6
Thursday, July 20, 1978
University Daily Kansan
Drag strip renaissance keeps rubber burning
By BRAD H. HAMILTON
Staff Writer
A green light flashes and a deafening roar reverberates across the crowded stands. The smell of burning rubber and gas fumes wafts across pincking families in the back of pickups. It's another Saturday night at the Lawrence Dragway, one mile west of Lawrence just south of Kansas Highway 40.
The scene that takes place at the dragway every Saturday night is reminiscent of the late 30s, a throwback to the early 90s, the fastest driver was kind of the drag strip.
Spectators, ranging from babies to girlfriends to grandmas, gather around the quarter-mile strip of asphalt to talk about cars and watch their friends race. Shouts pierce the *aie* as operators call out *five* or *two* drivers. Beer abounds.
THE AIR is filled with excitement each time two cars line up for their 12-second race down the strip.
According to Louise Pierce, who, with her husband, owns the track, the sport of drag racing has grown rapidly in the past three years.
"When we first bought the track we would have about 60 or 70 cars race a night, " Pierce said. "Now we have about 120 regular customers.
"Last year it really started growing. Now we have cars coming here from Manhattan, Kansas City, Atchison, Leavenworth, and most of our campus from 'lawrence.'"
Last Saturday, the dragway held a special super stock meet and offered a $100 purse. The meet drew almost 250 spectators at $3 each. According to Pierce, an average Saturday night will range from 100 to 200 people.
In addition to the Saturday night meets, the dragway holds grudge matches Wednesday nights in which race rivals can find out who is faster.
The language in the pits, where the drivers line their cars up and push them towards the start, can be understood only by those familiar with the sport.
"THE GOT A 327 block with a 258 crank so it comes out to about a 301." one raceer told another before he got into car. "I ran in the race and I was struck by numerical terminology refers to engine
Tom Young, 19, Lansing, did well in the super stock race Saturday night with his 1960 Chevrolet, which he bought in a junkyard for $25.
block size, which is measured in cubic inches.
"I redid the body, the transmission, the rear end and the engine and I put in a 327 block," he said.
According to Young, consistency is the key to winning.
Young, who works for his brother in a car repair shop, plays basketball for Baker University.
"I DO IT because it's a different sport. Not many people can say they drove cars."
"This is my third year of racing," he said. "I started when I was 15, and I do it as much as I can. The competition is a lot better now. It used to be that there were only about 60 cars here on a Saturday night but now there are usually more
Dallas said they came to Lawrence for the drag races.
Kathy Roadh, one of several female
drivers, comes from Maysville, Mo.
every weekend with her boyfriend, Steve
Dallas, who also races.
Dallas, who lost his brother.
"We came with a group of friends and brought five cars," Rhead said. "We both lost tonight, though."
"You've got to be consistent or you don't win," he said. "A lot of racers sandbag it at the end. That means they put on the brakes if they aren't ahead at the end so they get a slower time than we expected." That 3 looked down on ground here.
"As far as I'm concerned, it is the best strip around," he said. "We've been to some others but this is the best we one."
According to Louse Pierce, the track opens in March with grudge races. In April there are regular meets on Sundays and then on Saturday nights in June. On Oct. 1 they switch back to Sundays until the season, when they close for the season.
Bad weather often is a problem and can force rescheduling of races.
"We we've already lost seven races in the beginning of the season on account of bad weather," Pierce said. "We hold the race on the following Sunday morning if it's rained on a Saturday. That way people can just stay the night in town and don't have to drive all the way back home."
Fire...
From page one
we go through an elaborate workshop in the final to develop strategies for responding to changes in policy.
McEibenie said the KU police were notified immediately of an alarm.
"That's bad if it's a real incident. It could very well catch up with them some day."
BUT FRED McELHENIE, director of residential programs, said actual practice may differ somewhat from Thomas' recommendations.
Max Thomas, director of fire service training for the division of continuing education, said that in annual fire education classes for residence hall directors, he instructs the directors to report all fire alarms incidentally and then investigate the source.
Wolfe said the KU police dispatcher had a direct line to the Lawrence Fresher Department.
agent, John wrote, KU police dispatch supervisor, said that in about half the instances that an alarm was set off, the fire department was summoned.
"Generally, the person on duty tries to find out whether in fact we have a fire before the fire department is called. He can immediately locate the place where the alarm was pulled and direct someone to investigate."
"But a lot of people don't realize that except for four buildings we do not have a direct link to campus fire alarms," Wolfe said. "If a building alarm goes off at night, the only way we find out about it is if somebody happens to be walking or driving by."
THE FOUR BUILDINGS with automatic fire alarms linked directly to KU police headquarters in Hoch Auditorium are the Helen Foresman Spencer Museum of Art, the Spencer Research Library, the Kansas Union and the Kansas University Endowment Association building on West Campus.
The automatic system in Spencer
Museum has been responsible for six aliena alarms since the first of the years, but that was in 1962. It is now a museum.
There had been a problem earlier in the year when firefighters arrived at the scene of an alarm only to find the door to a building locked.
The fire department report on a Feb. 28 run to Spencer Museum reflected the
"We waited 10 minutes to get the door opened," the report said. "The KU police department was supposed to have a key in the police department office. The officers"
Fortunately, the alarm was false and the problem has since been remedied.
The KU police chief, Mike Hill, said that keys to all University buildings with automatic alarms were now kept in Hoch and policemen responding to alarms in those buildings picked up the key before going to meet the fire trucks.
Wolfe said he did not know of an instance when firefighters had not been able to gain access to a building after the procedure went into effect.
"I've had good cooperation from the KU police department," McSain said. "As soon as possible, I plan to spend some time with Mike Hill and Mike Thomas looking at the situation and see if we can work out a campuswide system for fire protection."
McSwain said that in an effort to combat the rising incidence of false alarms on campus he would like to develop fire education programs for University personnel.
Staff Photo by SUZANNE BURDICK
During last night's grudge match at the Lawrence Dragway, Dee Dgarmo of Olathe worked on an engine he built for such car races.
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