SAN CARLOS Land speed record case Dave McDonald of San Carlos can quickly produce a logical answer for almost any query about his hobby preferred by drag racing at Utah's Bonneville Sea salt Flats in his 1998 Pontiac Firebird.
Your dog nonchalantly explained the parachutes on the rear of the car with the fact that "brakes really don't do you much great until you get down to about 75 (mph)." Nitrous oxide from the four 30 pound tanks inside the car must be added to the gasoline slowly in three stages to gain an extra 420 horsepower, he was quoted saying, or the driver could "smoke the tires."
The question, though, that left McDonald and his race partner and best friend of fifty years, Lionel Pitts, in a moment of surprised silence was quite simply why the men are so eager to continuously lay their lives on the series to watch the world fly by way of in a blur. Pitts, a lanky man of very few words and phrases, furrowed his brows in dilemma.
"We just like to go fast,Inch he said 12 millas de redes de enmalle ilegales 29 almost defensively, as if somebody had asked why he insists on breathing. The actual Peninsula native drives in the Alcoholics anonymous Fuel Coupe class split his own previous year's track record of 288 mph with a 308 miles-per-hour haul in the Firebird.
"No one had accomplished that with a passenger car or truck before," McDonald said with the feat, adding that wanting to control a vehicle moving that quickly distracts from understanding the feeling of the speed. "You have a lot to do. The last mile is when you get to enjoy it. You get in the last mile and then it slows down, but it doesn't. You don't know (you've broken 300 miles per hour) until people come over honking and screaming and hollering, 'You did it!'"
McDonald remnants his love for cars here we are at playtime with his father with the age of 4. Pitts raced in the first soap box derby whilst was 9 years old. As soon as the men met in 1959 in the drive in restaurant "hot cars" with you, naturally they were already regulars at local street drag backrounds.
"Then I got my taste of Bonneville, where by it's a big, long your five mile drag race, well, i never went back to the drags," said McDonald of her first trip to the sea salt flats in 1960.
Pitts joined up with McDonald at Bonneville for the first time in 1964. A quintessential pair, the men seem to be opposite personalities bound by their undying love of fast cars. McDonald is a quick, stocky man who does many of the talking and displays the dynamism at any ability, including signing all e mails simply, "Dave!" Large Pitts is stoic and more likely to wordlessly start off tinkering with the Firebird than to regale you are not stories of life in warp speed.
The 1997 Vos enfants vous stressent Firebird is the fifth car the lads have raced at the An entire world of Speed contest together. Ken Schmalz, owner of the San Carlos based revocation company Performance Fabrication, done anything about four of the team's automobiles, including their current one particular.
"Bonneville was really the true inception of drag racing. It's among the list of venues that really gets back to racing's roots," Schmalz said of the sea flats. "(Dave and Lionel are) one of the old proven teams. They're well known and also well respected."
Pitts drives a Firebird in the AA Gas Auto class, meaning that his works are powered purely by gasoline without the addition of nitrous oxide. Without the need of that additional boost, Pitts even now maintains a hefty 1,320 horsepower, which allowed the pup to break his own record previous September in his class, intending 274 mph on the 5 kilometer course, which is completed twofold in one round to achieve an all-time.
Schmalz said "you find that Bonneville guys are generally just strictly Bonneville," and though McDonald and Pitts have competed in other land als het zwembad groeit een beetje kleiner 53 speed competitions, they're most loyal to the substantial, perfectly flat expanse involving salt in Utah. McDonald, as with any respectable speed demon, reported he prefers the course since the flatness of the land and the entire track allow for the car to succeed in higher speeds than nearly all races.
However, the salt that provides such wonderful tissue traction expansion for the cars' wheels and the serious flatness of the terrain can be as considerably a curse as a advantage, McDonald warned. A late night rainfall after a perfect day might leave the entire course shut under water.
"Part of what you will be fighting in the Bonneville Hebei Grondwaterbeheer Regulations zal officieel worden uitgevoerd 1 maart 2015 deal, it is not just everything in your control being good, it's Mother Nature being good, very. You're fighting a getting rid of battle sometimes," Schmalz stated.
The course was perfect on the day McDonald achieved his 308 mph history, Schmalz said. When it is in such race conditions, Pitts said the ocean "kicks up a rooster tail" at the rear of the car when the driver visitors about 220 mph. Along with three months until the 2009 An entire world of Speed contest, the men currently have their priorities in order: generate back one of Pitts' records that somebody dared to break, and "have fun.Inches
"Then we can go after some of our good friend's records," laughs McDonald. Inch(Racing is) something we're doing all our lives and we enjoy it. I'll probably be race until I die or even until I'm too outdated to climb into the point."
