Others have survived and continue to serve area racers. Some have since passed on, victims of the out-crawl of the suburbs and accelerated real estate values. But the Southwest was and is a stronghold of full-body, Sportsman racing, especially in what were the Gasser and Modified Production ranks.Īlong with those drag racing legends came equally famed Southwestern drag strips. Legends such as Kenny Bernstein, Raymond Beadle, Dick Harrell, Billy Meyer and Don Hardy hail from the region, along with many more equally well-known names. Here he makes a run at The NHRA Winternationals, Pomona, CA.įor drag racers the Southwest region of the U.S. Along the way Loper moved from Gassers to the loud and expensive nitro Funny Car ranks where his bad, black Funnies were never a laughing matter. That later became one of the Southwest’s largest and most successful speed warehouse operations. Loper’s small-block Chevy powered car became a well-known advertisement for his Loper’s Speed Shop. We didn't go there just to pick up girls, we were serious racers.From Phoenix, Arizona came Johnny Loper’s legendary “Lil Hoss” ’48 Anglia A/Gasser. The smoother the wheels, the faster you'd go. A lot of times I'd slide and hit the wall and the wheels would explode. They were detachables you'd take the wheels off, or trucks they were called. I had little bitty wheels in the front and big wheels on the back. We didn't have polyurethane wheels like today, we had wooden wheels. I'd be crouched down sitting on my skates, he was behind me on his toe stops and we'd go into the first corner and I'd lean and he pushed me into the corner.
There'd be like 10 of us lined up and they'd blow the whistle. McCourry was a bigger, stronger guy than me so Tom would push me. That's where I got the passion for speed. The Burbank guys didn't go to the Rainbow, just us Valley guys. "Tom and I were 14 or 15 when we started going to the Rainbow Roller Rink in Van Nuys.
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