Hot Rodders and a stop watch you ask?  Ya, I'll get to that in a minute.  But first, let me introduce you to one of my favorite automotive competitions:  Time Attack or Superlap Battle.   These pictures were taken by the MotorMavens.com crew at Eastern Creek Raceway in Australia, as part of the World Time Attack Challenge, the first of its kind, pitting the best the world has to offer in Time Attack. What exactly is Time Attack?  It's simply taking your car around a road course as fast as you can and recording the fastest single lap time, hence the name Superlap.  There are various classes that your car might fit in.  Currently most of the vehicles that compete today are of the Japanese or European make.  Here's where the hot rodders with the stopwatches comes in.  Time Attack has almost zero muscle cars.  Wat up wit dat?  Here's the R-Magic prepared Mazda RX-7, one of the fastest Unlimited Time Attack cars in Japan.  Time Attack began in Japan in the late 1980's.  It was a chance for top Speed Shops (they're referred to as Tuning Shops, not Speed Shops, but...

The latest Internet Barn Find is for those land speed racing Salt (or dust) Fever infected bunch.  I bring you DLRA.org.au, the Dry Lakes Racers Australia site.  The Dry Lakes Racers Australia held it's first Speed Trials meet in March 1990 and has been doing so (weather permitting) ever since. It has attracted competitors from all over Australia, the United States of America, New Zealand and the UK.  Currently they only race once per year, but that could change in 2011. The racing happens on Lake Gairdner (well, it used to be a lake).  It's an 8 mile track including the shut down area.  The bummer part is it takes 80 miles driving on dirt roads to get to the race track (compared to Bonneville's 1 mile from "Lands End").  Just like at Bonneville, the site admin told me that if you stand around too long, you'll likely get put to work.  Here's a fendered (smart move with 80 miles of dust) hot rod roadster heading out to Lake Gairdner for Salt Flats Racing.  80 miles of dirt roads is no joke and not for the faint of hot rod heart. There...

As I mentioned in the blog about the Rocky Mountain Raceway's Midnight Drift event, I met Marco and his friend Rudy in the pits during the Midnight Drag and Drift event.   First of all, to you hot rodders out there who don't YET get drifting, let me tell you about the Nissan 240SX.  In a way, this car in Japan is similar in following and cult status as a Mustang or Camaro.  The similarities may be more than you think.  Rear wheel drive setup, Coupe body styling, small back seat, huge aftermarket support and fun to drive status.  The differences are aplenty as well though.  Mustangs get a solid rear axle and V6 and V8 engines and weigh 3200-3600lbs.  The Nissan 240SX (or 180SX or Silvia in Japan) comes with an independent rear suspension and 2.4L 4 cylinder (turbo 2.0L outside Japan) naturally aspirated truck engine in the USA and weighs about 2800lbs.  So, there's a little history on the 240 for ya.  Marco has owned his S13 (S13 is like what the Mustang guy's equivalent of SN95 or S197 chassis codes for the 1989-94 240SX, S14 for 1995-1998 and S15 for...

Bonneville Salt Flats: Traditional or Modern? It's no doubt I have Salt Fever.  For me, the car that represents the Bonneville Salt Flats, El Mirage Dry Lakes and the hot rod hobby as a whole is the early Ford roadster. At Speedweek 2009 while hangin' out at the starting line just soaking in the Salt, I spotted 2 Lakes Modified Roadsters.  I knew I dug the stance on both rods.  I went in for a look-see.  CLICK on each Picture to Zoom in. The dark blue roadster is a more traditional style rod with its dual carbed flatty V8, cowl-less engine bay, floorless interior (ok, so there was some wood "floor panels"), bomber seats and wire wheels and skinny tires.  The orange roadster has a plush interior, shiny paint, an independent rear end and hot rod style big n little wheels and tires.  I actually dig each style for different reasons.  But, if I could only have one...which one would it be?  Let's take a closer look. Again, the difference is easy to see.  Bomber seats, no door panels, wood floors, a couple guages and big steering OEM wheel on the left, plush leather interior, shiny...

