2009 Gasser Reunion Thompson Ohio

Sorry Dale! Forgot the quote!

 

Chuck, nice shot of Rocky and me. Good to see you.

Steve

 

This weekend had many "great" moments....but the greatest for me had to be seeing legendary gasser pilot Fred Bear make "passes" in the K.S. Pittman tribute car. Here's my crew chief, best bud and father in law Bill Ellershaw guiding Freddy into the beams.

 

Here's another way cool happening. This is me in the K.S. 33 and Freddy in his 40 Willys. This was the first time two S&S race team cars went down the track side by side in 40 plus years..!

 

Another neat memory to a great weekend. I was doing triple duty at this race, thats me driving Dave Cobbs 33 Willys Flashback and Freddy driving the K.S. 33. I built the Flashback back in 1985 or so and sold it in 91, I hadn't been down the 1/4 mile in this car in over 18 years, it was a lot of fun. We were entered in the Pro Gas class (8.50 index) and was trying to dial her in to the index, went a 8.76 on the first check out run.

 

Coming into this event, I planned on making some exhibition runs in the K.S. 33. Nothing special, just some squirts down the quarter mile. When I saw there was going to be a AA/GS class at Thompson, I thought it would be neat to enter the KS car. My only reservation was the fact we didn't know what to expect performance wise (only two shake down runs prior)
Last Saturday we went to Cecil to test and ran back to back 5.80's, I was more than happy with this so we decided to give it a shot. The K.S. Pittman 33 is a tribute car I built to K.S. and the S&S race team, I built it as close as humanly possible to the original one that was built in 1966, same rear suspension, same front end set up, same drive line (early hemi, torque flite trans, 58 Pontiac rear), even the same style tires on the rear, M&H racemasters. The only addition was a set of wheelie bars to help keep the front end down. I knew going in there would be some cars that would be quicker, but figured if we could stay close anything could happen. Since I was driving two other cars at this event, I had original S&S team driver and my very good friend Fred Bear make the qualifying runs (and 1st round, as I was driving the Flashback Willys in the Pro Gas class) Freddy did great getting us into the number two slot at a stout 5.76. The number one qualifier was the bad ass Hemi J who ran a 5.55. We knew we had to close the gap, and we did, tuning the 33 to 5.67. In the final, we got what we needed, a good jump on the tree and a 5.71 to his quicker 5.61 VICTORY..!!! This win was for K.S. and LaVaun and the entire S&S team...........!

 

Oh yea....I forgot we even ran the funny car on Saturday night...talk about too much fun...this should be illegal...lol

 

We were booked in as part of the Great Lakes Funny Car Assoc. A great bunch of guys, that are a blast to race with. Here's our first round run against F Troop Steve.... We had two wins on the night and walked with low ET of the meet with a 6.89....

 

OK, last shot....our normal back up hottie, Michele couldn't make the trip, so we "borrowed" this very pretty young lady from the Damn Yankee funny car team, her name is Nicole and she did a great job...!

 

Thanks for clearing that up. That vette was really cool, but I still love those high nosed Willy's...

 

Rocky;
Good to see you and the entire team again.
Thompson is/was a great show with a lot of neat cars.
Always good catching up with folks we only see a few times a year.

Hemi J boys..Canadian eh?...they did well..
When was the last time ya saw 30 ....yes 30 ..409 cars in ONE place??? unreal show !!!

Proenfo..GREAT pics...(don't show these to Wenzelburger..LOL)..

Dispite our car going flat on it's face ,we still had a great time.

1939fiat
Rick

 

Rick,

It was great seeing you too. That Hemi J is one bad ass race car. I heard them warming it up and I thought it was one of the funny cars..! Plenty stout. We were fortunate to get by them. See you in Buffalo.......

Rocky

 

Yes ,it is..The old saying about keep throwing $$ at it ,till it comes around..must be true..

They have had their share of problems sorting that car out..I've seen them testing locally..
I think this a new motor from last year.

They are GUNNING for you AA/G guys...

Rick

 

You were one busy dude Rocky!

Thanks for helping out Dave with the Flashback so that we could have a full field in the pro-gas class. I was hoping you'd go a round or two after the bad luck he had in qualifying, but it was good to have you in there for a round anyway.

I only got to see the AA cars run as I was coming up the return road since they always ran after us. The KS-33 sure looks pretty coming down the track from the far end.

Perry

 

Hi Perry,

We were busy, but the important thing is we were having FUN....lol Dave made the 1st qualifier pass and broke the input shaft, he had some friends pull the trans out on Saturday night. We did our best to get the car close to the index, but had some issues with the back brakes not working, I made the first pass with little brakes, fun...(g) I thought we had solved the problem when we bleed them but they still weren't 100% for the first round. Racing Bob is always fun and he owed me a few, and he whooped my ass! Still, had a blast..! It was neat to be back in the Flashback, she goes straight as a arrow, should have no problems running 8.50's. You guys have a good thing going with your class, bunch of nice guys running hard and having fun....! Good luck the rest of the year.

Rocky

 

Here are some we took:

 

and a few more:

 

Funny Cars Anyone?

 

A few more

 

Breeze,

Thanks for the great shots....!

Rocky

 

Thanks Boss...Most of the ones I got were in the pits, I love some of the shots these others posted at the line pulling wheelies. Had a great time... Thompson has another one later in the year right? September/October???

 

The gasser style golf cart was pretty cool too!

 

While it's already been said I just gotta repeat it - the Thompson crew was absolutely fantastic! The car count was tremendous and yet they still managed to keep things rolling right along - even when some of us found ourselves in the wrong lane

My hats off to all of you guys and gals!!!!!! I still can't believe those 3 days went by so fast!!!!!


BTW - did anyone get any pics of my buddy's flamed '55 Ford towing the digger back down the return road?? I'd love to see how that looked.

 

More thompson shots. Check out page 12 for my other pictures.

 

Breeze,
Those are some great pictures. Thanks for including ours.
Gasser Girl

 

Camera video of the 550 car, 371 olds, B&M Hydro, pretty nostalgic in build
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I got a bad one, he was towing to fast...lol

 

BTW - did anyone get any pics of my buddy's flamed '55 Ford towing the digger back down the return road?? I'd love to see how that looked.[/QUOTE]
I got one of the two of you in the staging lanes. I'm trying to get some organizing and editing done before doing a Webshots gallery, but maybe tomorrow I will get it up and include that shot.

 

More

 

Hey Bob, I can't wait to see what you come up with!!!!!! I bet you're SWIMMIN' in pics - there was just so much to see there!!!!!!!!!! Looking at all the pics so far I see SO MUCH that I missed!!!!!!!

I got one of the two of you in the staging lanes. I'm trying to get some organizing and editing done before doing a Webshots gallery, but maybe tomorrow I will get it up and include that shot.[/QUOTE]