Of course NHRA isn’t the only game in town, although if you relied solely on the establishment media you’d swear IHRA’s been dead for the past decade. Maybe the Ohio guys have a secret plan, but I can’t see how no reporting outside the pages of their DRM house organ benefits anyone.

IHRA just held their first race of the year at the site of NHRA’s old home for the Cajun Nationals, State Capitol Raceway near Baton Rouge, Louisiana. From what little I could tell from the pictures of the race, not a whole lot has changed from when I made my annual Memorial Day trek to the “Moose-Plex” (track owner than was Norman “Moose” Pearah). It appears that the Lewis family has built a brick tower directly behind the track, but the old two-story wooden shack alongside it on the pitside appears to be history. I really don’t know much about those items as so many tracks don’t report any changes, but I’ve been in rehab for the past year and comatose for the previous three or four, so what do I know.

The Inaugural Mardi Gras Nationals appeared in some ways just the opposite of the past few NHRA events. IHRA’s Top Fuel class drew a competitive 12 cars for the eight-car show, and they ran respectfully (considering their budgets) with a number of 4.7s at 310-plus mph. The field ran the gamut from IHRA champ and event winner Bruce Litton through familiar entries like Terry McMillen and the two-dragster team of Bobby Lagana to veteran campaigners like (he’s gotta be somewhere near 80) Hall of Famer Chris “the Greek” Karamesines and old “Canadian Frantic 4” member, Fred Farndon.

What was stunning, though, in a negative sense was the hot rod association’s two bread-and-butter classes, Pro Mod and Pro Stock. From the aesthetic standpoint, the fields were disastrous. I could be wrong because my cerebral cortex has larger bruises on it, but the two fields may have been the weakest IHRA turnout ever. Awful.

Ray Commisso looked sensational winning the Pro Mod show with 5.9s at 240-plus mph, but he did it over an 11(!!)-car field. This is a class that routinely draws an effortless 25 to 35 cars with the vast majority running at the worst (save for breakage) 6.0s to 6.4s.

What happened? Louisiana is in the South, the home of the majority of the cars, yet the show was five short of a full field. IHRA Pro Stock was no better. Just 14 cars showed for 16 spots. Again, an IHRA show counts heavily on the fans of southern style-“Mountain Motor” Pro Stock, and to be two cars short of a full field is like a spit in the face of the Pope in Vatican City. You just don’t do that sorta thing.

This turnout was the kind of thing I feared the most beginning this season. Lack of cash and sponsorships would show in the pits, but for the moment I’ll put myself on hold.

Was it the ADRL’s first event of the season at nearby Houston Raceway Park that siphoned off the Pro Mod and Pro Stock racers? It appears so.

IHRA’s next show is in the home state of NASCAR and Southern-style Pro Mod and Pro Stock, Steve Earwood’s Rockingham Dragway in North Carolina. Earwood is as good as anybody in the promotion end of our sport and I really expect things to get normal. However, if 11 or 12 Pro Mods show at ”the Rock” I’ll reserve ledge space on the Empire State Building.
     
So, here we are into the fourth month of the year. Damn near 100 days and maybe that by the time you cast your orbs on this piece.

My grade? B--. No irreversible disasters yet and I hope we can keep it that way. But we’ve got to go a wee bit longer and I’m still not sure what will transpire, it still could go either way.

Poetically and as my nerves go, I’ll cop out with the words from one of the great poets of the English language of the last century, W.H Auden…

      Thoughts of his own mortality
      Like the distant roll of thunder
      At a picnic.