I happen to have a little experience in these matters, that is, being hung out to dry while being chased by something so fast it about blows you off the track at the finish line.
Many years ago, 23 to be exact, my then 5 months pregnant wife and I took a vacation to Phoenix and rented of all things, a Geo Metro convertible with a 3 cylinder automatic to tour the countryside with. And of course, every gearhead races his rental car before turning it back in the next day, doesn't he? (shades of Bret Kepner here). Found out there was a gambler race on Friday nights at a track way north of Phoenix, so we headed out there on our final night of vacation. The tech guy there looked at me and then at the car proudly wearing it's Alamo Rental Car plate and asked me if I was serious or not. Well, YEAH!
It passed tech and I was in.
Pictures of the time tickets from Phoenix Raceway park shown here.
The Geo was not exactly a "leaver", was not exactly consistent, and was definitely not fast. This car was all over the place. I dialed it in at something like 21.42 .
My first and only round pairing was with a 12 second early 70's Camaro. I took my best guess on a dial-in, seeing as how the car wouldn't run within .05 of itself, and turned the light green at the start. I had to be about 3/4 of the way downtrack before I heard that Camaro launch. I looked back and saw he'd turned his light green, so the race was on. Just as I'm approaching the traps and am running through the big X and the finish line cones, I thought I might have it won, but at the stripe something went by me so fast it rocked the little car with the wind as he passed by. The only thing I saw from then on was a pair of brake lights melting into one single light way out in the distance. He had went by me at 112 mph.
My wife had a report from the stands that was comical: she said when the people up there saw the pairing of the cars ahead of time, side bets were made on the senseless Geo/Camaro matchup and once the race started, a pack of them started chanting "Go-Geo Go-Geo Go-Geo! " Big moan from the crowd when the underdog lost.
Hey, it was kinda fun, a good memory...
This scenario could be repeated with a COPO, Cobra Jet, or Hemi matchup sometime. I'll have to tell you whether the wind from the fast car blows me sideways or not then.
