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Automotive Lifestyle: The Good Ol' Drag Strip

Automotive Lifestyle: The Good Ol' Drag Strip

Samuel Spencer

BIO

Sam is currently a fourth year Journalism major at the University of Cincinnati. He has been a lot technician at a Ford dealership since 2007, where... More

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1,982 views Jul 12, 2010

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Loving cars doesn't have to be reading magazines, memorizing the horsepower of the latest Ferrari or watching videos on Streetfire.net.

There are things going on in virtually every city that are more interesting than a couple of guys in Preludes gathering in a McDonald's parking lot.

It may seem unsophisticated and nauseatingly American, but all car fans should spend at least one evening hanging out at the drag strip. If there is one thing all petrol heads have in common it is a love for speed. What the drag strip shows you is that some love it more than others in fantastic ways.

Plus, it is worth it just to hear the nitrous-injected symphony of noise: tire squeal, V-8 bellows so deep they rattle the ground you stand on, and turbo whistle on par with the whine of a jet engine.

And who doesn't love the smell of burning rubber (especially someone else's rubber) once in a while?

I recently made the journey out to the far west side of Cincinnati to Edgewater Sports Park for their Test and Tune night of open drag races. This being in a very, very rural part of Cincinnati there were countless numbers of fox body Mustangs and old Novas running the strip. And for every Camaro there was a Civic. However, there were also some interesting cars that ran the strip. A Lingenfelter 427 C5 Corvette came out to play. A ridiculous Supra Turbo did a few runs before apparently ruining its clutch. There was even a youngster in a single-cylinder drag car doing some 1/8 mile passes that made his family proud.

The absolute best was the sleeper, of course.

When I first caught a glimpse of an old Ford Fairmont Futura and its faded maroon paint job I did what everyone does to sleepers: I underestimated it. I thought when the light turned green the crowd was going to be treated to the long groans of a V-8 running through an old 3-speed automatic transmission. Eleven seconds later, all I could say was "whoa." The car blasted through a five speed manual transmission with more aggression than almost any other street car on the strip that night.

That is the fun part about the good ol' drag strip. When you go you know you are going to be treated to speed, but the unexpected surprises are always worth the visit.