Sears Craftsman NHRA Nationals: Featured flyers

National Dragster, Jul 18, 2003

At the wheel of an F/SA '68 Chevelle with a rich history, 16-year-old high school student Matt Forbes reached the quarterfinals at the Sears Craftsman NHRA Nationals in his national event debut.

"There are stickers on the car from 1970," said Forbes. "Whoever got it out of the factory turned it into a race car right away."

Forbes' father, David, bought the Cadillac-maroon Chevelle with purple, orange, and red stripes a few years ago from the Texas-based Emmons Brothers team, which years earlier had bought it from John Melvyn, who gave the car its Heavy Hitter name. 0ver the years, the now 35-year-old car has appeared in multiple national event finals, most recently at the 1995 Automobile Club of Southern California NHRA Finals in Pomona, where Jerry Emmons drove it to a runner-up finish against former national Stock champion Don Keen.

"We haven't changed much of anything since we got it from the Emmonses, just the two-step," said Forbes, of Horse Cave, Ky., about 30 miles from Beech Bend Raceway Park.

David handles the bulk of the mechanical work on the car and all of the maintenance on the engine, a 396-cid, 325-horsepower powerplant that has CP pistons, Val Hedworth carburetor, MSD ignition, and stock cylinder heads, block, and connecting rods. Behind the firewall is a Turbo Hydromatic 400 transmission by Arnett and an ATI torque converter. A 4.10:1 ring-and-pinion turns Strange axles, Weld wheels, and Hoosier rubber.

In Madison, Forbes got down to seven cars in Stock before losing to eventual winner James Paul despite running an on-the-dial 11.77.

"It's a good, consistent car," Forbes said. "Driving is a lot easier when you don't have to worry about the car. The whole thing was pretty cool. There were a lot of people in Madison, and the atmosphere there was great. I've never raced in front of that many people. Driving through the pits, they were everywhere."

As does recent National DRAGSTER feature subject John Gallina, Tim Cole races in the almost-anything-goes SS/AX through SS/DX classes in Super Stock. Gallina races a twin-turbocharged V-6 '87 Grand National in SS/DX and recently became the first Super Stock racer in the sevens.

Cole, a performance account manager for Comp Cams in Memphis, races a '96 Corvette in SS/AX with a V-6 engine that never came in the Corvette. The car is one of only six SS/AXs in the country and the only late-model Corvette in Super Stock.

Cole races a V-6 because there isn't much he doesn't know about that type of engine, and the former longtime Comp racer switched to Super Stock because SS/AX is a little easier on the engine than if he were still racing in D/ED, a class in which he won four national events in six final rounds in the 1980s and early 1990s. This is the first year Cole has used the Chevy V-6.

Cole, who used to build Buick V-6s out of his Cole Performance Racing Engines shop in Denver before taking the job with Comp Cams 10 years ago, built the engine, which has a Comp Cams valvetrain, Gary Williams-modified Holley Dominators, GM splayed-valve aluminum cylinder heads, CNC block, SCAT crankshaft, MGP aluminum rods, CP pistons that provide a 16 to 1 compression ratio, T&D rocker arms, and Frank Parks-fabricated sheet-metal intake manifold.

The transmission is a Pro Trans-built three-speed automatic Torqueflite that has an A-1 torque converter. The Ford nine-inch rear end features Strange axles and spool.

With reaction times as good as .006, Forbes defeated two of the top veteran Sportsman racers from the region, former Super Stock national champion Amy Faulk and Danny Byrd.

"I'm just trying to get used to driving the car," said Forbes, who raced Jr. Dragsters from the time he was 12 years old. "This is a lot faster than a Jr. Dragster, that's for sure. Everything goes a lot quicker, and it's a lot more fun."

Pronto Acceleration Vehicles in Denver built the car in 1998 using many Art Morrison components. The four-link rear suspension has Strange double-adjustable coil-over shocks.

Cole said one of the keys to his consistency and quick times are experimental | tires - bias-ply 14.5x32 Goodyears - that he has been testing. The tires, part number 6062, should be released to the general public for the Mopar Mile-High NHRA Nationals.

The car weighs 2,300 pounds with Cole in it. He leaves the starting line anywhere from 6,500 to 7,500 rpm depending on track conditions and shifts at 9,200 rpm. This season, Cole, who last year held the SS/AX record at 8.82, has gone a best of 8.69 at 151.50 mph.

Mike Mans is not only another second-generation racer - his father, Randy, campaigned for more than 25 years - but he is among the growing ranks of drivers who gained experience in Jr. Dragster competition. The elder Mans began competing with an F/S '69 Camaro that he campaigned until 1987, when he switched to a new '87 Cutlass that he ran in GT/EA. In 1992, he began driving a GT/KA Olds Achieve.

Said Mike, "I began racing Jr. Dragsters in 1993 when I was 10, and the family got our current race car, a GT/HA '00 Pontiac Formula, in 1998. My dad drove it the first season to get the bugs out of it, then we split the driving duties in 1999. I do all of the driving now, and my dad is co-crew chief along with my mom, Dawn."