Hot Rod Drag Week 2021: Day Two

Drag Week faithful cruised almost 400km to front up on day two

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Photographers: Povi Pullinen


Hot Rod Drag Week 2021 is well and truly underway, with racing action a-plenty in Norwalk, Ohio.

Drivers left Michigan’s US 131 Motorsport Park yesterday, making the 246-mile (396km) journey to Summit Motorsports Park for day two of the five-day endurance challenge.

Dave Schroeder remains well-clear of the competition in his wild Unlimited Corvette. He laid down a 6.54@210mph on day two, with a blistering 1.01-second 60ft time. While the ET is a few hundredths slower than Dave’s effort yesterday, it’s a faster mile-per-hour.

Bryant Goldstone had trouble putting down power, leading to a few false starts in his Javelin. His day two best was a 7.12@200mph recorded on his first pass. Though off-pace, it’s enough to keep him in second outright with an average ET of 6.957 seconds.

Expat Swede Mikael Boggren has usurped Joe Barry for third position outright. Mikael’s Volvo wagon is agonisingly close to the six-second mark, turning over a 7.16@198mph timeslip.

Joe scrambled for grip in the Chev, though an 8.84@178mph means he’s still on top of his all-steel, Ultimate Iron peers.

Drag Week’s brutal road legs have already begun to thin the crowd. In total, nearly 30 cars had bowed out by the end of racing on day 2.

Clark Rosenstengel recorded a 7.616@191mph on day one, but hurt his Camaro’s twin-turbo SMX donk in the process. Things got worse on the road out of Michigan, with a broken rocker arm and damaged pistons. Clark and his mates worked valiantly on the dark highway roadside, but were eventually forced to call it quits.

Paul Cornman’s super-tidy 1971 Dodge Demon also retired early. Paul ran an 8.91@149mph at US 131, but didn’t didn’t turn out for day two. The car runs a cranky small-block Mopar, and was taking on the all-engine Super Street Small Block division.

Street Machine Eliminator’s quickest car so far is is Bill Spangler’s 1980 Fairmont. The class features a ten-second cutoff, and is decided by ultra-tight bracket racing on day five. Bill ran a 10.030@132mph yesterday, and a 10.011@133 today.

Rick Steinke’s ‘crewcab’ 1967 Chevelle Malibu is just three thousandths of a second behind Dustin Trance’s Mustang in the Street Race Small Block PA class, with an average ET of 8.512. Rick thrashed hard on the car in the days leading up to DW, reassembling the Dart-blocked Chev after torching a piston last week.

Thomas Rightler resurrected his General Lee replica in June, five years after it was wrecked in a crash. A Chrysler 440, 727 auto, and Dana 60 diff make for a purist Mopar driveline. The General suffered issues with its Holley Sniper EFI on Day One, but Thomas was able to push on after replacing an injector. With a 13.14@102mph under its belt on day two, it’s far from the quickest car on Drag Week, but remains a cool sight on the ‘strip nonetheless.

This wild truck-tractor combo is the brainchild of past Spirit of Drag Week recipient Jesse Madaffari. He’s been a Drag Week regular since 2012 in a John Deere-painted C10, but this year he’s created a true hybrid.

Titled and registered as a 1972 ‘ASVM Trucktor’, it runs the C10’s 496ci in a virtually-untested, custom-made body. Its best pass so far yielded a 12.86@102mph, placing it mid-pack in Street Machine Eliminator. Jesse bolts exhaust stacks onto the flipped headers for road driving.

Codey Helger’s Two-Lane Blacktop tribute ‘55 Chev makes for a mean sight. It’s been incredibly consistent so far, running a [email protected] and [email protected] on day one and two respectively.

There’s still three full days of racing before champions are crowned, and anything can happen. Entrants are now motoring to Lucas Oil Raceway in Indianapolis for day three — a mammoth 290-mile (466km) trek.

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