[Land-speed] Salt clips. 1

[Wester Potter]

Set up day on Sunday was a hurry up and wait situation for the  
inspection area.  The lines were LONG but they moved cars through at a  
nice pace.  There were four or five lanes with swarming inspectors for  
cars that had been there before and one or two for new cars.  These  
were fed by two long lanes of waiting cars, vans, trucks, trailers,  
with a rainbow of race cars in between.  As warm as it was, the  
temperature wasn't a killer.  The sheer volume of entrants was a  
greater problem but handled smoothly as much as I could tell.  The  
smattering of chatter I heard was mostly about those with new cars who  
had ignored parts of the build rules and refused to accept rejection  
for unsafe areas.  Log books were to be ready with all the proper  
papers in place before you advanced the 60 yards to a slot for  
inspection.

Seth Hammond's new lakester was the talk of the day.  Longer, smooth,  
subdued Chip Foose designed paint job, the canopy is attached the same  
way it was on the old lakester but that is about the only visual carry  
over,  The car is impressive.  You can tell that Seth has been  
thinking and brought his ideas to the construction because everything  
came together so well.  His first run in the car got them onto the  
long course for the rest of the week.

Rick Vesco had the Turbinator on display but they ran the 444 car, now  
in it's 51st year of racing on the salt.  Running a Chev engine.  It  
sounded strong yesterday on the course and Rick was pleased.

Burkland"s 411 will run this week but yesterday it was just on the  
carrier.  Tom was crewing for Rex Svoboda who had a good first run in  
his new Saabstory comp coupe.  He caused a bit of excitement when he  
backed out at the end of the run and the car fishtailed violently at  
speed.  Rex is getting used to a new drive train on the front engined  
car and didn't dis-engage a portion in his shut down sequence.  Driver  
error this time but I'll bet he won't forget again.  The chopped Saab  
99 body and extended front, the front wheel drive layout really allows  
lots of room to reach things.  Rex did a nice job on the car and you  
can tell he talked to Tom a lot.

Sparky arrived after noon yesterday after losing two tires on the  
trailer getting to the salt.  We accused him of sleeping in on Sunday  
morning.  He cleared inspection late yesterday and returned to his pit  
next to Skip and mayf on the far north end of the long, long pits.