I also want to give props to Paul Page, Mike Dunn, and Lewis  “the Statsmeister” Bloom and the pit reporters. Thanks to their work the broadcast was clean, sharp, cohesive and entertaining from opening shot to the fade. These guys are good.

And I want to say one more thing. It’s time to get off of Paul Page’s back. Yeah, he has a few issues with the facts and names occasionally. However, I have personally watched him do his homework before a race and he is a true professional. 

I’ll admit there are times when he drives me crazy, but I’d still rather have an announcer that loves the sport and screws up occasionally like Mr. Page than a superb technician who doesn’t care. Contrary to what some may believe, announcing a live event in front of a camera isn’t an easy job. I know because I’ve tried it. I suspect it is kind of like a rookie minister in a Baptist Church giving his sermon in front of a couple thousand of the faithful.

And lastly, I would remind you that the great NHRA announcer Bernie Partridge absolutely butchered the drag racing lexicon on many occasions and now we all remember those gaffs and laugh. And Bernie never had to do it in front of a national television audience.

I learned a lot about Nostalgia Funny Car racing at the March Meet. I found out that you hear and see things at nostalgia fuel racing that you just will never hear again at an NHRA or IHRA race. For example, on race day in the Funny Car pits one crew chief asked another (they actually fraternize, you know) what he was going to do. The guy replied, “I got 90 percent in the tank and 70 in the mag.” You simply aren’t going to hear that at an NHRA OR IHRA meet. And you aren't going to hear a nitro motor idling with that percentage in the tank. Those two items alone have me stoked on nostalgia fuel racing.

I also learned that really the only thing that is really nostalgic about AA/FC is the body and the points mag they all have to run. These cars use engines with billet blocks, heads, rods and cranks, and the preferred supercharger is just as expensive for these cars as any other fuel class. It's obvious that two guys and a ramp truck isn’t the norm and that it takes no less than five crewmen and a ton of support equipment to run one of these cars.

That means that even at the premium rate of $2500 a lap a AA/FC car owner would be hard pressed to break even, much less make a profit, unless he was racing in the town he lives in. That also means that none of these guys are going out on the road like they did in the 1960’s and make a living racing these cars. I just don’t think it is possible. Ditto for the AA/FD teams.

What I do believe is that the hobby AA/FC racers like Bonifante, Plueger, Turner, Romine, Halladay and “Snake” will be able to actually race nitro cars for a championship and not need a $3,000,000-budget to do so.

It also means that it is not very likely the West Coast cars are going to tour the Midwest or East Coast for the summer or vice versa unless one of these guys just decides to spend the cash and go race his car. It is pretty obvious that each part of the country is going to have to develop its own group of racers.

With the HRH points championship on the West Coast and the DRO solid, six-race points Championship in the Midwest, the future of nitro racing looks pretty good to me. Smaller tracks that could never afford a “name” nitro car can now book a match race without mortgaging their businesses. Racers can run for points and book the occasional match race for cash flow, and cars can be booked starting at $1,000 per lap. For the first time in a very long time nitro fans, racers, and promoters have a viable nitro option to the NHRA and IHRA series.

One last thought about the nostalgia nitro movement. The March Meet at Bakersfield is a huge success. It is unto itself. They charge every racer from nitro burners to gas coupes an entry fee and charge for the crew. The race is so important to West Coast racers that they will pay and do whatever is required of them to race at the March Meet and have done so for better than 50 years.

If the nostalgia movement is going to keep growing it needs an established  marquee event in the Midwest that is simply a “must attend”. I feel that the World Series of Drag Racing at Cordova Dragway is that race. It is the oldest continuous national event, period. It’s older than the U.S. Nationals and at one time winning that race was just as important as winning the U.S. Nationals or the March Meet.

Wouldn’t it be cool if for two weeks in August fans could attend the World Series of Drag Racing for Nostalgia racing one weekend and the U.S. Nationals the next? A fan can dream, can’t he?