off the beaten path,,,,,,maybe a little fun

[THE LEGEND]

Another true story.
IHRA U.S. open nationals in 1985 or 86. I won class with my pure stock 1975 monza(had a bye). THe car was about half seconfd off index. It had a primer fender,door and rear hatch. Robert Leonard the IHRA tech director came to my pit and told me the car had to be all primer or painted before first rd or I could'nt run. I asked why. He said IHRA could'nt take a chance on that thing being on T.V. looking light that. LOL
I drove into town went to K-Mart and bought a couple cans of spray on primer. I came back and primered the car in the pits. Got beat first rd. but I still got to race. LOL

Chip

[Michael Beard]

>> forgot to put gas in the car.

That's funny... the first round I ever won with the Dust Devil, when it was still in primer, I ran out of gas right on the starting line when the top bulb came on. As they pushed me back off the line, they told me I won... my opponent broke out!

When we went to re-paint the Duster years later, dad had the whole car pretty well sanded down. Still took it to the track for the season opener. I wanted to win just to make Todd (the track photographer) take a picture of the thing!


...and then I met BILLY NEES.
Dad and I had gotten interested in learning more about Stock. I'd heard some stories about the reclusive genius(?), but one day, he happened to show up at a race at Beaver Springs. I saw him in the staging lanes.
Hi, Mr. Nees, how's the Stock circuit going?
"Mr. Nees is my FATHER. I haven't earned that respect yet. It's Billy. And it's not going too good."
Um... oh.
"You know, you'd be a killer in a slow car."
Well, I uh...
"YOU'RE ARROGANT."
er...
"You're REALLY arrogant!"
ack...

And so he proceeded to show me the (insert angels singing) CLASSIFICATION GUIDE.
"How much money do you have?"
I don't have any.
"So you're going to run a front wheel drive car. What kind of cars do you like?"
I've always run Mopars.
HUFF. "Well, if you HAVE to run a Mopar..."
and the Turismo was begun... as did several years of death threats from Billy.

I actually found an '85 Turismo Duster, which Jim's Used Cars gave to me as sponsorship. We got the car home on a Wednesday, hacked the exhaust and power steering belt off of it, changed the oil and spark plugs, and took it to the track that Friday. It ran a 20.45. I won that night. I got a trophy. The starter got $10 because he bet somebody that I'd win.

"Michael, get that car to the track. If I don't take a SECOND off of this thing, I'll quit racing."
Ok, it's your career.
That Sunday, with a little tinkering, Billy ran an 18.79 on the first pass. I'm in the back of the lanes jumping up and down, with a bunch of guys looking at me like I'm a loon. Billy returned to the lanes, "I don't think I'll be quitting anytime soon, pup." Some fine tuning later, he ran an 18.45... picking the car up 2 seconds and 7 mph.


The entire buildup story is still available here: http://www.staginglight.com/stocker/intro.html

Although my favorite memory of racing with Billy may still be riding down to VMP together, singing the SPAM song. If you don't understand, don't ask.

[tgriffith]

Im my fist teardown,,(,which unfortuneatley got me tossed),,,,,the tech guy was measuring stuff and I could see the expressions on his race as he would measure ,, look at his book and then re measure...........me standing there looking as dumb as a coal bucket,,,finally got the nerve to ask,,,,"",I can see your concerned about something,,,Im new to this,,so would you care to give me some heads up and how this is done"",,,,,,,, he said,,,"well I keep measuring cause all the numbers keep coming up wrong,,,,they are way short,,,the cam is short,,cc`s are big,,,pistons are .020 in the hole when your allowed .000 deck"......who in the heck did this motor for you?????----I shrugged and said "advanced auto---the book says stock,,so thats what I told them,,,stock for a 89 cavalier 2.8"------I think the tech guys had GOOD LAUGH that day !!!

