Roadkill (2012–2020): Season 1, Episode 9 - Surviving HOT ROD Drag Week! - full transcript
On this episode of Roadkill, HOT RODs David Freiburger and Mike Finnegan hit the road with 500 of their friends for Drag Week. Its the most brutal test anywhere of real drag-racing, ...
- On this special episode of Road Kill,
we're going on a drag racing road trip
with 500 of our friends.
(car engine)
(squealing tires)
(rock music)
- This is Road Kill,
which is the show where
normally we are out there destroying
ourselves for your entertainment,
this time, we're going to force other guys
to wreck themselves.
It's Hot Rod Drag Week,
where we take 180 drag cars,
some of them with like 2,500 horsepower,
we make them run five
drag strips in five days
and drive 1,400 miles.
There is major wreckage involved.
- I don't know why anybody listens to us.
I wouldn't have agreed to that.
- And they're doing it all for a jacket.
- Suckers.
- Watch these chumps.
(car engine)
(upbeat music)
- This is Tulsa, Oklahoma, day one.
Registration and class
inspection and test and tune.
- [Voiceover] Drag Week
started claiming victims
before we even started racing.
I was interviewing Bob
Larson about a broken axle
on his car when I heard an awful noise.
- You done broke that right in half.
(engine rumbling)
I heard a turbo car
spooling up for a launch
and then an ugly noise.
- [Voiceover] We ran
over to find Doug Klein's
Camaro smashed.
Luckily, the only thing really
damaged was Doug's pride.
The sheet metal and front suspension
took the brunt of the
hit, but he was fine.
The cause of the accident was a
leaking intercooler reservoir that
threw water on the track
in front of his rear tires.
It cast a small cloud over the event
because we really hadn't
even started racing yet.
(car engine rumbling)
- [Voiceover] This is Tulsa Raceway Park
where we're going to start
and end Drag Week this year.
We stopped here last year and the traction
was just so killer that
we had to come back.
(engine roaring)
- [Voiceover] Larry
Larson has won Drag Week
four times in his '66 Nova,
so he knows what he's doing.
It'll be real interesting to see if he can
stay ahead of the pack this year.
(engine roaring)
- [Voiceover] Wow, Larry just ran a 6.94,
the quickest pass he's ever run,
and the quickest pass anyone's ever done
at Hot Rod Drag Week.
- The '55 Chevy over
there in the right lane,
the guy that owns it built it in 1970.
Made his own straight axle for it.
It's been in moth balls ever since.
His kid just talked him
into dragging it out
and they're doing Drag Week together
for the first time ever.
(engine roaring)
I forgot about that.
The one thing his kid asked him to change
was the clutch 'cause it's 30 years old.
Dad didn't change it.
That's what I smell right now.
Bye bye clutch.
- [Voiceover] Todd Maschmeier
has won the modified
Power Adder class before
in his 1968 Camaro
and he's back again with Travis Gilpin
behind the wheel to defend the title.
(engines roaring)
- [Voiceover] Oh, yeah,
look at the wagon go!
- The Camaro went 7.79 at 179,
that station wagon just
went 8.37, one turbo.
- [Voiceover] This is Jeff
Lutz and his twin turbo '57
Chevy and he's run Drag
Week with us for a few years
and that's what's going
to give him an edge here.
Not only is the car capable of the ET's
he needs to run to catch
up with Larry Larson,
but he knows what it's
like out there on the road.
He is going to be prepared for anything.
(engine revving)
Lutz showed us what he's
got with a 7.16 at 212
miles an hour, the fastest mile an hour
we've ever seen at Drag Week.
We'll see if he can hold
this thing together.
- [Voiceover] Repairs were
already underway in the pits
as racing came to an end on day one.
We spotted Jeff Lutz getting his
welder out of his trailer to
help a few other competitors.
(welding machine rumbles)
We were just about to leave.
Everybody's tired, hot, hungry,
when Jeff Lutz fired up his '57 Chevy
and heard something he didn't like.
Jacked up the car, crawled under it,
found a broken torque converter bolt.
Doesn't have the bolt,
but he's going to limp it
to the next track with five out of six.
Five out of six ain't bad.
It's four P.M., we've been here since
about eight in the morning.
This is the mess that happens
in the pits afterwards
as everybody packs everything they've got
to go drag racing into a little trailer.
Racing's done, we're heading for Texas.
- [Voiceover] We left Tulsa and headed
to the nearest gas station.
And wouldn't you know it,
after a couple of unlimited
racers topped off their tanks,
the station ran out of gas.
- So the wagon's overheating.
So they bought a garden sprayer,
filled it up full of water.
The passenger's going to pump
the thing while they drive
and a little hose is going to shoot water
at the front of their radiator.
Hopefully to cool it off
while they're driving.
When that doesn't work,
they'll take the hood off
like I told them to.
(engine rumbling)
- [Voiceover] 14 hundred miles doesn't
seem like that big of a
deal for a regular car,
but you put a serious
street strip car in traffic
and suddenly overheating
becomes a real issue.
Not 20 miles outside
of Tulsa, we found cars
dropping like flies, overheated
on the side of the road
in 90 degree temperatures.
- It's 8:40 at night,
we've been on the road
maybe five, six hours.
We've gone a total of 40 miles.
We just stopped under an overpass
and found Schroeder and
his buddy from Canada
and their '66 'vette
on the side of the road
with a dead battery.
So, they're fixing that right now
while I'm sitting here taking
pictures of their misery.
At the rate we're going,
we're going to get
to the track tomorrow when it opens
and we're probably not sleeping tonight.
- We've got some beers here,
so we need just ice. (laughs)
- [Voiceover] Another
20 miles down the road,
another broken car.
This time it's Todd Maschmeier.
He hit the bridge with his car,
took out the crossmember to the motor,
smashed the oil pan, the transmission pan.
Now he's got a welder to fix it.
(rock music playing)
- [Voiceover] Before the night was over,
we caught up with Shawn
Fink and Brian Macy
who were having a big of
charging system issues
with their panel wagon.
- That's our new alternator.
It kind of keeps up until
you go slow and then
not so good, but hopefully
we make it through.
- [Voiceover] And by the way,
the hood was off the car.
(rock music)
- [Voiceover] Day two of Hot Rod Drag Week
finds us in Ennis, Texas
at Texas Motorplex.
(engines roaring)
There was a new class this year called
Super Street Power Adder and
what's interesting about it
is that we make the small
blocks and the big blocks
run together.