Salt Lake City, Utah has a decent sized auto enthusiasts community for how small of a city and state it is.  There's about 2.5 million people in all of Utah.  Utah has 2 racing facilities, Rocky Mountain Raceway (RMR) with its 1/4 mile dragstrip and asphalt oval and Miller Motorsports Park with its 4+ mile road course. Last night I hit up the 2nd Midnight Drag and Drift event of the year.  RMR has been holding Midnight Drags since about 2001 or so.  It was touted as a way to get the young punks off the streets and have a safe and organized way to race.  I raced my first Civic at a couple Midnight Drags back then.  A couple years ago though, the Drift Enterprise of Utah started holding Midnight Drift events on the oval track.  I thought this sign was kinda cool.  "Section D" for DRIFT!!! The number of cars entered in the drag portion are probably 150-200.  For the drift boys, there's only about 8-10 cars.  The number of people watching the drag racing is probably somewhere around 1000+.  The people watching drifting?  1, maybe  2.  Ok, not that...

One of the first hot rod tricks a hot street car gets is a set of gears.  If your 'Stang's 8.8 inch rearend came from Ford with a set of 3.08's or even worse, 2.73's, the car was pretty much a DOG!  A set of 3.73's, 3.90's or even 4.10's really wakes 'em up.  Don't throw away those 2.73's though, you may wanna go for a run down the Salt.  haha Here is "Calera Kid" himself doing a burnout at the now defunct L.A.C.R. drag strip.  This was taken at the "Hang Over Nationals" in 2002.  Anyone ever hit the Hang Overs at Palmdale? "Sally" has run a best time of 12.85 seconds at 106mph at Famoso with 4.10's.  Eventually the plan is to replace the stock ported E7 heads for the GT40P heads and the stock cam with a higher lift unit.  For now, a set of Ford Racing 3.73 ratio Ring and Pinion from AmericanMuscle.com might allow the low revving stock head/cam "five oh" motor to utilize the good torque with a set of 3.73's. If you're a "do it yourself" hot rodder, here's the step by step instructions for the swap.  Part 1 will focus on the...

Story and Photos by Nick Koljian Today was the 9th Annual Car & Bike show held at Arroyo High School in San Lorenzo,CA. I've never been so I thought today would be a nice day to check it out. The sun was shining, a nice breeze blowing and my oldest, Mia, was really jazzed about her first show of the year with pops. So at about 9:00am the crew rolled out in route for San Lorenzo. Upon arrival at the High School I noticed that it was being held on the football field which I thought was pretty cool. Slapped down our 5 bucks (which goes to the Arroyo High Boosters Club) and we were in. As a  local show I wasn't expecting anything huge and I was right. But with that said, it was a comfortable show, maybe 100, 120 rides. There was more hot rods than channeled rusters, there was more paint than primer and there was more post 68' than pre 52'. But hey, not everyone has the same tastes in rides and that's what makes the love for cars so great. Beauty is in the...

I'm going to put this out there up front... I will not be able to do this story justice.  But, its such a great story and a cool car that you are going to get it and you are going to like it.  Ok, I got that out, now on to the man and the machine. The man is cancer survivor and current cancer fighter Dan Sallia.  The machine is the historic Burke Bros. Bonneville record holding 1962 Studebaker Avanti.  I originally found Dan's story on landracing.com in a build thread he started there.  That led me to his more detailed build thread on RacingStudebakers.com where I spent about 4 hours reading through the posts during 2 separate nights, checking out the pictures and soaking in one of the coolest car-guy stories I've ever heard.  I knew I had to share it the MyRideisMe.com readers. Here's Dan working in the engine bay of the Stude.  Now THAT is a setback motor! Dan has been racing against Cancer for about 4 years and has had 3 tumors.  Recently another tumor was discovered, so Dan is working with his doctors (one doctor is actually a land...

