51st Annual March Meet
The 51st annual March Meet in Bakersfield, CA’s Kern County drew a record crowd of over 30,000 fans to Auto Club Famoso Raceway for a three-day speed celebration. Every kind of racecar and hot rod were in attendance at the Patch ranging from rat rods to the first dragster and a Cacklefest corral of nitro-burning noisemakers that followed from the NHRA Motorsports Museum. Fuelers, Funny Cars, Gassers, Door Slammers, Altereds and approximately 800 RV’s packed the pits and midway giving the generations of families who attended plenty to see.
The 2009 March Meet marked the 1st West Coast appearance of The Pacers’ with their newly created Tasmanian Devil II AA/FA which was on display among The Frantic Four’s AA/FD, cartoonist Pete Millar’s amazing family and The Winged Express AA/FA. The message of why Taz II was built (to tribute both The Snizek & Dodge hall of fame racing team and to memorialize those who were tragically lost during the WTC attack) was well received by West Coast racers. Prior to the National Anthem on Sunday, Taz II and its crew staged Taz II under the starting line Stars & Stripes to honor and pay their respects. Two-time NHRA world champion Funny Car driver, Cruz Pedregon met with the team and many of the photographers and racers expressed gratitude at the ceremony and their appreciation for the team making it to the West Coast. For an East Coast team to be recognized and welcomed at a West Coast event was special and says much about how times have changed. While the rivalry was responsible for making the sport into what it has become, the people’s love of the sport is what keeps it going.
For those who didn’t know of The Pacers, the timing of the recent national coverage of Pacers in issue #43 of The Rodder’s Journal couldn’t have been better. It pictured Pacers’ Tasmanian Devil AA/A, their matching ‘57 Chevy step side push truck and crew at the 1963 & 1964 U.S.Nationals. Pacers gained National attention from the multiple magazine coverage for the records they set at Indy for ET & MPH (NHRA Class Record AA/Altered 161.87 MPH @ 9.56 SEC) in 1964. Pacers had also been awarded Popular Hot Rodding’s “Best Appearing Crew” the prior year at the 1963 Nationals.
The Hot Rod Heritage Series, the NHRA’s 8-race nostalgia racing series, kicked off the March meet with their first race of the season. Over 500 race cars were entered and competed across 14 classes: Nostalgia Top Fuel; Nostalgia Funny Car; A/Fuel; Junior Fuel; 7.0 Eliminator; AA/Gas Supercharged; Nostalgia Eliminator 1, Nostalgia Eliminator 2; Nostalgia Eliminator 3; A Gas; B Gas; C Gas; D Gas; and Hot Rod.
According to the NHRA, the series was created to appeal to drag racing fans young and old as a way to introduce the younger generation to the history of the sport while giving them a glimpse of racing the way it used to be. And it sure did.