Rick Prospero's got the '65 Nova wagon
with a turbo big block
and Tim Reed brought
back his '79 Pinto
that has a turbo LSX GM
small block in it.
Both of these cars are
capable of running 7.90's.
- [Voiceover] Tim Reed
has gone as fast as 8.005
here at Drag Week in his '79 Pinto.
His goal is to get into the sevens.
He is that close, so we came
over to give him an interview
and his dad Al is polishing the wheel
and the steering doesn't look great.
What's happening?
- (laughs) Well, Sunday we broke the uh...
He did a big wheelie and broke the rack
so we've been fighting it
the last couple of days.
- [Mike] He broke the oil pan too, huh?
- And broke the oil pan.
- [Mike] Alright, so I imagine Tim's off
trying to get some steering parts?
- Yeah, yeah, he's at the
O'Reilly's getting the parts.
- [Mike] Are you guys going to make
another hit on it today?
- Yeah, we're going to
try to make two more hits.
The wax job I'm putting on it, you know,
is going to make it a little slicker.
So that ought to get that half a second.
- [Mike] Oh, yeah, that's
like race stickers.
That's good for ten or 20
horsepower right there.
Awesome, alright, well, good luck.
- Hey, thank you man.
- We'll see you later.
(engine roaring)
- [Voiceover] Tim Reed
finally got his Pinto
into the seven's with a 7.99 second pass
and then Rick Perspero
answered with his own
seven second pass, A 7.93.
(engines roaring)
The question is, can Rick keep it together
for the rest of Drag Week?
Dodge Ram, single turbo on a Viper motor
went 9.09 at 148 yesterday.
Today, not so good.
What happened fellas?
- Blew a head gasket.
- [Mike] Blew a head gasket?
What did you do, up the boost some more or
was it just time for it to go?
- It was the same, I just
think it was time for it to go
so it's got about 50 dyno pulls in it and,
but we just, I mean, we
got a dyno last week and
so it's fresh, very fresh combination.
- [Mike] Cool, did you guys find a gasket
to replace it?
- [Dominique] Yes, sir.
- [Mike] Cool, going to
make another hit today
or just fix it and hit the road?
- If we can get back on
the road, I'd be happy.
- [Man] Yeah.
- [Mike] Alright, cool, good luck guys.
[Voiceover] What they thought was just
a blown head gasket turned
out to be a torched head
and block and since V10 parts
are hard to come by in Tulsa,
the Dodge was out.
- Dad's bringing his son an
axle for his eight and 3/4
Dodge rear end.
Going in his old Ram pickup.
How's that for service?
So did you guys get to make a lap today?
- Made one, but it was
about two seconds off
due to the set backs.
- [Mike] So how quick can you guys do this
'cause it looks like
you've done it before.
- [Man] Hopefully, we'll be
done here in about 20 minutes.
- [Mike] 20 minutes for
an axle change, I like it.
Clock's ticking, go for it.
Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick...
How much nitrous?
- [Man] Oh 150 shot, correct?
- [Mike] 150 shot?
That's a crappy axle if
I ever saw one. (laughs)
Nice work, Dodge.
Call it experience, call it luck,
call it being a general bad ass,
but Larry Larson makes this look easy.
We just talked to him and found out
he had all kinds of problems himself.
Pulled over by the cops, got lost,
left the hotel this
morning, got a flat tire.
And then on his first hit, broke a sprag
in his Lenco transmission, so
he's got some repairs to make
and he's definitely
got to make another run
'cause he knows everybody
else is gunning for him.
(engine roaring)
- [Voiceover] Despite last
night's roadside troubles,
Maschmeier's Camaro
goes 7.68 at a buck 81.
- We're standing here with Todd Maschmeier
and Travis Gilpin after
your pretty much epic pass.
Last night, this car was
strewn out all over the highway
like a yardsale, what happened?
- We were outside of
Muskogee and hit a big bump
in the road and knocked
the crossmember out
and knocked a big hole
in the transmission pan.
Some very nice people come to save the day
and rescued us.
Brought a welder and a generator
and we sit there for about
two and a half, three hours
and got it fixed.
Got back on the road,
struggled to get here,
got, well, we didn't even
go to sleep last night.
- What did it go, 4.99 to half track?
- 4.99 to the eight, yep.
Went 1.2864 which is our
best sixty foot too, so.
- So, hit the road now,
make it to the next stop?
- That'll be it.
- That's the plan.
- Alright, good luck fellas.
- Thank you, man.
- Thanks.
- [Voiceover] In pro
street naturally aspirated,
we've got two time winner Doc McEntire
coming back with his '68 Camaro.
Naturally aspirated, this
car has almost run an eight
and that's his goal for this week.
(engine roaring)
- [Announcer] 121 at the
eighth mile, McEntire
get it flat footed goes
8.92 and a three, baby.
- Congratulations, man.
- Thank you.
- How did the pass feel?
- Beautiful, 1.23 and a sixty.
- Nice.
You picked up a whole bunch.
- You can't believe the timing curve
I built for that to run that.
- [Mike] Really? It's Aggressive?
- [Doc] No
- [Mike] Soft?
- [Doc] Soft
- [Mike] And it didn't
blow the tires off finally.
- [Doc] Yep, it was perfect.
- [Mike] Wow, less is more, nice.
It's about time you did your job.
(laughing)
You going to hit the road or?
- [Doc] Yeah, I'm done, man.
- [Mike] Alright
- Going to nurse it along, get to Friday
and see if I can get that third jacket.
- [Mike] Awesome.
- [Voiceover] With the rest of the class
more than a second off his pace,
all Doc McEntire's got to do now
is finish Drag Week and he'll take the win
in pro street naturally aspirated.
- Day two of Drag Week kicked off
with my favorite Canadian, Dave Schroeder.
You've been here before with a '55 Chevy
looking like the two lane black top car,
I loved it.
This thing off the trailer was an animal.
How quick did you go on day one?
- Yeah, day one we went 7.32 at 195.
I was really thrilled about.
And that was with two stages and
it's let a lot more in it.
- [Voiceover] Schroeder and Ens Corvette
made the fastest nitrous pass
in the history of Drag Week.
A 7.32 on day one, we lost them on day two
after battery failures and overheating
took the car out.
- [Voiceover] This is Elana.
She's a new staff member on Hot Rod.
And we figured that her first Drag Week
should be trial by fire,
so we threw her in the car with this guy.
- It's day two, we're
here at Texas Motorplex
and I'm about to go for a ride with Randy.
Randy, what are we riding in?
- My '91 Mustang with twin turbos.