Bonneville Salt Flats: Speed Week 2010 Preview: ...ok, ok, for those counting (who, me?) its actually 100 Days, 19 Hours, 34 Minutes and...wait for it, wait for it...53 seconds! For everything about Bonneville and Speed Week, check this out: Bonneville Salt Flats – Speed Week, Records and Pictures Or, see for yourself at the LandRacing.com homepage, where they have a countdown clock for Speed Week.  It's going year 'round for those with Salt Fever. Here's a little taste of the Salt from Speed Week 2009.  Dig this flamed 5 window coupe hot rod and yes, oh yes, a Studebaker Avanti.  That's a teaser for a feature coming up on another certain Avanti you guys will love. Speed Week is THE coolest car show around! One of the great "unofficial" events at Speed Week is the first 2 nights (the night before races start is night #1), there is a big gathering of all those racers, crew and hot rodders who've made the trip out.  It goes down at the Nugget Casino (across the street from Montego Bay Casino as you can see in the pic above) in Wendover (about 5 miles...

It's been too long since I've posted a "Hot Rod Ramblings" feature.  For this post, I'm gonna go Nostalgia Drag and Funny Cars on you guys.  But, these "hot rod ramblings" come from my Uncle, "RickyRod" Hechtspeed.  These are my Uncle's memories of the "Pit" from the late 60's.  The "Pit" was the nickname for the first Irwindale Dragstrip. A quick background... the "Calera Kids" were my dad (Rodger "Calera Ave burnout king" and Ford/Merc' lover and his little bro, the "Chevy Puke" (as my dad would call him) and their buddies Rick Patterson, Scott Henry, John DeGraff (sporto), Lalo Gabriel, Rob Shultz, Pat Murphy and a few kids not directly in the "hood" Scott Taylor and Steve Presley were drag fans.  They lived on Calera Avenue in Azusa, California, the next city over from Irwindale. Anyway, these ramblings are taken from some emails from my Uncle.  They mean a lot to me, because it is a piece of the Hechtspeed history.  I thought you guys would really dig 'em too, so here goes, let the Ramblings begin! "It is possible that the four kids shrouded by the supercharger are the “Calera Kids”.  That was one of...

I wanted to continue my international hot rod theme of late and share some pictures sent to me by Ken Sakata of Trident Speed Shop from Nara Prefecture, Japan.  We first introduced you to Trident Speed Shop in Tano's '26 T roadster feature a few weeks back.  In an email from Ken, he told me that Trident has been in business for 10 years.  He was proud to say that he does not advertise in any magazines becaues he gets his business from word of mouth. Tano tells me that he takes his '26 T Roadster to Ken in Nara, which is on the opposite side of Japan from Sapporo, because Trident is the only shop he trusts with his hot rod.  This black and white photo above is rad!  This is Ken's roadster built in traditional hot rod style.  I love these aircraft style windscreen frames, they really give hot rods that 1940's traditional feel dont they? Ken says he loves the speed culture.  Hot Rods are very important in his life and he especially respects hot rodders. Here is Ken lubing crank bearings during reassembly.  Anyone know what kind of engine this is? ...

Throttle Magazine was the first known "hot rod" magazine, before it was even known as hot rodding.  Throttle was almost 100% focused on southern California Lakes and Midget racing.  It was only printed for 1 year, 1941, and included 12 issues.  The bombing of Pearl Harbor turned the USA upside down and hot rodding all but dried up for 3-4 years along with the magazine.  Throttle never came back after WWII ended.  "Hot Rod Magazine" picked things back up in January 1948 with their first issue.  Here's a quick look at Throttle through a Reprint book I purchased at The Rodders Journal website. Thom Taylor (check out Thom's website ThomTaylorDesigns.com), hot rod artist, was the person who spearheaded the effort to put together a quality reprint of all 12 issues.  No small task considering relatively few copies were printed and the fact that they are almost 70 years old.  That's Old School cool! Here's a glimpse from the Introduction by Thom Taylor of just what kind of effort was involved in this project: "Jack Peters, who created Throttle and was its editor and publisher, was an enigma.  Finding out what happened to him was difficult but also...