Friday, Oct. 25, 2002 | 9:37 a.m.
Editor's note: Larry Dixon, driver of the Miller Lite Don Prudhomme Top Fuel dragster, is writing a daily column exclusively for the Las Vegas Sun in conjunction with the second annual AC Delco Las Vegas NHRA Nationals at The Strip at LVMS.
It's Friday and we hit the track today at 5 for our first round of qualifying for the ACDelco Las Vegas NHRA Nationals.
Before I get into my Miller Lite dragster, I'll take probably five or 10 minutes to just sit in the tow vehicle and start blocking everything out that doesn't really pertain to the job at hand.
Once I get my suit on and I'm in the car, it's my time. There are a lot of times you're in the car and you don't hear the motor. You're so focused on what you're trying to do that you don't hear anything.
My two jobs at that point are to first cut a good light and, second, try to make as smooth of a run as possible by staying in the groove. I don't worry about too much else other than that. I figure if I can do those two things and everybody else on the team can do their job, then we'll come up with a good package to race with.
When you hit the throttle on the starting line, you're looking at the tree. By the time you look ahead, you've already traveled the first 100 feet. I like to tell people that leaving the starting line is like being shot out of a cannon with your tail about three inches off the ground. It's a ride that only the guys over at Nellis Air Force Base could possibly appreciate. It just isn't something you can go to Disneyland and do.
The sheer force of the start tries to pin you against the seat, but you're already bolted in the car so tight with the seat belts. That's the reason why, when we get out after a run, we're breathing so heavy. It isn't from the four seconds of work, it's from the 5Gs off the starting line, followed by the 6.5Gs it pulls during the run and when you let the parachutes out, it'll go negative 5Gs for a couple more seconds
Put it all together and you've got a 10-12G range swing in a matter of five seconds. That's why we're huffing and puffing and breathing hard at the top end.
I take safety very seriously. Throughout your career, you'll go through situations where you see people possibly getting injured and you try to learn from them. I wear a helmet, fire suit, special gloves and shoes, a mouthpiece and the HANS device for obvious reasons. I also have a six-point safety harness in my racecar. I make sure I have everything I can safety-wise. I see it as preventative maintenance.
Not that I would ever do it, but you could probably make a thousand runs in your life without a helmet on and be fine. But it's that one run you do need it that makes all the difference so that's why I have all this stuff -- for that one run. It's a no-brainer: I let all my safety equipment do all the work for me so that I can just go out there and think about racing.
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