- And this little green
car's kind of quick.
- Yeah, it's run as fast as 8.49 at 164.
- Does it have air conditioning?
- Uh, yeah, you roll down the windows
and you go 40 miles an hour
and the air conditions you.
- It's going to be a long drive.
(bouncy music)
(laughing)
- So wild.
- You want to go 1182?
- Yeah, sorry, I just missed the turn.
I'm a lousy navigator.
(twangy music)
- My girl can ride faster than you.
I'm trying to talk her into
marrying me she's really cool.
(laughs)
- I'm living in two lane black top.
- You know what always upsets me though
when I go through most
of these school zones?
- What? There's no kids?
- Yeah, it's like, okay,
show me what I can kill.
(record squealing)
- You're not supposed to kill the kids.
That's the whole point of the school zone.
People totally frown on that.
- Kids should be eaten, not heard.
(laughing)
- [Voiceover] We're on the road
coming out of Ennis, Texas, The Motorplex,
and we spotted this
little dinky drag strip
that we had to check out.
Cedar Creek Dragway,
middle of nowhere Texas.
This is America.
- [Voiceover] Today we're
cruising with Brian Lohnes
who's been a friend of
mine for a long time
he's out announcer for Drag Week.
He's a hard core drag racing historian
so it didn't take much for me
to convince him to pull over
at this cool old drag strip
in the middle of nowhere.
It's one of the last,
or maybe not the last,
it's one of the Grassroots,
outlaw, non-sanctioned
drag strips around and
it's been here 50 years.
The same over here has owned it for 30
and it's just got so much character.
I mean the burn out box is worn deep,
the place has been around so long.
But it's all concrete
and nice wall, nice tree,
they're gluing the
place, got a nice tower.
This is really Grassroots drag racing.
We wouldn't have Drag Week
if it weren't for guys
sort of finding their way
at little tracks like this.
- [Brian] So it was a high speed
game of chicken, essentially?
(laughing)
- This right here was
the original drag strip.
You can see the lines on it and such.
And this is the new one
they put in in 1986.
- The tree was on that
concrete block up there.
- Oh, I see the block yeah, look at that.
- Yeah, the pole sticking up.
- [David] Here, check this out.
So this is the center block
where the Christmas tree
used to slide in, you just drop them in
so they can take them out later.
That's cool.
- To think that two guys ran
jet dragsters down this thing
in the threes--
- That wide.
- Yeah.
- Side by side and this is about as wide
as a freeway lane in L.A.
(laughing)
- [Voiceover] What could be better
than having a junkyard on
the side of the drag strip?
That's essentially what this
guy's got going on here.
He's got a big collection
of '50's cars and
some worthless stuff, but
inside he had a TransAm,
this early Camaro, a
Tri-Five Chevy, good stuff.
We got to hit it, onto Louisiana.
(upbeat music)
- [David] 12 hundred bucks?
Get out, that is a '64-5ish
Nova for 12 hundred bucks
or trade, how much is that camera worth?
Chevy II 100, it's the low
end one, it's pretty rusty.
Good looking from afar
but far from good looking.
- [Voiceover] Keith
Harrison's a Drag Week veteran
but this is his first
time with a '55 Chevy
running in our gasser class.
Unfortunately, he was
fighting fuel pump problems.
And this is Luther
Duncan in a '70 Maverick
with an old school small
block and a four speed.
The cool thing here is
that the engine was built
by Eddie Miller who is a
past Drag Week champion.
(engine roaring)
(upbeat music)
- [Voiceover] Now we're at
Thunder Road in Louisiana.
A lot of people thought
this was going to be
the sketchy track, the
groove is really narrow.
Guys have been hooking up pretty good.
The surprise though, is Larry Larson.
He just ran like an
8.50 banging and farting
all the way down the track.
Sometimes I wonder if he
does that for the show.
That's what he did yesterday
and then he pulls it off
at the last second and puts down a number
that keeps him just in the lead.
Makes good drama for us.
(engine roaring)
- [Announcer] He's going to the six,
it's down to the eight mile,
166, Jeff Lutz goes out.
Seven flat on the two.
- We just finished up,
we went 7.00 at 212.
We're headed to Memphis early.
Drag Week, 2012, here we come.
(honking)
- [Voiceover] Maschmeier's
bad luck continued
when the 605 Chevy into
the hood of the Camaro
ate a cam and a set of lifters
the night before running.
(motor roaring)
He still went 8.11 at
a buck 74 in Gilliam.
- [Voiceover] Contrary to popular belief,
winning Drag Week is not about averaging
the lowest ET in your class,
it's about beating the road.
Breakdowns are the norm,
they're not the exception
to the rule and we're
cruising down the road here
and just saw Vince and
his Firebird laid up here
with a bunch of broken valve springs.
As per usual, a bunch of
other competitors stopped.
They're helping him out, they'll
get him back on the road.
One of the major hurdles of Drag Week
is getting everything you need
from one track to the next
and so guys are hauling little trailers.
Eric Yoast's team, they
built their own trailer
and it's nice, man, this is aluminum,
bead rolled, TIG welded.
What do we got going on here?
- Basically, we got everything
we need on the trip.
If we happen to break anything,
I got everything to rebuild
an entire transmission,
converter, got our pit bikes
if we need to ride around,
cooler full of ice.
- [Mike] Keg?
- [Man] Yeah.
- [Mike] Nice touch.
- [Man] Yeah.
- How much do you think
you've got into this thing?
- 150 bucks.
(laughs)
- PT Cruiser axle is all we paid for
and the rest is just scrap that some
race teams have donated over the years.
- [Mike] I love the wheels.
Makes a good hood holder
for an overheating car.
You could hide from the
police inside of here.
I mean, if you needed to,
I'm not saying you need to.
- Whatever you like to do.
- We're broke down on
the side of the road,
but we've got the best trailer ever
and some pretty damn cold
beer so everything's alright.
(horn honking)
(twangy music)
- [Voiceover] In day four, we're at
Memphis International Raceway.
(engine roaring)
(tires squealing)
Memphis isn't kind to Lutz or Larson.
They're both having trouble
getting their cars down the racetrack.
- Struck a rocker on 'em.
Must have broke it on the first hit
and that's why it slowed
down a little bit.
(sputtering)
- [Announcer] Oh, he lifted at 300 feet.
- [Voiceover] After an aborted attempt
at making a run down the drag strip,
Larry ripped apart his rear end
to find a smashed ring and pinion.
- Ooh, yeah, pieces.
