Quote:
Originally Posted by ss3011
"I remember a '70 named Kathy's Clown. I have a pic of it running against Rock Running's Super Sleeper."
Ray Stover raced Kathy's Clown in Div 3 , Ray was an NHRA Tech Inspector after he stopped racing . Both Ray and Kathy worked for Div 3 , nice people !
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Yeah, I remember that name now. Haven't seen or heard it in years. I always remembered the car's name, because Kathy was the name of my high school girlfriend. And, because of the old pop song "Cathy's Clown".
As all the older guys will remember, there were LOTS of cars back in the old days that had some sort of name on the side. Yeah, many had a sponsor's name, or the name of the car owner, or the business the car owner had, or the driver's name, & sometimes the name of the driver & owner or driver & partner, or driver & wife.
But, there were also lots of catchy names. Seems that those were the names that were easy to remember. And we usually referred to a car by it's name, especially if it had a good one. For example: I would never have referred to that car as Ray Stover's car, since I didn't even know him. I'd have referred to it as Kathy's Clown, or the Kathy's Clown car.
Same with Rock Running's "Super Sleeper" cars. I know he's had quite a few with that same name. So, I might have said the Super Sleeper '74 GTO. or the Super Sleeper T-37, or whatever kind of car he had that name on.
So, when I built a car for my girlfriend(now wife TJ), we decided to come up with a good name for it. Again, you older guys will remember this. There was a song that was the country music song of the year, for 2 years in a row, back in the early '70's. It also went pretty high on the Billboard top 100. The song was "Easy Lovin", by Freddy Hart. It was played on radio stations, a LOT. Most everybody could sing along without missing a word.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Easy_Loving
Why am I spending so much time on this. It's because car names were a very important part of drag racing, back in the old days. Hey, if you wanted your car to LOOK like a drag car, all you had to do was put a good name on it, lots of racing decals, then a nice set of wheels & tires, just like the real drag cars had. I can still call a car's name, from some of the tracks we raced, over 40 years ago, and TJ will remember the car, & sometimes even the owners name. We can all remember certain cars by their name.
I've noticed that in recent years, lots of racers don't want a name on their car. They don't want ANY lettering of any kind, and no decals. I personally don't like that look, for a drag car. I want a drag car to look different from a street show car. Opinions differ.
We used the EZ name on 3 different '68 Firebirds. All our area tracks dropped class racing & went to all brackets, by '77. So, we switched too. TJ went right on winning at bracket racing, just like she had at Stock racing. The basics of driving are the same. Cut a good light & run your dial. She won the LA State Championship Race in Stock, then the Southwest Ark Championship Race, then the IHRA points race held at the Tyler TX track. Got her pic & a little ink in the IHRA drag review paper, for that win. Also got a pic of her car & a little ink in Hot Rod mag, in the Nov '77 issue. The pic was made at the Green Valley Race City track, where the div 4 bracket finals were held.
Well hey, ya'll will just have to excuse me. You just have to toot your own horn now & then. Very few members here have ever even heard of us, much less met us. Due to life's circumstances, I have not got to race near as much as I would have liked, & never had enuff money to do it right. But that don't make me like it any less. I still like to talk about it, & keep up with what others are doing.