[Don Himes]

"Reclusive Genius"? His legend keeps on growing! I just thought he was a "crusty 'ol poop" myself. One day at E-Town, Billy saw me heading toward my race car with two hands full of tools. He jumped up from his trailer and screamed at me "Put down the tools and back away from the car!" Apparently my "expertise with wrenches" was better known than I expected. He then jumped under the car and replaced all of my body mounts. The car had been moving and hitting the slicks upon launch.

[FLEMING]

The first year I started racing this guy in the lanes beside me dialed 5.68 (it was a bone stock nissan pickup) I was trying to be polite and point out there was no way that truck could run that .. The guy pulled his slip out of his pocket and pointed to his reaction time... "See here he said, it ran 5.68 the last run".. I said well good luck! LOLOLOL

A good one on me.. I went with rusty to hattisburg points race in 1997, they had a friday night bracket race $10 entry $2,000 to win.. So rusty decided that (WE) would get in it.. So he goes down and enters us, I had never made a lap in his monza, but I had driven his dragster (which was my wifes car then)... So I he decides it would be best if I raced the monza?? WTF?? LOL SO I roll up to the water box in the car that is leading the national points race by a TON I do my burnout and notice that the distance from the edge of the water to the starting line is really really short.. People were rolling thru the lites because they couldnt get stopped so I did the same... I was backing up and saw the lites flicker as I rolled backwards thru the beams, I stop, put my top light on and start bumping to get my second one on.. Mark horton walks up and opens the door and tells me I am staging with my back tires!!!!! LOLOLOL Too damn funny.. Glad people thought it was rusty and not me.. LOLOLOL

[Michael Beard]

>> Mark horton walks up and opens the door and tells me I am staging with my back tires!!!!!

I'm afraid I've been there, too... LOL I was driving Adger Smith's Super Stocker, and he said that the line lock wasn't working sometimes. Sure enough, it didn't work in the burnout box, so I tried to just "Pro Stock" it to get some heat in the tires, and stop before the line. He had recently switched classes and put a bigger hoodscoop on the car, not to mention the seat is mounted really low in the car. As it turns out, I had no idea where I was... Sam Kearns walks out in front and points back toward the line, so I put it in reverse, back up, I saw the pre-stage/stage lights flicker, and he waved his hand. So I stop. He looks at me again like, "Are you DUMB?" So I back up more to finally get the *front* tires behind the line. And Tim Lee got it all on video tape. Some hero! LMAO!

[THE LEGEND]

Dumb as a coal bucket. Thats really funny.

Back in the early 90's I had a guy come to me and asked if I would look at his delay box. He called it a computer as did a lot of "DUMB AS A COAL BUCKET" people did back then. I said whats wrong with it. He did'nt know. He had just put it in and kept redlighting. I asked what numbers he had in it. He said he put all zeros in so he could have a perfect light. I told him it must be a bad box LOL
Chip

[Michael Beard]

Wayne Golanka got to drive Billy Nees' U/SA Nova a few times. The first time, Billy gave him the talk-through of how to drive it. "Bring it up a little, bump it in, hold the brake as hard as you can, and mat it. And don't look at the tach!"

Wayne came back from his first run, with an .800 light. What happened?
"I couldn't help myself! When I put it on the wood, I looked at the tach! I couldn't stop staring at it!" he yelped in disbelief.

John DiBartolmeo got to drive the car, and got a similar speech. John's sitting in the car, with Billy leaning in the passenger side. "Hold the brake, and then put THAT foot on the FLOOR."

John's head whipped around, "Are you SERIOUS?"

I ran against him on his first time shot. I was in the Turismo, so even though he only ran in the 14's, he got to beat somebody to the finish. Keep in mind that the slowest thing John D had ever driven was his 12-sec Chevelle he won the first Bracket Finals at York US30 with. When he got out of the car, his grin was wider than his face. (I've had a couple of Super Stock guys drive the Turismo over the years, with similar reactions.... "This thing is FUN!") Kinda like a go-cart I guess.