a drag racing career may not carry consistent financial rewards – enough to feed a family of three and provide a comfortable lifestyle – Bradshaw wisely put racing aside for a while to earn a Doctor of Chiropractic degree in 1992.  He’s built a solid practice in Odessa and now finds his vocation and avocation vying for his complete attention.

Like, how can he be in two places at once?

“I’m not sure,” Bradshaw answered. “I was telling one of my buddies the other day that it’s almost like my primary bread-winner has become a thorn in my side because of conflicts with scheduling and priorities involving my racing and my chiropractic careers.  I am totally committed to my patients, but since Vis Viva came on board and Dexter hired me, I have been 110 percent sold out to them as well making sure everything has been done and anything they needed was accommodated.  And I am going to continue that commitment to all of them – my patients and the race team.

“In order to meet the demands of my private practice I’ve pulled in another doctor who is a good friend and colleague of mine.  He is coming in on the latter part of the work week to finish what I can’t get done while I’m gone.  That helps out.  It’s an expensive venture to bring in a part-time doctor because most of them have day jobs anyway, so when you take them away temporarily you have to make it worth their while.  But that’s my commitment to Dexter, Vis Viva and to my professional racing career.  Whatever it takes, we are going Top Fuel racing and nothing is getting in the way.”

He is able to fulfill that opportunity all the while very cognizant of drag racing’s capricious nature.

“We are in the top five (chiropractic) practices in Odessa,” Bradshaw said. “There are 18-to-20 chiropractors in town and I could probably make the top three if I was able to commit 100 percent of my time to private practice.  But at this point, I have a very healthy practice that provides a nice way of living for my family, and that’s important, and it allows me the opportunity to chase my dream of Top Fuel drag racing.

“Drag racing is high up on the pedestal but, meanwhile, I have to respect the fact that the world of drag racing and motorsports in general can be very fickle – especially when you are not the team owner and bread winner of the team.  I must respect that and protect my interest here locally as a chiropractor and take care of my patients and all the people here who care about me. 

“I just have to keep everything in check.  Drag racing is my passion and I would like nothing more than to make a living doing what I love the most, which is drag racing. But we live in the real world and right now chiropractic is my primary bread-winner and for now and I’m okay with that.”

It’s easy to understand Bradshaw’s passion considering it has been burning inside him since he was 2.

“I know it sounds corny and people may call it a cliché, but I was born to race,” Bradshaw said.  “I think it is definitely genetic, definitely a learned passion as well because I grew up going racing with my dad all my life.  It’s just a part of me that can’t change.

“Some people live to go fishing; some people live to go on vacations.  I live to race cars and every decision I’ve made in life was to reach that goal.”

Bradshaw’s dream season continues this weekend at Phoenix.  He’s tied for ninth (34 points) after one race. He qualified sixth at Pomona but fell victim to tire smoke in the first round. 

“I feel very fortunate and truly blessed that Bill Miller, Dexter Tuttle, and now Vis Viva have given me the fortitude to go out and compete against the top drivers when there are many (other drivers) out there that could’ve been chosen.  I feel really fortunate.”

And that sportswriter a long time ago turned out to be a pretty good seer.