Tony Bartone (near lane) gets the AA Fuel Dragster win over Adam Sorokin.  (Tim Marshall photo)

March Meet at Bakersfield, Calif.

Words by Brian Losness
Photos by Tim Marshall and Paul Schmitz

Since 1959 the March Meet has been Mecca for drag racing and for over two decades it has been the center of the nostalgia drag racing universe.  This status was further fortified by the car count at the 2015 March Meet held at Auto Club Famoso Raceway.

Over 450 cars were on the grounds and nearly seventy – yes, seventy -- were nitro cars.

If you are a lover of nostalgia nitro racing, this was your destination for the weekend. 

TOP FUEL

Testing opportunity was afforded to the teams, which started on Wednesday, March 4, and continued on Thursday. Numerous teams took advantage of this time to check out their work from over the winter.

T Bone  (Paul Schmitz photo)

The one run that got everybody attention happened on Thursday was that of Tony Bartone. Bartone ran the car under power to only a thousand feet and still stopped the clocks at 5.560 seconds. This showed the rest of the Top Fuel teams that Bartone was still the baddest on the block, after going perfect in 2014 in taking the title. Bartone was to have the car front halved at chassis builder Murf McKinney’s shop but schedules did not align, so Bartone says that work will take place after the March Meet.