CLASS RACER FORUM - Terry Bell

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bob Pagano (Post 124973)

Terry, I emailed Bruce a month ago at nhra about a wrong pan # and I still have not gotten an answer. Things must be tough everywhere.

I cant speak for Bruce or others on why they have not gotten back with you but I finally woke up after 22 years of it. To many hours on your feet in the humidity and heat, travel using your own vehicle (wear and tear), time off work to do this stuff missing pay and or vacation days used to be beat up on, low to no pay unless you think $100 for a 17 hour day is great (NHRA workers get far less than IHRA workers), and the associations want you to do every crap job like scraping the track after midnight after being on your feet since 7 AM to cleanning the **** houses. Then there is the lack of thanks and respect from the so called racers as I have experienced even when one tries to help someone at the races and on this forum. I/we did it for the love of racing so Im not really complainning but trying to explain the whys and what fors. Why do you think Stock/Super Stock Sportsman tech offical Duane Eiskant quit IHRA a couple of years ago?? He did it all from towing the tech trailer (with his van) and answered tech questions, edited the rule book, kept the precision tools clean and in spec, up dated HP ratings, updated the tech books, and all he wanted a small raise in pay.....yeah right....like that was going to happen. I have met some wonerful people and made some great friends but then there is the other side of the coin. Over the years ive been threatened, had a gun pulled on me (more than once) and some fellow tech people, Who needs it. The people who do it now are either new at it or see visions of grandure in thier eyes. Over the years I have worked for NHRA (2 years), IHRA almost 22 years), and the NMCA (3 years) when it belonged to Racing Head Service out of Memphis Tenn. THEN I had a brain fart about starting a Stock and S/S association a while back with Alex but I could soon see certain people either didnt want to see it happen or they just wanted to argue about if the sky was blue or not. I would ask a simple question and you would think the world was going to implode before something even came to happen. The ONLY people who make any money at working at these races are the Division Directors and the NHRA prema donnas in Calif.. Even the Division TECH DIRECTORS do not make squat at these races. The track personnel and the tech people not only do not earn enough to make it worth while they have thier decisions overturned by a certain someone in Calif. So why do it? Because we love the pepole and the sport....Theres no other reason for wanting to have your nuts crushed in a vise that I can see. Besides the tech people who REALLY know stock and super stock are OLD and getting older and starting to bail out as I have done. This is one reason for the total lack of tech of these cars in about the last 20 + years plus (can we say cam and valve spring rule, bogus heads and intakes, "paper" cars, replacement parts) the fact is the associations dont want to pay what little they do pay to have a good crew in to do a correct job.. The good guys are all gone on to other things like Greg X (my mentor), Marty Barrett (passed away), Skip Asay, Westly Robinson (wont do National events any more)), and many more that elude me at the moment. Be VERY tankful you have guys like Travis Miller, Hank Blankenship, etc. OK.....Im done venting.. .