peedweek 2007 went off without a hitch despite rumors that it might be cancelled due to heavy rains. The three courses originally planned were scrapped because of flooding and the SCTA/BNI crews worked non-stop to get two courses up and running. Although we all had to drive through two to eight inches of water at the end of the road, the courses were clean and the race went on.
Wayne Jesel’s 2005 Dodge Ram (#4449) pickup bumped the old record in its class by nearly 100 mph. Under the hood is a 358” Dodge NASCAR engine with twin turbos on it. Driver Jimmy Barton ran a two way average of 248.694 on the old class record of 153.149. |
The rumor of cancellation did seem to keep a lot of racers from attending. I had a list of over 20 entries either Chrysler powered or bodied and only managed to find fourteen of them. There were a couple of Mopar spectators and I did manage a nice shot of a ’34 Dodge coupe with Hemi power as it drove away. There was a Hemi Roadrunner clone and a ’70 AAR ‘Cuda running around but I never managed to find them on the salt.
Ethel and I had a great time photographing the cars we did find and we hope y’all enjoy the photo essay. Our thanks to the entire staff, volunteer crew, and racers for yet another great time on the salt. My only wish was for us to be able to stay the whole week. At least we had until Tuesday morning. Hopefully in the future we’ll see more Chrysler bodied cars with Mopar engine combos.
Here is the Hardman racing G/BGL #315 getting under way to raise the bar again. Driver Ken Hardman ran 248.309 on a 212.765 record. Behind Ken in the lakester is a 2 liter Chrysler Touring car series race engine turbo’d to the hilt and capable of turning 9,000 rpm. Tom Wierzchon and John Bucknell help out Ken and his dad, Ralph Hardman, on this record breaking lakester.