(drilling)
- [Voiceover] The scramble
was on to find spare parts,
not to make another pass at Memphis,
but to get back to Tulsa
and make his last pass
on day five of Drag Week.
When we caught up with Todd
Maschmeier and Travis Gilpin,
neither guy had slept more than four hours
during all of Drag Week.
They ended up limping the Camaro
into Memphis, Tennessee on six cylinders.
The duo had every intention
of hitting the six cylinder
powered Camaro with
three stages of nitrous
to try and hold their
lead over Brian Goldstone,
but when the car wouldn't do a burnout
in the water box, they knew
they had to call it quits.
They broke the beam and got themselves
a 20 second ET and that was
it for them at Drag Week.
- It looked like you guys
intended to make a lap.
- Yeah.
- And then what changed?
- It wouldn't do a burnout.
Our intent was to make a lap
and if it blew up, it blew up
and whatever we were on our way to camp,
out to comp to pick up a can of
lifters and put it together
tonight and drive, but...
- [Mike] You haven't slept in four days.
- We got three hours of
sleep, two nights ago.
Like I said, hitting the
bridge that first night...
It put everything behind.
There's all kinds of
bearings and roller tips
in the bottom of that pan right now.
- [Mike] Playing ping pong.
- Mhm.
- That's never good.
- I'm sure we'll be back next year.
Thank you, Mike.
- [Mike] Thank you.
(engine roaring)
- [Voiceover] Jeff Lutz
7.14 pass was enough
to give him a one
hundredth of a second lead
heading back to Tulsa, so
I decided to hop in his '57
Chevy and find out what was on his mind
as he headed into the home
stretch with the lead.
(twangy music)
- [Mike] We just left Memphis
International Raceway.
Not more than ten miles
ago, we heard a chirp,
just didn't sound right,
he didn't like it.
I didn't like that he didn't like it,
so we pulled over to
find out what's going on.
He thinks we might have a broken lifter
which, that's not good because
we've got 400 miles to go.
And I think he's got lifters,
but we don't have another camshaft so
this is going to get
interesting right now.
(drill running)
- Oh.
- [Mike] Wow, Jeff Lutz just
saved his engine from disaster.
That noise he was hearing
as we were driving
was at least this lifter, maybe
more, that stopped rolling.
This was basically
skidding along on the lobe
of the camshaft wearing the
roller and the camshaft out.
And once you do that, metal
goes through the motor,
parts play ping pong, bad things happen,
and he doesn't get to Tulsa tomorrow to
try to win this thing, so,
he's got a spare set of these
and hopefully a new camshaft
waiting for him in Tulsa.
And he'll get this thing
bandaged up and we'll
drive 415 miles tonight and make it there.
(engine rumbling)
- [Mike] Wow.
We're about an hour from Tulsa, we're...
It's been raining and
the road is super wet
and these giant meats in the
back are not happy about it.
We are literally just skating
all over the road right now
so we pulled over, took a little break.
We're going to crawl right now,
maybe like ten miles an hour tops
so we can keep making some time.
Oh, wow, it's cold.
Almost made it to the last check point
before the last day, not
quite, the rain stopped us so
going to crash here in
the car for the night
and hit the road in the morning.
We're done for tonight.
- [Voiceover] Day five and
we're back where we started,
Tulsa, Oklahoma.
It's raining here today and,
if it doesn't dry up soon,
we're just not sure if we're going
to get this race done or not.
- Alright, everybody, listen
up, in about 30 seconds
we have the announcement on
the fate of the event coming
and yeah, give us 30 seconds.
Well, unfortunately, as you can tell,
the weather has been junk today
and it's not looking like
it's going to get much better
before tomorrow afternoon,
so I'm going to dodge the flying fruit
when I tell everybody
that this thing is done.
The event has been ended, we're--
- [David] What are you saying?
- What?
- [Mike] No, no, no, not ended.
- Okay, Brian just completely choked.
(laughs)
- [Brian] You said I was pulling the plug.
- Nope. Here's the deal.
I'm standing here right now thinking
you know what, we need to race this thing.
There's a ten percent chance of rain
at noon tomorrow, we're going to run.
(crowd cheering)
- We're back at Tulsa here today,
which is Saturday and it's not raining yet
and so we're doing our best we can
to get all these guys down the track.
(engine roaring)
- [Mike] Tommy here,
in his unlimited class
'57 Chevy, found out the hard way
there was plenty of traction
on that racetrack right now.
What happened Tommy?
- We had tuned up the car
to make a really good pass,
try to get the car to the H today
and whenever I let go of the trans brake,
it came up pretty hard
and it was on a good pass
and then it came down and whenever it did,
it broke both front shocks on the car.
- [Mike] I imagine you'll fix that up
and be back next year.
- We'll fix it, we'll
probably bring the '57 back
and possibly bring a second car, too.
- Thank you, I'll see you further down.
- Alright.
- [Voiceover] Perspero
got in line to make a pass
right in front of Tim Reed,
but about 300 feet into the run,
something definitely went wrong.
- Well, we hurt the
transmission on that last pass.
Sounded like second gear went bad,
so we had our spare from
the very first time,
we're sticking it back in right now.
- Tim just ran a 7.94, he
needs a 7.91 to beat us,
so that's why we want to
make one more bonsai pass
to see if we can get it
down into the sevens again.
- We are less than one
hundredth apart right now,
so we put nitrous on it about an hour ago
and we're going to go out and
spray it and see what happens.
- [Voiceover] Perspero
pulled off a miracle
getting his Powerglide back
together and in the car
to make another pass, but
he did not go any faster
than his previous run.
Tim Reed's gamble of
adding nitrous to turbos
didn't pay off.
- Ended up blowing the
spark out about 500 feet.
I'll be back next year.
- [Voiceover] In the end,
Larry Larson came from behind
to beat Jeff Lutz by less
than one hundredth of a second
and earned his fifth consecutive
unlimited class title.
His '66 Nova is Hot Rod Magazine's
fastest street care in America.
(engine roaring)
Drag Week is an anomaly.
We don't give you a dime
if you win this event.
All you get is a jacket
and the pride that comes
with having a seriously fast street car.
Join us next month for
another episode of Road Kill
and watch Freiburger
and I destroy ourselves
for your entertainment.
- Does Goose throw a blender?
- Yeah.
- Let's make some margaritas.
- Mix us up a margarita.
- What are we waiting on?
(engines roaring)
(laughter)
- [Man] Oh, my god, he
went into the center lane.
(engine roaring)
- [Announcer] (undecipherable
mumbling) at 141 miles an hour
Eric Yoast goes 7.60 with a five.
