- Joined
- Jul 22, 2013
- Messages
- 2,693
- Reaction score
- 1,350
- Gender
- Male
- Political Leaning
- Independent
Back in the 80s I got my 1st job while in high school, building parts for professional drag racing cars and street cars. So I used to go to our local drag strip on Friday night's and even ran my own car a few times. The top sanctioning body of drag racing in America is the National Hot Rod association(NHRA). They've been around since shortly after WW2 when vets came home and discovered they could make their v-8 powered cars faster.
***Note: Before you die, you should go to a NHRA national event that includes the Top Fuel classes. Watching it on tv is almost completely irrelevant to the live experience. Its absolutely stunning to stand 75 feet away from the track and watch a 10,000 horsepower car go from 0-320mph in 3.7 seconds! You FEEL it....
Anyway, In Nascar you hear about Danica Patrick, but as far as I know she is the only woman there now and she hasn't finished a race better than 6th place, and overall she is a mediocre driver, along with quite a few mediocre male drivers.
The situation is different in pro drag racing. It has 4 top classes: 1. Top Fuel dragster, 2. Top Fuel Funny Car, 3. Pro Stock, and 4. Pro Stock motorcycle. There are at least 100+ lower classes/subclasses but they aren't televised.
As of last week, a woman was leading each of the top 2 classes! Now Brittany Force is in 3rd place in Top Fuel dragster and Courtney Force is in 1st place in TF funny car. Last season, the Pro Stock champion was another woman named Erica Enders-Stevens, and she's in 9th place now(new car manufacturer = still getting bugs out). In Pro Stock motorcycle, we have Angelle Sampey in 6th place now.
So, woman are not only competing, they are competing against men(unlike most sports) and they are winning. But more importantly, they are accepted and embraced by their fellow male racers and by the fans.
If a testosterone fueled sport like drag racing is this accepting of women, then it helps to disprove the claims that America is so backwards when it comes to equality of the sexes....
Nice job NHRA.....
***Note: Before you die, you should go to a NHRA national event that includes the Top Fuel classes. Watching it on tv is almost completely irrelevant to the live experience. Its absolutely stunning to stand 75 feet away from the track and watch a 10,000 horsepower car go from 0-320mph in 3.7 seconds! You FEEL it....
Anyway, In Nascar you hear about Danica Patrick, but as far as I know she is the only woman there now and she hasn't finished a race better than 6th place, and overall she is a mediocre driver, along with quite a few mediocre male drivers.
The situation is different in pro drag racing. It has 4 top classes: 1. Top Fuel dragster, 2. Top Fuel Funny Car, 3. Pro Stock, and 4. Pro Stock motorcycle. There are at least 100+ lower classes/subclasses but they aren't televised.
As of last week, a woman was leading each of the top 2 classes! Now Brittany Force is in 3rd place in Top Fuel dragster and Courtney Force is in 1st place in TF funny car. Last season, the Pro Stock champion was another woman named Erica Enders-Stevens, and she's in 9th place now(new car manufacturer = still getting bugs out). In Pro Stock motorcycle, we have Angelle Sampey in 6th place now.
So, woman are not only competing, they are competing against men(unlike most sports) and they are winning. But more importantly, they are accepted and embraced by their fellow male racers and by the fans.
If a testosterone fueled sport like drag racing is this accepting of women, then it helps to disprove the claims that America is so backwards when it comes to equality of the sexes....
Nice job NHRA.....
Last edited:
