Shadyside spark

        It was a lonnnnnng Memorial Day weekend at Shadyside, thanks to the weather, but the trip proved to be a useful one even though the Beast didn't make the field, qualifying 13th out of 20 or so cars with a 4.32. The big discovery, Paul said, was that the magneto was faulty, which means all the tuneup adjustments basically "never made any difference" because it wasn't firing correctly.
     Paul said he suspects the problem may have begun while the car still ran a clutch, and when it ran its best times. Since the switch to the automatic, the Beast has come within about a tenth of its best clutch performances, and has been wildly inconsistent. "You could have a good run, but it wouldn't repeat," Paul said.
   So, the magneto was sent back to MSD for a thorough refurb, is recertified and back in the car. Confident now that any tuneup changes will be reflected on the track, Paul said he's going back to the fast tuneups when the car had a clutch for his new baseline.  The first chance to run again could be July 9-10 at Huntsville at a Southern Outlaw Tour event. Paul sees it as a test session, since the SOT is a screw-blower series. If the weather isn't too hot, he said, the Beast likely will be there.
    As for the quirky Shadyside track, Paul said the racing surface was great, an uphill shutdown area a la Holiday Beach, and even the hairpin at the end wasn't a problem.

   He said there was plenty of stopping room, but you had to get on the chutes "real quick. If your chutes failed, you'd be in trouble." The difficulty came at the other end of the track, Paul said, as the car had to be pushed back and forth to get it into the staging /burnout area. He couldn't fire the car and pull right into staging  But he likes the series, so it's likely the Beast will be back at Shadyside, and at other tracks in the Carolinas.
   We'll update closer to the Huntsville race.

Keep on the Shadyside

  
    Paul and the Cuda Beast team will be at Shadyside Dragway in Shelby, N.C., which has to be in the running for the most primitive/throwback track in the South, if not the nation. It's hard to believe that fans are this close to the track, where such high-powered machines as promods are running.

     It's not quite the 1960s at famous Southern outlaw tracks such as Paradise Drag Strip in Calhoun, Ga.,

but it's comparable. And the promods can run big numbers at Shadyside, before heading up the hill and turning left through the trees.

    Amazing, and there is a lot of video online (the source of  these images) that is riveting to watch.
So, about the race. It's an eight-car all-run field, no screw blowers, 2,500 pound weight limit -- what Paul said are basically PDRA rules for its pro boost class. Testing is Saturday -- Paul, who has never run at Shadyside, said he hopes to get in a couple of passes then -- followed by three qualifying rounds on Sunday, one more qualifier on Monday, and then eliminations. Keith Dockery  will be along for the race to run the computer, and Paul will also have a former promod tuner who has run 3.9s with a setup almost identical to the Beast's on hand.
    Should be great. There will probably be some info on the message board at promodifieds.us, along with info on the slew of other promod races slated for the holiday weekend. Hope it's a fast, safe weekend for everyone.

Rods and custom

    Paul and the Beast team did not travel to the NMCA Bowling Green race this past weekend, as the customary pre-race run-through of the engine revealed that the rods needed replacing. Paul said he was planning to replace them after Bowling Green, but what he found during the hemi's checkup indicated that now was the time. So, instead of racing last Saturday, he was in the shop working on the engine.
    He does have the next race circled on the calendar, and it's as outlaw as it gets, speaking specifically of the track -- Shadyside in Shelby, N.C., and the Carolina Xtreme Promods.  I enjoy seeing pictures of and watching video from small tracks in the South, and outside of George Ray's, which couldn't handle promods anyway (track record last I knew was 4.84 by a dragster), Shadyside is the most primitive I've seen. There is plenty of youtube video from events at the track, really professionally done, that gives some of the flavor of the racing there. It's hard to believe they go that fast there. Simply riveting to watch.
    The race is Memorial Day weekend. I'll be sure to preview it.

Yeow! NMCA Atlanta recap

        The racing the weekend of April 7-10 was terrible on many levels -- equipment blown up or crashed and the worst that can happen  -- the loss of life. The death of Top Sportsman racer Ronnie Davis at the PDRA race cast a pall over events across the South and beyond. The winds were blowing all across racetracks, to ill effect.
     Paul and the Cuda Beast, racing at the NMCA event at Covington, Ga., was almost part of the destruction, dodging a crashing Gene Musto in what one commentator described as the best driving he's ever seen to avoid a wreck. Yes, it was that close, and Paul even managed to miss the 330 cone.
     The Beast ran what Paul described as an "easy" 4.40 in a test, and then came the qualifying round against Musto, who spent more time in Paul's lane than he did in his own, crossing into it twice before hitting the wall. For once, it was a good thing that the Beast blew the tires on the starting line. Otherwise, the Beast gets smashed, and likely in the driver's door. Paul was pedaling to try to stay in the run, and said it was sheer reaction -- no braking -- to avoid Musto. There's video of it (of course) out there. The Beast wound up the 16th qualifier, drew No. 1 Tim Savell, blew the tires again, and the weekend was done.

