War Stories 2012 - #1 qualifier

[Mopar 151w2]

WAR STORIES CLAIM TO FAME – A TENDENCY TO BE IN THE WRONG PLACE AT THE WRONG TIME

TELLING THE STORY: TOLD YOU THAT PIT BIKE WAS GONNA HURT SOMEONE

What you’re about to read is a true story and there’s no changing the names to protect the guilty. The story I am about to tell is about the night both a pit bike and a rental car reached a fiery conclusion – in other words, they both died a horrible death.

This was several years ago when I worked with Bob Gilbertson, along with Tommy DeLago. Over the winter Bob had made some changes to the Funny Car team including a new sponsor and a larger budget.

This was the perfect time for Tommy and I to work together again for the first time since we had left the Kalitta camp. Tommy had worked with Mike Green over at Prudhomme’s and he brought over with him the knowledge of how to build a car similar to what they were running. We spent much of the off-season building Bob a car capable of running with the top teams. We finished up a week before Pomona and decided to head to Vegas for a three-day test.

We arrived in Vegas on Thursday and had a really young crew. At the time, Bob had a motocross team and was really into this style of racing. Somehow or another Bob had come across this really small motorcycle to use as a pit bike.

This bike was brand spanking new and it didn’t take much to encourage the kids on the team to do donuts and all kinds of youthful tricks.

It also didn’t take long for us to realize this thing was going to hurt someone and even Tommy piped up, “Why do we need this thing? It will hurt someone.”

We had this discussion Thursday night with Bob but it was filed away by the time we came out for testing on Friday. We worked on the car and finally made a 330-foot run and decided we’d make Saturday a big day of runs. Bob made his quickest runs to the 330 ever, the first time being in a slip-joint chassis. Making the moment festive is the fact hardly anyone else made a good run that day. Things couldn’t have been any better.

We’d make four runs on Saturday and head on over to Pomona.

The guys were almost finished servicing the car, so we, with the exception of Bob (who was driving back to the hotel), decided to partake in some adult beverage(s).

We were having a grand old time.

When it was time to go we sent PR guy Berserko to get the rental car. We piled into the car when one of the crew guys hopped on THAT pit bike and took off flying through the pits, shooting rocks up as it pulls away.

This is when we reminded Bob just how dangerous this little bike was.

“Bob, somebody is going to get f****** killed on that thing; something bad is going to happen.”

Truer words were never spoken. No one got killed but something bad did happen.

Bob replied, “F*** that thing, I don’t care … I’ll run it over with the rental car, I don’t give a s***.”

The kid came flying up on the bike and we told him Bob was going to run over the pit bike. So he pushed it out into the road and laid it on the side.

We should have just left the thing in the desert.

About the time he laid it down and got out of the way, Bob nailed the gas in the rental car and ran over the top of the bike. The car came to a screeching halt with the bike lodged under the passenger door. The peg was jammed into the asphalt and the gas tank was leaking. The sparks from the foot-peg then ignited the gas.

There wasn’t an explosion but a small fire underneath the car was growing bigger by the second. This might have been entertaining to watch except I was sitting in the passenger seat right under the bike as the black smoke was billowing.

As the flames grew, I reached over to raise the window but I couldn’t because the window lock is on. I screamed to Bob to take the lock off.

“What’s wrong?” He asked.

“What’s wrong?” I replied. “We’re going to f****** die, that’s what’s wrong!”

Every one of the crews were scrambling for a fire extinguisher.

Meanwhile, Berserko was in the back seat trying to make an exit. Then Bob became excited and mashed the gas. He had the rental car floored trying to dislodge the bike. The fire was creeping in through the window because I couldn't get it up.

By this time, there’s a trail of fuel, and the asphalt was on fire behind us … the stuff you see in cartoons. We were going down pit road about 35 or 40 miles per hour.

I look over at Bob and offered, “Bob, I gotta roll the window up, I’m getting burned!”

This inspired Bob to begin doing do-nuts. By this time all efforts to dislodge this bike had failed.

Then it occurred to me, “I gotta get out of this thing!”

I opened the door into the fire, and bailed out.

Bob resumed his donuts.

Bob took off through the pits, with people chasing him with fire extinguishers as I laid on the ground wondering what has just happened.

I heard on more than one occasion, “He’s f’ing crazy! He’s f’ing nuts!”

I felt awful low as I began to talk to myself.

My first f****** day at the track with this team and we’re never going to be able to race again. Tommy finally gets a tuning gig and now we’re both going to be banned from the NHRA.

I looked up enough to see the rental car in the dark, and in flames, headed towards the dirt track. It’s the talk of pit road. It looked like a 1970s Funny Car fire. It comes to a skidding stop and then there’s a big giant f****** puff of dirt and fire.

I was having flashbacks to my childhood and watching the old Funny car fires and braced myself for the impending explosion. Then it came, “baaaarooooooooooooom!” there’s a big f****** fireball. The car’s gas tank blew up in a big mushroom cloud.

It didn’t take a genius to realize we’re in big f****** trouble.

I figured Bob was dead, we just blew up a rental car, and then Berserko was dead, with the car just sitting there burning. Our guys jumped in the van and ran down there. It’s far away.

Next thing I know, I get up and begin walking back to the pits where Tommy is standing there in a state of disbelief. I just looked at him and all I could say is, “Bob’s dead.”

All we could do is sit there and say, “Aw f***.”

We drew the conclusion our careers were done and we were going to jail.

If there’s a silver lining, five minutes later, the van rolled by.

Sure enough, there’s Bob in the passenger seat, smiling and waving. Berserko is in there too, and he’s waving. They just drive on out of the track.

Tommy and I just looked at one another and I just said, “Well … he AIN’T dead.”

We determined, it was in our best interests to get out of there as quickly as possible. We hopped over the fence because the track was locked. We walked to the truck stop and called a cab back to the fleabag hotel we were staying at. We were settling in when Tommy got a text from Capps, “dude, what happened to the rental car?”

The rental car was the talk of the internet and message boards.

We got to the track early the next morning and there was a big sign taped to the side door of the trailer from Chris Blair, the track manager.

“Do not touch anything, do not open your trailer. Come and see Chris Blair in the tower ASAP!”

Me, Tommy and Bob go up there and Chris promptly says, “Load your s*** up and get out of here.”

We tried to explain and he didn’t want to hear any of it. He did point out we’d get a bill for the damage to the asphalt and so on.

We loaded up and headed to Pomona and by this time, the sponsor has heard about it.

Bob explained the situation and we became concerned maybe the NHRA might not let us run Pomona and maybe the whole season.

Bob then called Graham who told him he didn’t know if he’d be allowed to run Pomona.

“Bring your rig to Pomona and we’ll decide if you’re going to get to run, and there will be a fine, we’re working on it now,” Graham told Bob.

We got to Pomona on Tuesday and they turned us around at the back pit gate. Wednesday we were still sitting outside of the gate. The fine was handed down -- $25,000 and had to be paid before we could come in the track. Bob had the money wired, we parked. We went out and qualified, and even won a round.

But really, we lost. By the time we added up the cost of the fine, we also had to pay Bruton’s Speedway Children’s Charity $20,000 for the asphalt and even though the rental car was insured, it cost us another $8,000.

Of course, Tommy offered we might have saved money because we didn’t make those test runs. That made him feel better I’m sure.

And, in the ultimate I told you so moment, I couldn’t help but remind them all how I told them the pit bike was going to hurt someone.

So, there’s the real story of what happened with the pit bike in Vegas. If I make it past first round, I’ll tell the story of the dynamite, the toilet and the Hampton Inn, in case you were wondering.

I came to win this thing.

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