Quote:
Originally Posted by revjimk
I miss "run whatcha brung" full inversion myself.....
That's what got me started back in the early 1960s, Smokey Stover running modifieds (hotrod coupes!) at Eastside Speedway, Waynesboro Va. He started in the back damn near every race (full inversion by points) & won 22 out of 24 races in 1962!
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Run what you brung was during what I consider the golden days of small guy racing.
The variety was unreal and if you really wanted to race pretty much anyone could afford it.
At Flemington the four or so fastest guys always started at the rear and always put on a show getting to the front. Nobody grumbled about being inverted, today if you put the fast guys back they act like your insulting them or ripping them off.
The racing went downhill and tracks closed with the invent of the factory modifieds, especially Grant King mods and Weld cars, cars for wealthy owners and drivers. Besides that the eastern modified owners had to compete with a influx of cocaine money into the sport. I know of two big time cutting edge builders that pretty much helped destroy the sport by having huge pockets of dirty money (both eventually went to jail) but the ball was rolling. Cookie cutters, especially the over priced over engineered cars did nothing but price many guys like me out of the sport and onto motorcycles as we did or maybe finding a different hobby all together. About the same time in the name of outright speed everybody had to go winged, more horsepower needed, more speed equals more money always has.
Anytime I hear a interview of a driver of a dirt car and he says he was keeping the car hooked up and as straight as possible, I know the racing sucked.