         On a good note, computer guru Keith Dockery was back at the track for the first time in a year. He's the big guy in the red and black towering over the car at the back right center.

     Up next for the Beast may be a test session this Saturday at U.S. 43 in Etheridge, Tenn., to get ready for another NMCA event, May 12-15, at Bowling Green, Ky.  Paul said the tuneup focus is on the fuel mix -- "We've got to get it fat enough at the hit. It needs a lot of fuel." One other thing from the weekend concerns windy conditions. Paul said he won't race in the kind of strong winds that blew at Atlanta and many other places that weekend. 
    We'll try to set up the Bowling Green race and offer any info from the test session.

Let's crank this season up

   It's a big weekend for promod racing, with a PDRA event at Rockingham and the Southern Shootout opener at the Super Chevy Show in Memphis, but rather than travel hundreds of miles, Paul and the Beast team are staying closer to home for this NMCA event that is basically just down the road -- at Atlanta Dragway at Commerce, Ga.
   Paul has run well at Atlanta, and also experienced a crazy mishap a couple of years ago when his competition ran into him in the shutdown area. The race is an easy decision -- proximity, good payout and a level field. It's an all-run race -- but there are rules to make it even for blowers (no screws), nitrous, and I guess turbos.
   The team will get set up today for two rounds of qualifying on Friday and Saturday, one round of racing on Saturday, and the conclusion on Sunday.
   The Beast made just one of two test sessions that were on the calendar last month -- at Montgomery Motorsports Park. The track was hosting an Edmund Hall event, but Paul said track prep wasn't minimal, so the team didn't learn much from a couple of test passes. He said they took about 500 horsepower out of the motor, but the Beast still lost traction about 60 feet out. "If the track had been prepped, it might have held the car," Paul said. The team did not go to a test session at U.S. 43 the following week.
   As noted, it's a busy week for racing. I'm sure promodifieds.us will be covering Memphis, and there will be plenty of links to the PDRA event, but I'll keep an eye out for any Atlanta news.
   All racers: Be fast and be safe.

It's 2016, and almost time for racing

          It has been a long time away from the track, but Paul and the Cuda Beast team are getting fired up for their return after a 2015 season that was a tough one away from the racing. Crew member Keith Dockery, who spent most of last year in various hospitals, is getting better, "more like himself every day," Paul said.  This weekend, the team had a party at the shop to get things kicked off.
         The season will start next weekend with a test session at Montgomery Motorsports Park. Last year,  Paul had a conversation with a top pro-mod tuner who had run sub-4s with the same engine and setup that's in the Beast. The tuneup was radically different from what the team had been using, so Paul decided to tear down the motor and get the transmission refurbished so the car would be at peak readiness for the new tuneup. He didn't get to try it before the season ended, but will finally at MMP next weekend.
        It's a much more aggressive tuneup, which sounds counterintuitive for a car that's had problems getting launched. More power when you're blowing off the tires?  That's it. Paul said if they blow off the tires, they'll back down on the tuneup until the car launches. He said if the tuneup works out, he's expecting even better results than his tuner source got because the Beast is a couple of hundred pounds lighter.
       The MMP session will be followed the next weekend with more testing at U.S. 43 Dragway in Etheridge, Tenn.  The first weekend in April is the first big racing weekend, with the PDRA at Rockingham and a Southern Shootout event at the Memphis Super Chevy Show. Also that weekend, just 90 minutes or so down the road, will be a pro-mod event at the NMRA NMCA All-Star Nationals, and that's where Paul said he's planning to take the Beast.
      As far as the rest of the season is shaping up, PDRA events are definite possibilities. I'll post any test session results I learn. Round up your earplugs. The big noise is ready to return.

No racing

    Paul and the Cuda Beast team had hoped to return to the track these past two weekends, but were unable for a couple of reasons, the most serious being health problems for Paul's mother that have required her to be hospitalized. That occurred last week, between the Southern Shootout race at Montgomery and this past weekend's PDRA event in Richmond.
    Before the Montgomery race, Paul said the car was all set to go with a refurbished motor, and the only remaining task was to get the overhauled transmission back into his Dodge dually. The transmission has proved tough to get fixed, and Paul said he tried to borrow another truck to make the Montgomery race, to no avail. Then came his mother's hospitalization.
   Between  that and the long health struggle for Keith Dockery, the team's computer guru and Paul's brother-in-law, this year has been emotionally draining for everyone in the Gibbs family. They can certainly use all the prayers and good wishes you can send their way.
   Paul did mention the possibility of a race in Bradenton, Florida, but that's way off in December.