Friday, July 16, 2004 | 9:19 a.m.
Brian Hilderbrand covers motor sports for the Las Vegas Sun. His motor sports notebook appears Friday. He can be reached at [email protected] or (702) 259-4089.
This is not your father's drag racing.
When the Garrett Turbos NHRA Sport Compact Nationals begins this evening at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, the two-day event will feature today's "muscle cars" -- Honda Civics, Mazda 6s, Chevrolet Cavaliers, Saturn Ions, Toyota Solaras and just about every other make of compact car, both foreign and domestic, you can name.
This, according to reigning NHRA Pro FWD (front-wheel drive) champion Nelson Hoyos, is "the new generation of drag racing."
While mechanically inclined youths from Hoyos' generation would soup up hand-me-down Chevrolet Camaros or Ford Mustangs in the '70s and early '80s, the trend today among the younger crowd is to trick out compact cars. The reason, Hoyos said, is simple.
"I think what happens is the generation right now -- the X and Y generations, as we call it -- has grown up with small economy cars that are more prevalent now vs. muscle cars," said Hoyos, who drives a Chevy Cavalier for GM Racing in the PRO FWD category. "(Production) muscle cars have pretty well subsided, although they are now making a turnaround and coming back ... but for that long-term period between the middle '80s to now, everything has been small cubic inch, four-cylinder, front-wheel drive economy cars.
"Of course, the parents of these kids have given them those cars to grow up in, so they've got Hondas and Toyotas and VWs and Chevrolets and Pontiacs and that's what they soup up because that's what they have."
The rise in popularity in racing compact cars -- the entries for this weekend's event at The Strip have nearly doubled from a year ago -- also stems from the fact that it can be less expensive and more practical to soup up today's four-cylinder compact car as opposed to the tradition V8-powered muscle car of the '60s and '70s.
"There is just so much new technology available right now that, realistically, for a weekend racer/streetable car, the technology today will outdo any of the muscle cars that we ever had," Hoyos, 45, said. "In order to make some decent power from a (late '60s Pontiac) 389 TriPower, you had to put a big cam in it, headers and big compression and all that. Now, that car becomes somewhat limited in driveability for an everyday driver. On top of that, you consume so much fuel.
"Now, you can take a little Cavalier, flop a turbo on it and put bigger injectors on it and you can squeeze 500 horsepower out of that thing with just the blink of an eye -- and still make 25 miles a gallon. It's the best of two worlds; you have the total driveablility, you have the reliability and the fuel economy but when you stomp on it, boy, it's going to set you back in the seat real quick."
Although the look of the muscle car may have changed since Hoyos was a teenager, he said the principal of Sport Compact racing is the same as it has been in drag racing since the 1950s.
"That old cliche still continues to work: Win on Sunday and sell on Monday," Hoyos said. "That's very, very prevalent in GM's marketing plan; they're taking our success on the track and trying to parlay them into sales in the showroom."
MORE CHANGES: As expected, NASCAR president Mike Helton on Thursday announced the Nextel Cup Series and Busch Series would adopt a "green-white-checkered" format beginning next week to help ensure races would not end under caution.
Unlike the system currently in place in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series, however, only one restart under the new format would be attempted. If a caution comes out during the green-white-checkered period, the race would end under caution.
The new format will consist of a restart of two laps: a green flag for the first lap of the restart and the white flag signaling the final lap leading to the checkered flag. All additional laps will be counted and scored.
"The green-white-checkered format is an attempt to achieve everyone's goals -- a green-flag finish," Helton said.
"This format has been successful in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series and, considering the tight competition week in and week out in the other two national series, we feel the time is right to use the same procedure in all three national series."
The NCTS, which uses as many green-white-checkered restarts as necessary to finish a race under green-flag conditions, also will adopt the new format beginning with the July 31 race at Michigan International Speedway.
"FATBACK" OUT: Joe Gibbs Racing announced this week that Michael "Fatback" McSwain has been fired as crew chief for Bobby Labonte's No. 18 Chevrolet in the Nextel Cup Series.
Brandon Thomas, a JGR engineering department employee, has been named interim crew chief on the No. 18 car.
SCORE SCHEDULE: SCORE International this week released a five-race schedule for its 2005 Desert Series, which includes two races in Southern Nevada.
The 2005 season will open with 11th annual Laughlin Desert Challenge (Jan. 13-16), followed by the San Felipe 250 (Feb. 25-26), the Baja 500 (June 3-5) and the Las Vegas Primm 300 (Sept. 9-11). SCORE's 32nd season will close with the traditional Baja 1000 (Nov. 17-10).
AT THE STRIP: Bryan King (Super Pro), Nick Ariotti (Pro), Kristin Kaminski (Street), Kahea Woods (Motorcycle) and Billy Fraker (Sport Compact) were winners during Jerry's Nugget Championship Drag Racing Series competition Saturday night at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. Bill Dudley of Las Vegas claimed the NHRA "King of the Track" honor.
Strip competitors raised $1,385 for the Darrell Russell Memorial Fund during the "Dash for Darrell" competition. Racers donated a $20 entry fee to compete for prizes donated by several local businesses.
PERSONAL WATERCRAFT: The National Arena Personal Water Craft American Racing Series will return to Terrible's Lakeside Casino Resort in Pahrump Saturday and Sunday. Each day's program includes main events from 9:30 a.m. to noon and from 2:30 p.m. to 5.
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