[Land-speed] A "Rat's Pix" page from World of Speed

[Ray Buck]

I'm back home for the moment.  I left the salt around 5 pm 
Friday.  It's 10:30 now.  I transferred the files from the laptop to 
the main box and threw a quick web thingie together:
http://www.chevyasylum.com/lsr/bsf2009/wos/pix/Welcome.html

It was a hard workin 2.5 days.  And it ain't gonna get a lot easier 
for about 10 days.  Rolex Grand-Am tomorrow, then back to the salt 
for the Shootout.  I might get a half-day off if they take extra time 
to set that up.

There were several records broken, but I really didn't have time to 
get into the speeds/records.  I was pretty much on my own, since the 
owner of landracing (Seldom Seen Slim, aka Jon Wennerberg, for whom I 
was working) was busy getting his wife, Nancy into the 200 mph club 
on a Hayabusa.  She ran 204 today (I missed the run cuz I took a 
potty break...dammit!) and has to run 206 tomorrow to break the 
record over 200.  It's a slightly strange deal, but that's the way they run it.

There were a few scares...the worst one was Bob Johnson in his Caddy 
XLR-S (I think) who had broken the C/Gas Modified Sports record at 
Speed week and was trying to get the Fuel record by adding a little 
nitro to the mix.  He'd just run 257 to qualify for the record and 
all he had to do was stop, turn around, go to impound and repeat it 
the next morning.  However, he didn't expect the chute to lift the 
ass end of the car off the ground.  When that happened, the front end 
dug in and it flipped end-over-end several times.  Bob, the owner, 
builder and driver of the car was hung upside-down in the harness cuz 
it landed on its lid.  When they got him out, all he had was a bloody 
nose...probably from hangin like that for a few minutes before the EV 
guys got there.  Tom Shannon (friend of mine from Miller's and USFRA 
for years) was the first one on the scene, but he didn't wanna let 
him out of the harnesses until he had some help.  But I was real 
happy to shake Bob's hand later that evening and see that he was up, 
walking around and bitching cuz he couldn't back up the 
record.  Oh...and that he had a wrecked race car.

There were a fair number of blown motors, some of which oiled things 
down a bit (most of it seeps into the salt, not like asphalt) and a 
few spins.  There were also some of the craziest vehicles (and I use 
the term loosely) running on the 130 mph Club course.  Karts, street 
luges (one ran on the long course at over 150 mph...with the driver 
lying on his back) and various and sundry other wheeled things.

I gotta get some sleep.

Ray