(engines roaring)
(motor roaring)
(announcer mumbling)
(cars racing)
(announcer mumbling)
we're going on a drag racing road trip
with 500 of our friends.
(car engine)
(squealing tires)
(rock music)
- This is Road Kill,
which is the show where
normally we are out there destroying
ourselves for your entertainment,
this time, we're going to force other guys
to wreck themselves.
It's Hot Rod Drag Week,
where we take 180 drag cars,
some of them with like 2,500 horsepower,
we make them run five
drag strips in five days
and drive 1,400 miles.
There is major wreckage involved.
- I don't know why anybody listens to us.
I wouldn't have agreed to that.
- And they're doing it all for a jacket.
- Suckers.
- Watch these chumps.
(car engine)
(upbeat music)
- This is Tulsa, Oklahoma, day one.
Registration and class
inspection and test and tune.
- [Voiceover] Drag Week
started claiming victims
before we even started racing.
I was interviewing Bob
Larson about a broken axle
on his car when I heard an awful noise.
- You done broke that right in half.
(engine rumbling)
I heard a turbo car
spooling up for a launch
and then an ugly noise.
- [Voiceover] We ran
over to find Doug Klein's
Camaro smashed.
Luckily, the only thing really
damaged was Doug's pride.
The sheet metal and front suspension
took the brunt of the
hit, but he was fine.
The cause of the accident was a
leaking intercooler reservoir that
threw water on the track
in front of his rear tires.
It cast a small cloud over the event
because we really hadn't
even started racing yet.
(car engine rumbling)
- [Voiceover] This is Tulsa Raceway Park
where we're going to start
and end Drag Week this year.
We stopped here last year and the traction
was just so killer that
we had to come back.
(engine roaring)
- [Voiceover] Larry
Larson has won Drag Week
four times in his '66 Nova,
so he knows what he's doing.
It'll be real interesting to see if he can
stay ahead of the pack this year.
(engine roaring)
- [Voiceover] Wow, Larry just ran a 6.94,
the quickest pass he's ever run,
and the quickest pass anyone's ever done
at Hot Rod Drag Week.
- The '55 Chevy over
there in the right lane,
the guy that owns it built it in 1970.
Made his own straight axle for it.
It's been in moth balls ever since.
His kid just talked him
into dragging it out
and they're doing Drag Week together
for the first time ever.
(engine roaring)
I forgot about that.
The one thing his kid asked him to change
was the clutch 'cause it's 30 years old.
Dad didn't change it.
That's what I smell right now.
Bye bye clutch.
- [Voiceover] Todd Maschmeier
has won the modified
Power Adder class before
in his 1968 Camaro
and he's back again with Travis Gilpin
behind the wheel to defend the title.
(engines roaring)
- [Voiceover] Oh, yeah,
look at the wagon go!
- The Camaro went 7.79 at 179,
that station wagon just
went 8.37, one turbo.
- [Voiceover] This is Jeff
Lutz and his twin turbo '57
Chevy and he's run Drag
Week with us for a few years
and that's what's going
to give him an edge here.
Not only is the car capable of the ET's
he needs to run to catch
up with Larry Larson,
but he knows what it's
like out there on the road.
He is going to be prepared for anything.
(engine revving)
Lutz showed us what he's
got with a 7.16 at 212
miles an hour, the fastest mile an hour
we've ever seen at Drag Week.
We'll see if he can hold
this thing together.
- [Voiceover] Repairs were
already underway in the pits
as racing came to an end on day one.
We spotted Jeff Lutz getting his
welder out of his trailer to
help a few other competitors.
(welding machine rumbles)
We were just about to leave.
Everybody's tired, hot, hungry,
when Jeff Lutz fired up his '57 Chevy
and heard something he didn't like.
Jacked up the car, crawled under it,
found a broken torque converter bolt.
Doesn't have the bolt,
but he's going to limp it
to the next track with five out of six.
Five out of six ain't bad.
It's four P.M., we've been here since
about eight in the morning.
This is the mess that happens
in the pits afterwards
as everybody packs everything they've got
to go drag racing into a little trailer.
Racing's done, we're heading for Texas.
- [Voiceover] We left Tulsa and headed
to the nearest gas station.
And wouldn't you know it,
after a couple of unlimited
racers topped off their tanks,
the station ran out of gas.
- So the wagon's overheating.
So they bought a garden sprayer,
filled it up full of water.
The passenger's going to pump
the thing while they drive
and a little hose is going to shoot water
at the front of their radiator.
Hopefully to cool it off
while they're driving.
When that doesn't work,
they'll take the hood off
like I told them to.
(engine rumbling)
- [Voiceover] 14 hundred miles doesn't
seem like that big of a
deal for a regular car,
but you put a serious
street strip car in traffic
and suddenly overheating
becomes a real issue.
Not 20 miles outside
of Tulsa, we found cars
dropping like flies, overheated
on the side of the road
in 90 degree temperatures.
- It's 8:40 at night,
we've been on the road
maybe five, six hours.
We've gone a total of 40 miles.
We just stopped under an overpass
and found Schroeder and
his buddy from Canada
and their '66 'vette
on the side of the road
with a dead battery.
So, they're fixing that right now
while I'm sitting here taking
pictures of their misery.
At the rate we're going,
we're going to get
to the track tomorrow when it opens
and we're probably not sleeping tonight.
- We've got some beers here,
so we need just ice. (laughs)
- [Voiceover] Another
20 miles down the road,
another broken car.
This time it's Todd Maschmeier.
He hit the bridge with his car,
took out the crossmember to the motor,
smashed the oil pan, the transmission pan.
Now he's got a welder to fix it.
(rock music playing)
- [Voiceover] Before the night was over,
we caught up with Shawn
Fink and Brian Macy
who were having a big of
charging system issues
with their panel wagon.
- That's our new alternator.
It kind of keeps up until
you go slow and then
not so good, but hopefully
we make it through.
- [Voiceover] And by the way,
the hood was off the car.
(rock music)
- [Voiceover] Day two of Hot Rod Drag Week
finds us in Ennis, Texas
at Texas Motorplex.
(engines roaring)
There was a new class this year called
Super Street Power Adder and
what's interesting about it
is that we make the small
blocks and the big blocks
run together.
Rick Prospero's got the '65 Nova wagon
with a turbo big block
and Tim Reed brought
back his '79 Pinto
that has a turbo LSX GM
small block in it.
Both of these cars are
capable of running 7.90's.
