1955 Chevrolet
The cool 1955 Chevy in "TWO-LANE BLACKTOP" with Laurie Bird and Dennis Wilson
1955 Chevrolet 210 and 1970 Pontiac GTO
Who brought the weenies?
Don Prudhomme, Funny Car, 1976
Consecutive event wins: 5 | Consecutive round-wins: 22
How could Prudhomme possibly top his six-of-eight 1975 season? By winning seven of eight, of course, which he did in the most dominant season in Funny Car history.
Prudhomme won the first five consecutively: Winternationals, Gattornationals, Springnationals, Summernationals, and Le Grandnational with respective final-round defeats of McCulloch, Greer, McEwen (back-to-back), and Prock.
The Winternationals win was his second of what would be four in a row, and the Gators triumph was his third in a row there. He’d never won the Summernationals before 1976, but then went on to win it five times over the next seven years, and his win in Montreal was his second straight in a string of six wins in eight years north of the border.
How dominant was he in those first five events? He had low e.t. and top speed at all five and qualified No. 1 at four of the five, outdone only by Gary Burgin at the Gatornationals, where Prudhomme’s 6.31 was behind only Burgin’s 6.29.
Burgin also ended Prudhomme’s bid for a perfect season, stopping him in the Indy final as Beadle had done the year before. Prudhomme had qualified No. 1 in the quickest field in history (6.26 bump) with a national record 5.97, a full tenth ahead of Beadle’s second-ranked 6.07, then raced past Tom Hoover, Gordie Bonin, and Ron O’Donnell with runs of 6.05, 6.13, and 6.15 before shaking the tires to a 6.46 loss against Burgin’s 6.25, ending “the Snake’s” winning streak at 22 rounds.
Combined with his wins at the final two events of 1975, Prudhomme racked up 30 straight round-wins over the two seasons, which still stands as the longest winning streak in Funny Car history.
Prudhomme would go on to win in Seattle and Ontario to finish 1976 with seven wins in eight starts and a 30-1 round-win record.
Hawaii's Winningest Drag Racer, Roland Leong, Inducted into Hawaii Sports Hall of Fame
Those of you who get it, get it. The rest of you, I feel sorry for you.
Rodder and Super/Stock Magazine - July 1965
Car Craft Magazine - June 1964
Rodder and Super/Stock Magazine - September 1967
Car Craft Magazine - April 1965
Car Craft Magazine - September 1966
Tom "The Mongoose" McEwen and Don "The Snake" Prudhomme
1/35 scale die cast cars and full size cars.
HAVE A WHEELIE GOOD DAY
Swamp Rat I at Bakersfield in 1959 Steve Gibbs Photo
Through 1959 Don toured with the car basically unchanged from when he set the records in November 1957 and attended races from one coast to the other. Here the Don's Speed Shop Special pictured behind Isky's shop with Setto Postoian's car behind. This was the week before the first Smokers March Meet at Bakersfield. This was also the last week that the motor cover would fit on the car. After the March Meet where Don wasn't able to equal the performance of the supercharged Nitro burners he installed a blower and was loaded for Bear at Kingdon Dragstrip, where he cleaned up on the field.
Here are two very rare shots of Don at Kindon, CA in 1959.
On his way back to Florida from California, Garlits stopped off at Chandler AFB and had some fun with the Arizona boys and a few Californians. Here you can see that Don simply slipped a blower under his eight-carburetor set-up. That worked okay and Don was one of the last to stick with them, but they were not as precise in fuel metering as the more commonly used Hilborn fuel injection. Also, the numerous fuel delivery and overflow return lines that were necessary with the Stromberg carburetors was daunting to say the least. Dave Beck Photo
Barb Hamilton
The Late Barb Hamilton...she was the first woman to earn a license to race Supercharged cars. She won the 1966 Springnationals and was runner up at the 68 Indy Nationals.
My parachute didn't open.
The Five Second Club.