Chris Rini stages in the semi-finals

Below is one of my favorite cars.  I guess growing up in the era I did, and seeing a lot of nice ’57′s on the street and strip has never worn off.  This week I was sure to bring my flashes and lots of spare batteries.  I was experimenting with different techniques and liked the way these turned out.

Gotham City Pro Mod

Here is a shot of Chris Groom's beautiful Camaro coming out of the water box. Chris took the Lil'Dog win with a 4.21.

Here Todd Howard and Rocky Rainor pair off

Here's "Happy" Gilmer Hinshaw in his Senecal Construction Chevrolet Cobalt coming out of the water box. He qualified sixth with a 4.203.

In the Jr. Dragster class, Mitchell Harkey stuck it out to the finals to take the win.

Here are a few shots of some of the other contenders in the field.  There’s something about a huge huffer sitting on top of a race motor the grabs my attention.

Blown Pro Mod Corvette

Another crowd favorite. What a display of raw horsepower.

Blown Pro Mod

Here's my favorite '57 trying to get slowed down after another 180 MPH run.

Here Chris Groom is showing us what it takes to get to the winner's circle!

See at the races!  Jack

What a lineup of cars!   The quick 16 were definately in the QUICK category and every one of them were running all out.  Most up around 175 in the 1/8 and in the mid 4′s.  I think the Mo Pars and the Fords were truly outnumbered today.  Here are a few of my favorite shots of the fantastic action today.

Corvettes – couldn’t count them all.

Here the O’Reilly Auto Parts / Cheerwine corvette warms up the tires.

and then goes on to knock off another round.

Here the Hendrick Durham AutoMall corvette is working his way thru the qualifying tree.

I think one of everyone’s favorites, including mine, was this 55 Corvette.

Here a Chevy Nova tries to save some wear & tear on the front tires coming off the line.

I always like to position myself right about where the cars stop after their burnouts.  If I rack my 80 – 200 way out I can get some cool shots of the drivers in the cars.  In this one, I got a drivers view of the track from the reflection in his sunglasses.

By this time of day the sun was getting low and I knew I could get some good shots of the cars on the big end.  I took the hike down that way to capture some of the shots below.  I snuck up real close to the guardrail to get these.  I always keep my other eye open to watch for an unruley chute getting to close to my guardrail.

Here a Corvette uses both chutes to get stopped after a 175+ MPH run.

Here a nice 69 Camaro relies on the binders to get stopped.

At first I thought this Camaro was slidding the tires a bit, but I think he ended giving a little more than he had on this run.  Short intermission while the clean-up crew removed some expensive engine oil from the track!

So now I’m way off in BFE by myself, my Ipod way back in the truck, no tunes to listen too and getting really bored watching the clean-up crew mosey up and down the track when I heard this noise up in the sky.  Amazing how I can entertain myself when I have too!  There was a cow pasture behind me, but I decided on posting the copter pic instead!

So now I’m back to work and grab a couple of more good shots on the big end.  Now it’s starting to get a little to dark out here in BFE, so I take the hike back up to the line for round 3.  Just in time to catch this beautiful split window coming off the line.

Here Larry Leazer’s Camaro gets some good bite off the line.

Another nice Camaro doing a burnout!

Talk about being in the right place at the right time – or should that be the other way around.  I heard this loud pop, saw a ball of fire and a lot of people yelling.  The motor coughed and shot the scoop into the air like a cannon.  It landed 3′ behind me.  That’s nitrous escaping from a severed line.  Another intermission so the clean-up crew could earn their keep!

It was really starting to get dark, which meant I was loosing shutter speed really fast.  My ISO was up around 3200 and since my D300 isn’t anything like it’s big brother I had to call it a night.  I did manage to get a good shot of the fire coming out of the exhaust of this 57 Chevy.

Lee’s Performance Spring Fling at Mooresville Dragway May 9, 2009

I really enjoyed seeing all of the nice bikes today at the Strip.  What amazes me is how the technology has advanced by leaps and bounds since I’ve retired from active participation in the sport.   The weather was good for the most part if you overlook the really big storm that dumped a ton of crap on the track for about an hour.  Thanks to the fantastic crew drying the track off, things were up and running in no time.  As an added bonus to an already great time, Chris Rini made a couple of short passes to make a few final adjustments to his car.  What an awesome machine!  I met up with a fellow photographer and we both had a good time doing our own “bench racing.”  You should take time to check out his site.  I’m sure he has more pics of the race posted by now.  www.chrishullphotography.com

Chris Rini headed for the traps

After the Summit Pro Am last week I could hardly wait for this weekend to get here.  A lot of fantastic cars and people at Mooresville Dragway.  I was truely amazed at the recent technology in all of the cars and really enjoyed the show that the outlaw cars put on.  Chris Rini waded thru all of the contenders to take the final round win.

Explore the gallery and be sure and check out the cool slideshow of the race.   All of the images in the gallery are available for purchase, so make sure you look for your car!

See ya at the races.

Jack

Here is the link to the Gallery of more race pics!

IHRA Pro Am Series at Mooresville Dragway

Here’s a Gallery of more Pictures from this race

Some highlights from the IHRA Summit Pro-Am at the Moorseville Dragway.  April 3, 4, 5th 2009.

See ya at the races

Jack