LA Times article on drag racing

[tom h]

yesterday's (Thursday Nov 4) LA Times "Calendar Live" section had a features-type article on drag racing. Unfortunately that particular section requires an LA Times subscription to access.
http://www.calendarlive.com/printedition/calendar/calwknd/more/

Article lead-in was:

Whiplash nation
By Dan Neil, Times Staff Writer
COVER STORY: Anyone with a car, a license and $20 can burn some serious rubber on a drag strip.

It was mildly entertaining, and focussed on a Test&Tune night at Irwindale Raceway in LA county. Mainly he wrote about the strange spectrum of people and cars he observed, from 60's muscle cars to middle aged ladies running a mercedes (or something like that).

The writer (also the LA Times auto editor) brought a BMW MiniCooper to the 1/8 mile track.

His night's best: 12-ish seconds @ 64 MPH

Article had a positive attitude, that can only help. Most LA news involving drag racing usually starts off "3 children killed by lawless racers"

 

[turbojimmy]

Originally posted by tom h
The writer (also the LA Times auto editor) brought a BMW MiniCooper to the 1/8 mile track.

His night's best: 12-ish seconds @ 64 MPH

There's a car and driver that I love to hate. It used to be the Subaru drivers were the worst (I find that they're more aggressive than most). But everyone that has one of those stupid little Minis thinks it's some kind of race car. Yeah, it handles well, but they always look so shocked when you blow them away at a stoplight or an entrance ramp. Don't get me started on the Cooper "S" drivers

Jim

 

[tom h]

At least in this case, the MiniCooper was "on loan" because the writer was doing a review of it for another article.

If you're ever able to read the article, the writer was poking fun at himself, and he was pretty good natured about the whole evening. He even did not disparage all the Ricers there, but he didn't call them ricers ... it was the "import tuning crowd" or soemthing

 

[ledzeppac]

I like to go to Irwindale, we make fun of the Ricers and they actually think they are fast. Its hilarious when a 6 sec. car lines up agaisnt these 12 sec ones. Most of the time they can't even stage their stupid car. In teh pits you get to see all the losers talk about putting ice in the radiator to make them faster. There are however real cars there. I would say its 60/ 40 more domestic than import.