[Land-speed] Most prolific record setting car #1

[Wester Potter]

If you take two weeks of long hours assembling an engine for a specific 
class and then run it on the salt in a proven car I don't see that to 
be a hollow victory.  I'd be more inclined to say congratulations to 
Dave.  If you want to start on open records and soft speeds you may as 
well go back to the sixties rule book as well when classes were split 
and records retired to give an advantage to "friends".  Check out the 
records Wilford Day set as an example.  Ford funneled a bunch of money 
to some shops to try and break those records and they never succeeded.

I have been friends with Don West since 1951 when I first met him on 
the salt.  I was delighted to find he lived fifteen miles from my home. 
  Over the years he has run a flathead n a '32 Ford coupe (and I was 
happy when he hit 120), among others he built a belly tank lakester 
that ran on the salt, a Chrysler powered '53 Studebaker that actually 
was the first door-slammer over 200, a Corvair with the supercharged 
Chrysler tucked under the windshield and a Firebird with the Chrysler 
power.  After over thirty five years of trying and one "incident" that 
banged him up pretty well he finally got a red hat at a 247 average in 
a Firebird.  He put the car away for years but after the Classic class 
was defined he freshened it up and his son Marty set a record in the 
class at over 260 mph after a couple of frustrating years trying to go 
over 200 in a Monza.  Again I was happy for him.  The car was on the 
Speedweek tee shirt a year ago.  Unfortunately Marty and his brother 
died within a month of each other just over a year ago.