- [Voiceover] Tim Reed
has gone as fast as 8.005
here at Drag Week in his '79 Pinto.
His goal is to get into the sevens.
He is that close, so we came
over to give him an interview
and his dad Al is polishing the wheel
and the steering doesn't look great.
What's happening?
- (laughs) Well, Sunday we broke the uh...
He did a big wheelie and broke the rack
so we've been fighting it
the last couple of days.
- [Mike] He broke the oil pan too, huh?
- And broke the oil pan.
- [Mike] Alright, so I imagine Tim's off
trying to get some steering parts?
- Yeah, yeah, he's at the
O'Reilly's getting the parts.
- [Mike] Are you guys going to make
another hit on it today?
- Yeah, we're going to
try to make two more hits.
The wax job I'm putting on it, you know,
is going to make it a little slicker.
So that ought to get that half a second.
- [Mike] Oh, yeah, that's
like race stickers.
That's good for ten or 20
horsepower right there.
Awesome, alright, well, good luck.
- Hey, thank you man.
- We'll see you later.
(engine roaring)
- [Voiceover] Tim Reed
finally got his Pinto
into the seven's with a 7.99 second pass
and then Rick Perspero
answered with his own
seven second pass, A 7.93.
(engines roaring)
The question is, can Rick keep it together
for the rest of Drag Week?
Dodge Ram, single turbo on a Viper motor
went 9.09 at 148 yesterday.
Today, not so good.
What happened fellas?
- Blew a head gasket.
- [Mike] Blew a head gasket?
What did you do, up the boost some more or
was it just time for it to go?
- It was the same, I just
think it was time for it to go
so it's got about 50 dyno pulls in it and,
but we just, I mean, we
got a dyno last week and
so it's fresh, very fresh combination.
- [Mike] Cool, did you guys find a gasket
to replace it?
- [Dominique] Yes, sir.
- [Mike] Cool, going to
make another hit today
or just fix it and hit the road?
- If we can get back on
the road, I'd be happy.
- [Man] Yeah.
- [Mike] Alright, cool, good luck guys.
[Voiceover] What they thought was just
a blown head gasket turned
out to be a torched head
and block and since V10 parts
are hard to come by in Tulsa,
the Dodge was out.
- Dad's bringing his son an
axle for his eight and 3/4
Dodge rear end.
Going in his old Ram pickup.
How's that for service?
So did you guys get to make a lap today?
- Made one, but it was
about two seconds off
due to the set backs.
- [Mike] So how quick can you guys do this
'cause it looks like
you've done it before.
- [Man] Hopefully, we'll be
done here in about 20 minutes.
- [Mike] 20 minutes for
an axle change, I like it.
Clock's ticking, go for it.
Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick...
How much nitrous?
- [Man] Oh 150 shot, correct?
- [Mike] 150 shot?
That's a crappy axle if
I ever saw one. (laughs)
Nice work, Dodge.
Call it experience, call it luck,
call it being a general bad ass,
but Larry Larson makes this look easy.
We just talked to him and found out
he had all kinds of problems himself.
Pulled over by the cops, got lost,
left the hotel this
morning, got a flat tire.
And then on his first hit, broke a sprag
in his Lenco transmission, so
he's got some repairs to make
and he's definitely
got to make another run
'cause he knows everybody
else is gunning for him.
(engine roaring)
- [Voiceover] Despite last
night's roadside troubles,
Maschmeier's Camaro
goes 7.68 at a buck 81.
- We're standing here with Todd Maschmeier
and Travis Gilpin after
your pretty much epic pass.
Last night, this car was
strewn out all over the highway
like a yardsale, what happened?
- We were outside of
Muskogee and hit a big bump
in the road and knocked
the crossmember out
and knocked a big hole
in the transmission pan.
Some very nice people come to save the day
and rescued us.
Brought a welder and a generator
and we sit there for about
two and a half, three hours
and got it fixed.
Got back on the road,
struggled to get here,
got, well, we didn't even
go to sleep last night.
- What did it go, 4.99 to half track?
- 4.99 to the eight, yep.
Went 1.2864 which is our
best sixty foot too, so.
- So, hit the road now,
make it to the next stop?
- That'll be it.
- That's the plan.
- Alright, good luck fellas.
- Thank you, man.
- Thanks.
- [Voiceover] In pro
street naturally aspirated,
we've got two time winner Doc McEntire
coming back with his '68 Camaro.
Naturally aspirated, this
car has almost run an eight
and that's his goal for this week.
(engine roaring)
- [Announcer] 121 at the
eighth mile, McEntire
get it flat footed goes
8.92 and a three, baby.
- Congratulations, man.
- Thank you.
- How did the pass feel?
- Beautiful, 1.23 and a sixty.
- Nice.
You picked up a whole bunch.
- You can't believe the timing curve
I built for that to run that.
- [Mike] Really? It's Aggressive?
- [Doc] No
- [Mike] Soft?
- [Doc] Soft
- [Mike] And it didn't
blow the tires off finally.
- [Doc] Yep, it was perfect.
- [Mike] Wow, less is more, nice.
It's about time you did your job.
(laughing)
You going to hit the road or?
- [Doc] Yeah, I'm done, man.
- [Mike] Alright
- Going to nurse it along, get to Friday
and see if I can get that third jacket.
- [Mike] Awesome.
- [Voiceover] With the rest of the class
more than a second off his pace,
all Doc McEntire's got to do now
is finish Drag Week and he'll take the win
in pro street naturally aspirated.
- Day two of Drag Week kicked off
with my favorite Canadian, Dave Schroeder.
You've been here before with a '55 Chevy
looking like the two lane black top car,
I loved it.
This thing off the trailer was an animal.
How quick did you go on day one?
- Yeah, day one we went 7.32 at 195.
I was really thrilled about.
And that was with two stages and
it's let a lot more in it.
- [Voiceover] Schroeder and Ens Corvette
made the fastest nitrous pass
in the history of Drag Week.
A 7.32 on day one, we lost them on day two
after battery failures and overheating
took the car out.
- [Voiceover] This is Elana.
She's a new staff member on Hot Rod.
And we figured that her first Drag Week
should be trial by fire,
so we threw her in the car with this guy.
- It's day two, we're
here at Texas Motorplex
and I'm about to go for a ride with Randy.
Randy, what are we riding in?
- My '91 Mustang with twin turbos.
- And this little green
car's kind of quick.
- Yeah, it's run as fast as 8.49 at 164.
- Does it have air conditioning?
- Uh, yeah, you roll down the windows
and you go 40 miles an hour
and the air conditions you.
