HORSEPOWER & HEELS

Sad to admit, Geiger is dead-on with his prediction: If Tony Schumacher cannot bring home an ESPY for his amazing championship year, then drag racing has little hope of ever gaining its due acceptance or accolades in the motorsports world.

But why is drag racing constantly being overlooked? The NHRA fan base is just as loyal, the sport itself has more accessibility, and more overall membership (with the inclusion of sportsman ranks) than any other motorsport. Why are we left constantly in the shadows of NASCAR, IRL, and others?

I had high hopes when Ashley Force won the AOL Hottest Athlete contest a few years back. She beat some big celebrity athletes, including IRL's darling Danica Patrick, for the coveted title. Obviously, Ashley is gorgeous, but I felt that it was more the support of the drag racing world that helped edge out the tight competitions. And her win against NFL superstars made it all the more hopeful that Drag Racing's day was finally about to arrive.

But what about now? Up against the commercial juggernaut of NASCAR's legion, will drag racing be left by the wayside again?

It will unless we stand and rally NOW. Voting continues until July 11th on the ESPY nominations. Each and every drag racing fan should be voting.... I'm somewhat dismayed to learn that NHRA's promotion of the fan voting event was limited to small releases only. It requires a free registration, but really folks... let's not let Tony go down without a fight!

Deadline: July 11th

Please tell your friends!

The biggest lesson I've learned in the past few years of downtime is to fully appreciate how much it takes to build/race/maintain a racecar at this level of competition. The costs, the devotion, the hard work, and the risks are just mind-blowing. And it can all be gone in an instant.

Nowhere does logic pay off in this sport... you build a costly car that runs for mere seconds, you race for a purse that more often than not will never pay back the expenses, and even the most skilled driver gambles that a split second will not destroy all that hard work, or result in injury or worse.

This year at the NHRA Gateway race in St. Louis, a seasoned Fuel driver Melanie Troxel walked away from a crash in Raymond Commisso's 5.8-second Pro Modified entry, an incident she attributed to her "inexperience. I just didn't have enough laps." She went on to say "these cars are a handful," a sentiment that Rick Stivers would probably agree with given his own spectacular crash that same weekend in the Get Screened America Pro Mod Challenge at the O'Reilly NHRA Midwest Nationals.

His 2006 Stratus hit the wall and flipped -- what Stivers described as "all hell [breaking] loose - literally." Both incidents illustrate that in a class of promods with tremendous power (Troxel's car put out 2,500 hp), crashes are often simply beyond the driver's control. Both Troxel and Stivers were wearing their seat belts and are lucky; their injuries could have and probably should have been severe.

Not surprisingly, the major factors in this class are the inherent danger, the expense of repairs, and how attractive these high class machines are to thieves. So what makes it worth all the risk?

The remark that I hear across the board is that Pro Mod is the most difficult class to navigate. The cars make a ton of power, and don't have near the downforce of their bigger nitro brothers. They are a handful to drive, but they are the fastest true doorslammers in existance. Several nitro drivers such as Mike Ashley, Scotty Cannon, Matt Hagan and others have gotten their starts in Pro Mod. And several nitro pilots have also learned much like Melanie how much these cars are underestimated.

With cars now reaching 250mph with ease, these cars continue to put on a wild, fun-filled show that remains unrecognized by NHRA as a professional class. It only takes a quick look to the stands during Pro Mod to see that it is a class the fans really enjoy, a point further proven by the ADRL's sell out successes outside NHRA confines. Speculation behind why the NHRA refuses to grant professional class status includes complications from the Pro Stock truck lawsuit, and competition to their own pro stock class, but when will the NHRA wise up and see what a fan pleaser it has in Pro Modified?

While most kids dreamed of growing up to become veterinarians and doctors, I was awe-inspired at the tender age of 6 by what would be a classic 80's Hollywood movie... oh yes, wait for it.... Top Gun. [cue Danger Zone music]

I very clearly remember watching it with my family one night, and even though I was a restless 6 year old, was absolutely transfixed by what I saw. My dad was a career Air Force officer, and had retired from the Air Force before I was born. Perhaps my love of aircraft and speed came subconsciously from him, but I don't think they expected what came out of my 6 year old mouth after watching Maverick and the rest of the characters lighting up the sky in those F-14's.

And no, it wasn't the Volleyball scene, or a actually still relevant at the time and hot Tom Cruise, I had zero desire to be a Kelly McGillis lusting after some flyboy (though admittedly, I DO have a thing for men in flight suits as an adult). Top Gun was Navy, but whatever, I had decided at age six I wanted to be an Air Force Fighter Pilot.

My dream was rather crushed when my dad told me (at the time) that women were not permitted by the military to be combat pilots (something that changed in 1993). It wasn't because he didn't want to encourage me, I'm pretty sure it was also his dream growing up, and his eyesight was the disqualifying factor for him, so he didn't want me to be disappointed by the rule in place. Talk about a crushing blow... but instead of becoming an Ace Pilot, I later would settle on becoming a pilot of a different sorts... a drag racing pilot.

Maybe its not a screaming jet with supersonic speed and all kinds of fun G's, but drag racing at 200mph is still pretty thrilling. (Here's to hoping I get my chance in a Top Fuel Dragster and get to that 300mph thrill) And now the Air Force has figured out how to get the average person to merge these passions together with their latest recruitment tool: The Mustang X-1.

Designed by the same people responsible for the new gen KITT car (Galpin Autosports), this car has been totally redone for the USAF. On the exterior a radical lowered stance and low profile tires make for the aggressive aircraft-inspired theme complete with carbon fiber body, aerodynamic air intakes, and gull-wing doors. The flight cockpit interior completely replaces the Mustang interior with flight-stick, a touch-screen interfaced control system, and a single driver ejection seat center-mounted setup. GPS and nightvision technology is also found on the high-tech console.

At first, I was rather curious how they were "driving" via a flight-stick, but I read on to discover that there is a hidden regular motorized steering wheel that pops out for the "pilot" to steer with (slight disappointment that its not stick-driven, but whatever). The stick is actually a very nifty shifter for the manual transmission. I was also surprised that the car is only hopped up to 500 hp with cams and exhaust, which by my hotrodder standards does it zero justice... I mean why not twin turbos or something cool!

Alas, its a pretty cool recruitment tool if you ask me... they also have a Charger called the "Vapor", but the X-1 is definitely the more radical of the two.

Now that I'm grown and have spent the last 10 years chasing my dream of drag racing, I wish I would have had the level of determination applied to pursuing my dream of being a fighter pilot. I had no way of knowing then, but CAN'T just means you have to try a little harder.... Its still on my "Bucket List" to ride in a supersonic jet at some point, to cross off both me and my dad's dreams together. Or maybe I'll land a Top Fuel/Air Force sponsor and get to combine both dreams at once. (Keep your fingers crossed folks!)

Regardless, I feel pretty lucky to be participating in the land-version of high speed flight in drag racing, because as Goose and Maverick put it oh so well....