Earlier I went. For the first time!!!! Oh man it was the Nitrous Street Car Brawl (The sound of burnouts, open headers and the smell of burning tires and nitrous put me in Eden). All I was hoping to see was at least one GS (around here Buicks are a very, very small crowd) and I saw one......run a 9 second quarter mile, and pull a very nice wheelie :eek2: (I also saw a 10 second GN, which one of the people who was with me claimed that the little 6 wouldn't run fast; I knew better). I talked to the guy who ran the GS afterwards. I figured that he had a Buick engine in it considering it had a Stage 2 hood on it (if the guy had used a chevy engine he wouldn't have bothered with one of those) and sure as taxes and death he did have a Buick engine. It was a red (with black hood) Stage 2 with full exhaust!!! I was just amazed at it just glowing in all its Buick mightiness. I asked him a few questions about his car and Buicks in general and was surprised that he knew what a Buick Apollo was so he obviously knows Buicks. He got a call on his cell phone while I was talking to him and that ended that since he was loading his car up anyways and my friend who was with me wanted to go check out a few of the camaros (which there were plenty of, not to mention the number of Mustangs!!) so we checked those out. Soon after we got back to the stands we watched as the GN waited a second or two before reaction to the light catch up to and pass in short order an 11 second mustang!!! All in all very cool, something which I hope to see many more times during the duration of this summer!!! Oh and i'm just curious if anyone on the board knows of the guy who drove the GS or if he is on this board. Now hopelessly addicted to drag racing, Patrick
Patrick, Some of the first times I was at Union Grove was in 1970 racing my old man's 66GS Riviera (unbeknown to him) in the grudge matches. One night the announcer said something about how surprised he was at how fast the big old Riv was for it's size. My buddies got a real kick out of that. I was about 18 at the time. Later on in the 80s I was there with my Corvettes. Took second place in my 66 coupe to a 67 427 tri-power convertible due to reaction times. Gotta admit it's been a long while since I was there now. Glad to hear you got the bug. It's fun to watch, but you haven't done nothing yet until you start driving.
If it was Saturday the 15th you were most likely looking at Tom Rix's GS with Perry Carlini's motor. They had posted on the Chicago GS Club site they would be up there doing a little T&T before going down to BG next week. Couple of hard core Buick racer's there. I wanted to go but we had a social obligation that couldnt get blown off:ball: Sounded like you guy's had fun though, thanks for the update, allways nice to hear about strong Buick's running at Da Grove. D.:TU:
Union Grove Patrick, Perry, Jack and I were up there trying to get the red car to live up to it's potential, getting closer but not there yet. Maybe it will be fast enough by Salem? Legal GSM trim without nitrous. Could have sold the car several times to some of the folks from the south side of Chicago for street racing purposes, but Carol said the "club" would disown me if the old J&B car ended up as a street racer! Perry did redeem himself by getting the blue car in the 11's so he can now sleep at night. Hope to see you at another race. Tom Rix
Re: Union Grove im not sure who I was talking to (I never asked for any names how foolish am I lol ou: ) but it sounded as if he (you maybe?) were dissapointed in the car's performance (carb problems I believe) and I would have to say it was still very impressive and really blew the mind of my friend Jim (the guy with the long hair) considering it was full exhaust!! We had originally planned to go to see Barry (72? burnt orange Nova) who is a friend of Jim's dad and it kinda stunk that the only run we saw his son make (who is 17 I believe) was when he red lighted because his hand slipped off the handbrake. All in all a very cool night. And the best of wishes to you guys on your GS, it certainly is inspiring to see 455 power at the drag strip, makes me wanna get off my ass and get started on the Apollo....well almost :grin: . Chao, Patrick
i bicycled past there twice sunday. did a run from waterford to racine and back again. nice 50 mile bike ride. I saw 2 regals on trailers and one GN being drivin along with lots of imports goin there. oh yea and a bunch of mid 90's cameros. I do need to go there just see what my slow convertible can do. Nate
Nate, You a roadie? I have never ridden that area of Wisconsin and am always looking for good road rides.
Mike, I've recently turned roadie. in training to do GRABAAWR (hey if your going to do it why not jump in all the way right?) http://www.grabaawr.com/grabaawr2004brochure.pdf I've had a Mtn. bike for awhile but never really got hooked till recently, and it was with my road bike. It's pretty nice around there (waterford area). not too terribly hilly, but nice rollers though some hills get kinda steep, but the down hills:TU: the ride is nice with farms all around the wind lately has sucked though. I generally ride with a friend of mine from work but she's pretty slow so I dont get to challenge myself too much. though her son was out this last sunday and keepin up with him was a challenge. over 52 miles we averaged about 17 mph. coulda been a lil higher in my opinion just sometimes had to slow up. it would be nice to find some other people to ride with. where do you generally ride?
That looks like a great ride. 490 miles over 7 days shouldn't be too bad. I had a friend I worked with that would do the Iowa ride which is similer, and he did it on a $200 mountain bike and cut off jeans. ou: I'm 35 miles southwest of Chicago. I also have alot of farm roads out here, but we don't have much in the way of rolling terrain. The wind is my hills LOL. 17mph over 52 miles is very respectable with the wind we have here in the midwest. I have been into cycling my whole life. I started out racing BMX when I was a kid and raced through my teens. Then started racing mountain bikes in my early 20s. I got my 1st road bike about 12 years ago to train for MTB racing and began to enjoy road riding so much that I do that most of all. I would love to do a ride up there somoeday. The only riding I have done in that area is MTBing at Kettle Morraine. Unfortunatly, this year is a wash for me to do any long distance stuff, since I am still working through rehab on one surgery and have another in September or October. I have just recently been cleared to ride my MTB for a whopping 20 mins a day. My physical therapist laughed at me when I mentioned that I would have to start judging my riding in hours instead of miles. She said more like mins instead of hours. Ahh well, at least I have my Buick. There's always next season.