- It's going to be a long drive.
(bouncy music)
(laughing)
- So wild.
- You want to go 1182?
- Yeah, sorry, I just missed the turn.
I'm a lousy navigator.
(twangy music)
- My girl can ride faster than you.
I'm trying to talk her into
marrying me she's really cool.
(laughs)
- I'm living in two lane black top.
- You know what always upsets me though
when I go through most
of these school zones?
- What? There's no kids?
- Yeah, it's like, okay,
show me what I can kill.
(record squealing)
- You're not supposed to kill the kids.
That's the whole point of the school zone.
People totally frown on that.
- Kids should be eaten, not heard.
(laughing)
- [Voiceover] We're on the road
coming out of Ennis, Texas, The Motorplex,
and we spotted this
little dinky drag strip
that we had to check out.
Cedar Creek Dragway,
middle of nowhere Texas.
This is America.
- [Voiceover] Today we're
cruising with Brian Lohnes
who's been a friend of
mine for a long time
he's out announcer for Drag Week.
He's a hard core drag racing historian
so it didn't take much for me
to convince him to pull over
at this cool old drag strip
in the middle of nowhere.
It's one of the last,
or maybe not the last,
it's one of the Grassroots,
outlaw, non-sanctioned
drag strips around and
it's been here 50 years.
The same over here has owned it for 30
and it's just got so much character.
I mean the burn out box is worn deep,
the place has been around so long.
But it's all concrete
and nice wall, nice tree,
they're gluing the
place, got a nice tower.
This is really Grassroots drag racing.
We wouldn't have Drag Week
if it weren't for guys
sort of finding their way
at little tracks like this.
- [Brian] So it was a high speed
game of chicken, essentially?
(laughing)
- This right here was
the original drag strip.
You can see the lines on it and such.
And this is the new one
they put in in 1986.
- The tree was on that
concrete block up there.
- Oh, I see the block yeah, look at that.
- Yeah, the pole sticking up.
- [David] Here, check this out.
So this is the center block
where the Christmas tree
used to slide in, you just drop them in
so they can take them out later.
That's cool.
- To think that two guys ran
jet dragsters down this thing
in the threes--
- That wide.
- Yeah.
- Side by side and this is about as wide
as a freeway lane in L.A.
(laughing)
- [Voiceover] What could be better
than having a junkyard on
the side of the drag strip?
That's essentially what this
guy's got going on here.
He's got a big collection
of '50's cars and
some worthless stuff, but
inside he had a TransAm,
this early Camaro, a
Tri-Five Chevy, good stuff.
We got to hit it, onto Louisiana.
(upbeat music)
- [David] 12 hundred bucks?
Get out, that is a '64-5ish
Nova for 12 hundred bucks
or trade, how much is that camera worth?
Chevy II 100, it's the low
end one, it's pretty rusty.
Good looking from afar
but far from good looking.
- [Voiceover] Keith
Harrison's a Drag Week veteran
but this is his first
time with a '55 Chevy
running in our gasser class.
Unfortunately, he was
fighting fuel pump problems.
And this is Luther
Duncan in a '70 Maverick
with an old school small
block and a four speed.
The cool thing here is
that the engine was built
by Eddie Miller who is a
past Drag Week champion.
(engine roaring)
(upbeat music)
- [Voiceover] Now we're at
Thunder Road in Louisiana.
A lot of people thought
this was going to be
the sketchy track, the
groove is really narrow.
Guys have been hooking up pretty good.
The surprise though, is Larry Larson.
He just ran like an
8.50 banging and farting
all the way down the track.
Sometimes I wonder if he
does that for the show.
That's what he did yesterday
and then he pulls it off
at the last second and puts down a number
that keeps him just in the lead.
Makes good drama for us.
(engine roaring)
- [Announcer] He's going to the six,
it's down to the eight mile,
166, Jeff Lutz goes out.
Seven flat on the two.
- We just finished up,
we went 7.00 at 212.
We're headed to Memphis early.
Drag Week, 2012, here we come.
(honking)
- [Voiceover] Maschmeier's
bad luck continued
when the 605 Chevy into
the hood of the Camaro
ate a cam and a set of lifters
the night before running.
(motor roaring)
He still went 8.11 at
a buck 74 in Gilliam.
- [Voiceover] Contrary to popular belief,
winning Drag Week is not about averaging
the lowest ET in your class,
it's about beating the road.
Breakdowns are the norm,
they're not the exception
to the rule and we're
cruising down the road here
and just saw Vince and
his Firebird laid up here
with a bunch of broken valve springs.
As per usual, a bunch of
other competitors stopped.
They're helping him out, they'll
get him back on the road.
One of the major hurdles of Drag Week
is getting everything you need
from one track to the next
and so guys are hauling little trailers.
Eric Yoast's team, they
built their own trailer
and it's nice, man, this is aluminum,
bead rolled, TIG welded.
What do we got going on here?
- Basically, we got everything
we need on the trip.
If we happen to break anything,
I got everything to rebuild
an entire transmission,
converter, got our pit bikes
if we need to ride around,
cooler full of ice.
- [Mike] Keg?
- [Man] Yeah.
- [Mike] Nice touch.
- [Man] Yeah.
- How much do you think
you've got into this thing?
- 150 bucks.
(laughs)
- PT Cruiser axle is all we paid for
and the rest is just scrap that some
race teams have donated over the years.
- [Mike] I love the wheels.
Makes a good hood holder
for an overheating car.
You could hide from the
police inside of here.
I mean, if you needed to,
I'm not saying you need to.
- Whatever you like to do.
- We're broke down on
the side of the road,
but we've got the best trailer ever
and some pretty damn cold
beer so everything's alright.
(horn honking)
(twangy music)
- [Voiceover] In day four, we're at
Memphis International Raceway.
(engine roaring)
(tires squealing)
Memphis isn't kind to Lutz or Larson.
They're both having trouble
getting their cars down the racetrack.
- Struck a rocker on 'em.
Must have broke it on the first hit
and that's why it slowed
down a little bit.
(sputtering)
- [Announcer] Oh, he lifted at 300 feet.
- [Voiceover] After an aborted attempt
at making a run down the drag strip,
Larry ripped apart his rear end
to find a smashed ring and pinion.
- Ooh, yeah, pieces.
(drilling)
- [Voiceover] The scramble
was on to find spare parts,
not to make another pass at Memphis,
but to get back to Tulsa
and make his last pass
on day five of Drag Week.
