By Ro McGonegal
• 8/8/06
The last Vega? Jenkins in NASCAR? Yes and sort of. The infamous sub-compact would soon be abandoned for a new Monza-bodied race car infused with everything Jenkins Competition had learned with the Vega. Whether it was the money or his work ethic pushing him into it, Bill was thoroughly entrenched in a NASCAR small-block development program as underwritten by Chevrolet. Engine man Joe Tryson was instrumental to the success of the power program and he and Jenkins rolled out the impetus for Donnie Allison’s pole-position DiGard Chevy at the 1975 Daytona 500 as well as 331-inch bullets for the Pro Stock Monza panel car.
This “Grumpy’s Toy” hosted dry sump lubrication, strut suspension, rack-and-pinion steering, a body that was hung on the tube frame in sections, and the tricky three-link rear suspension that he’d cherished since it appeared first on the maiden Vega.
But there was too much to do and not enough time to do it all, so Bill, not unhappily, gave the reigns and a great deal of responsibility to a young shoe from upstate Pennsylvania. Larry Lombardo had successfully campaigned his “Shotgun” ’61 Corvette in F/S and had a solid rep as being good on the tree and cool in the head. Development in Pro Stock had moved at hurricane speed ever since the Winternationals-winning Vega, but Jenkins stopped long enough to realize that drag racing was becoming homogenized and predictable. Lots of corporate money kept the furnaces blazing, but the corporations flexed their influence and the slaves all bowed down.
Pat Enos Photo
Between 1976 and 1979, Jenkins Competition built two more Monzas. One a legal car for NHRA events; the other had a monster big-block required for the lucrative and highly-popular match bash rodeo. There was a third manifestation; one that never saw public light, a far-out Camaro that Jenkins called the “ladder car.” It was designed so that the engine and the transmission acted as main torsional members, but were separated by a tube. This formed a structural spine, much in the style of C5/C6 Corvette. Jenkins lengthened the input shaft of the Lenco planetary gear transmission so that it essentially became another driveshaft. Naturally, NHRA was unable to abide such a radical departure, so Bill reluctantly abandoned the project. |
