Ditto

Your opinion speaks for me. I totally agree with your 'Beating my head against a dead horse' and Jok Nicholson's 'Why I won't be a paying spectator again anytime soon', all from the April issue of DRO. Haven't been to a big show since July 1990 in Englishtown. I stopped watching ESPN2's coverage of NHRA two years ago due their obsession with John Force and his daughters. For me, it’s strictly local shows, nostalgia nitro races and maybe an IHRA Nitro Jam.

Guy Radcliffe
Florence, New Jersey

The root of all evil

Dear Jeff - having read all of your articles over the years that Drag Racing Online has been around, I have to admit that I have agreed with the vast majority of them. For those of us that have been blessed enough to have witnessed all of the changes over the past 50 years (I attended my first race with my dad and brother in 1962 at Detroit Dragway when I was 12), it has been quite an experience. There have been so many highs and lows that I wouldn't know where to start if someone asked me about providing a synopsis of all that has happened since then. But looking back in retrospect, I would have to say that the influx of corporate money into NHRA changed everything. Specifically when the Winston money came on board, it not only changed the perspective on how NHRA Management viewed the sport but how the dollars affected them on a personal income level. During this time Wally Parks became a very wealthy individual, and by the time Dallas Gardner became the heir apparent as Wally's health began to fail, a new course had been set for the NHRA. Self-serving Wealth Management was the new course for the NHRA, and Customer Satisfaction for the spectators and racers alike was placed on the back burner. There was money to be made, but it was not to be dispersed as to somehow benefit the masses.  As the old cadre of the original NHRA Management Team (front office and Division Directors) began to age and retire, they were replaced by individuals who did not have the "seniority" invested in the product, nor were they going to reap the financial benefits of those who were now in charge. To the new corporate sponsors and NHRA money managers, this was just another account on their ledgers. And so, even before the passing of Wally Parks, the die had been cast with Tom Compton taking over as the helmsman for NHRA under the guidance of the Board of Directors. 

While there are numerous "fixer up" projects spread across the entire spectrum of the NHRA, the vast majority of those projects have languished for 20 years. There was money to be made, but there was never money to be spent... especially on "fixer up" projects that involved NHRA properties. And yet, through the pages of Competition Plus and Drag Racing Online, so many astute veterans of the sport, both participants, spectators and Drag Racing aficionados like yourself have called out the NHRA on valid points that should be addressed, and numerous critical mistakes that the NHRA has made, and yet it has made no difference whatsoever. None. No one has listened, no one is listening, and it's not that they don't hear your calls for righting the ship, it's just that they're too busy looking at their pay stubs.  I do foresee a demise of the NHRA in the not too distant future, adding to the fixer upper pile of things that should have been done but never happened. Many larger corporations, LLCs, banks, lending institutions, have already fallen by the wayside over the past four years. Why would it be hard to believe that NHRA could financially fail and disappear? I believe that it can and it will. And in the end the sport will be rightfully mourned by tens of thousands of fans, you and I alike. But in the end, all of the fans, the racers and all of our valid complaints will be headed for the "fixer upper" pile. 

Dave Gutierrez
GBR - Gutierrez Brothers Racing
Detroit, Michigan