I grew up in racing; my father ran a ‘32 Bantam with a cammer in the Sixties. He was in the nines with a straight axled altered back then; I even remember him rolling one of those cars in Ohio. From the early Sixties through the Seventies my father ran altereds, front engine dragsters and rear engine dragsters.
For us, our big summer vacation was going to Indianapolis over Labor Day for the U.S. Nationals. In the early days we were spectators, but later on my father competed in the always tough Competition Eliminator class. Racing is in our pedigree, with my father, and now all three of my daughters involved in the sport.
The first drag car I drove was a 1970 Super Gas Maverick. The Maverick is still here and was one of the first cars in the country to use EFI. We converted the car over to EFI in 1995 and were very successful in NHRA Super Gas and bracket races around the country. The car still uses a FE engine employing a 427 Tunnel Port and a FAST EFI for power and engine management.
This is the Shotgun powered 2000 ‘Stang that ran predominately in the NHRA 9.90 class. (Auto Imagery photo)
I also owned a 2000 roadster style Mustang with a 590 inch shot gun Hemi (above). This was a unique piece that mainly competed in NHRA Super Gas competition. The car was an index car running 9.90 at over 170 mph and at its time was one of the highest mph Super Gas cars in the country.
The concept for my current Mustang was to create a high tech high profile car that used state of the art technology with a powerplant that consumers can relate to. An ‘07 Cobra Mustang with an ‘07 DOHC 5.4 Cobra engine in it …who would of thunk it. These engines appeared to have an enormous amount of potential; it just seemed to us that if we could get behind it and garner help from our peers in the industry that it was possible to take this package far beyond where it has gone before. We (the Aeromotive crew) were insistent on building a multi-purpose car. By that I mean one that is legal under numerous sanctions, to debut the car at a variety of different races. For instance we can run the car in NMRA, NMCA and Fun Ford in their PRO class and also compete in NHRA in the Competition Eliminator class.
When I decided to build the car I wanted to go with someone that could not just design and build the chassis but also someone that could help us with managing the car down the track. I have known Larry Larson for years and every time I went to a race track he was there. His help didn’t end when the car rolled out of his shop. He has been there for every race and has been responsible for setting up the car.