When we caught up with Todd
Maschmeier and Travis Gilpin,
neither guy had slept more than four hours
during all of Drag Week.
They ended up limping the Camaro
into Memphis, Tennessee on six cylinders.
The duo had every intention
of hitting the six cylinder
powered Camaro with
three stages of nitrous
to try and hold their
lead over Brian Goldstone,
but when the car wouldn't do a burnout
in the water box, they knew
they had to call it quits.
They broke the beam and got themselves
a 20 second ET and that was
it for them at Drag Week.
- It looked like you guys
intended to make a lap.
- Yeah.
- And then what changed?
- It wouldn't do a burnout.
Our intent was to make a lap
and if it blew up, it blew up
and whatever we were on our way to camp,
out to comp to pick up a can of
lifters and put it together
tonight and drive, but...
- [Mike] You haven't slept in four days.
- We got three hours of
sleep, two nights ago.
Like I said, hitting the
bridge that first night...
It put everything behind.
There's all kinds of
bearings and roller tips
in the bottom of that pan right now.
- [Mike] Playing ping pong.
- Mhm.
- That's never good.
- I'm sure we'll be back next year.
Thank you, Mike.
- [Mike] Thank you.
(engine roaring)
- [Voiceover] Jeff Lutz
7.14 pass was enough
to give him a one
hundredth of a second lead
heading back to Tulsa, so
I decided to hop in his '57
Chevy and find out what was on his mind
as he headed into the home
stretch with the lead.
(twangy music)
- [Mike] We just left Memphis
International Raceway.
Not more than ten miles
ago, we heard a chirp,
just didn't sound right,
he didn't like it.
I didn't like that he didn't like it,
so we pulled over to
find out what's going on.
He thinks we might have a broken lifter
which, that's not good because
we've got 400 miles to go.
And I think he's got lifters,
but we don't have another camshaft so
this is going to get
interesting right now.
(drill running)
- Oh.
- [Mike] Wow, Jeff Lutz just
saved his engine from disaster.
That noise he was hearing
as we were driving
was at least this lifter, maybe
more, that stopped rolling.
This was basically
skidding along on the lobe
of the camshaft wearing the
roller and the camshaft out.
And once you do that, metal
goes through the motor,
parts play ping pong, bad things happen,
and he doesn't get to Tulsa tomorrow to
try to win this thing, so,
he's got a spare set of these
and hopefully a new camshaft
waiting for him in Tulsa.
And he'll get this thing
bandaged up and we'll
drive 415 miles tonight and make it there.
(engine rumbling)
- [Mike] Wow.
We're about an hour from Tulsa, we're...
It's been raining and
the road is super wet
and these giant meats in the
back are not happy about it.
We are literally just skating
all over the road right now
so we pulled over, took a little break.
We're going to crawl right now,
maybe like ten miles an hour tops
so we can keep making some time.
Oh, wow, it's cold.
Almost made it to the last check point
before the last day, not
quite, the rain stopped us so
going to crash here in
the car for the night
and hit the road in the morning.
We're done for tonight.
- [Voiceover] Day five and
we're back where we started,
Tulsa, Oklahoma.
It's raining here today and,
if it doesn't dry up soon,
we're just not sure if we're going
to get this race done or not.
- Alright, everybody, listen
up, in about 30 seconds
we have the announcement on
the fate of the event coming
and yeah, give us 30 seconds.
Well, unfortunately, as you can tell,
the weather has been junk today
and it's not looking like
it's going to get much better
before tomorrow afternoon,
so I'm going to dodge the flying fruit
when I tell everybody
that this thing is done.
The event has been ended, we're--
- [David] What are you saying?
- What?
- [Mike] No, no, no, not ended.
- Okay, Brian just completely choked.
(laughs)
- [Brian] You said I was pulling the plug.
- Nope. Here's the deal.
I'm standing here right now thinking
you know what, we need to race this thing.
There's a ten percent chance of rain
at noon tomorrow, we're going to run.
(crowd cheering)
- We're back at Tulsa here today,
which is Saturday and it's not raining yet
and so we're doing our best we can
to get all these guys down the track.
(engine roaring)
- [Mike] Tommy here,
in his unlimited class
'57 Chevy, found out the hard way
there was plenty of traction
on that racetrack right now.
What happened Tommy?
- We had tuned up the car
to make a really good pass,
try to get the car to the H today
and whenever I let go of the trans brake,
it came up pretty hard
and it was on a good pass
and then it came down and whenever it did,
it broke both front shocks on the car.
- [Mike] I imagine you'll fix that up
and be back next year.
- We'll fix it, we'll
probably bring the '57 back
and possibly bring a second car, too.
- Thank you, I'll see you further down.
- Alright.
- [Voiceover] Perspero
got in line to make a pass
right in front of Tim Reed,
but about 300 feet into the run,
something definitely went wrong.
- Well, we hurt the
transmission on that last pass.
Sounded like second gear went bad,
so we had our spare from
the very first time,
we're sticking it back in right now.
- Tim just ran a 7.94, he
needs a 7.91 to beat us,
so that's why we want to
make one more bonsai pass
to see if we can get it
down into the sevens again.
- We are less than one
hundredth apart right now,
so we put nitrous on it about an hour ago
and we're going to go out and
spray it and see what happens.
- [Voiceover] Perspero
pulled off a miracle
getting his Powerglide back
together and in the car
to make another pass, but
he did not go any faster
than his previous run.
Tim Reed's gamble of
adding nitrous to turbos
didn't pay off.
- Ended up blowing the
spark out about 500 feet.
I'll be back next year.
- [Voiceover] In the end,
Larry Larson came from behind
to beat Jeff Lutz by less
than one hundredth of a second
and earned his fifth consecutive
unlimited class title.
His '66 Nova is Hot Rod Magazine's
fastest street care in America.
(engine roaring)
Drag Week is an anomaly.
We don't give you a dime
if you win this event.
All you get is a jacket
and the pride that comes
with having a seriously fast street car.
Join us next month for
another episode of Road Kill
and watch Freiburger
and I destroy ourselves
for your entertainment.
- Does Goose throw a blender?
- Yeah.
- Let's make some margaritas.
- Mix us up a margarita.
- What are we waiting on?
(engines roaring)
(laughter)
- [Man] Oh, my god, he
went into the center lane.
(engine roaring)
- [Announcer] (undecipherable
mumbling) at 141 miles an hour
Eric Yoast goes 7.60 with a five.
(engines roaring)
(motor roaring)
(announcer mumbling)
(cars racing)
(announcer mumbling)