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The Last Sandy Beach
Outlaw Race, 1982.
Posted
Sunday, January 25, 2004
Told
by the Kalama Valley Kid.
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There
must have been over 200 cars and hot rods mixed in with twice that
amount of people waiting for something to happen. Sandy Beach
looked like a Saturday afternoon surf meet without the media
hoopla. I wouldn’t have guessed it at the time, but it was all
because of me?
Could
all these people have known that I was coming there to test a
bottle of Nitrous? The only two people who knew about my plans
were Guy Swift and Chevrons night manager, Dean. It was a sure bet
that Dean didn’t have any reason to say anything to anyone and
as far as Guy, well he was pre-occupied with running his own
homegrown business sort to speak.
I
slowly pulled into the first entrance to Sandy’s looking for
anyone I knew. As I also looked for a place to park between
crowded parking stalls, a short scrawny local guy wearing baggy
beige shorts and a light blue tee-shirt walked up to my mail-slot
sized window and said, "Brah, my boy like race you." I
replied as cool as I could, "who’s your boy?" Again,
he repeated to say his boy, not mentioning any names, wanted to
race me but this time pointing towards the highway.
Every
outlaw race I did up until that point had been well organized. I
always made sure that an exact quarter-mile had been clearly
marked off and, to even-up my odds of safely winning, I always
took the suicide lane.
I
felt that by taking the on-coming side of the road would give me
more control in case anything drastically went wrong. But this
time, whoever wanted to race me, was already prepared and had been
waiting on the suicide lane evenly lined up with a faded make
shift chalk line poorly scribed into the asphalt.
It
was a fast Volkswagen Bug owned by a guy named Joe Yu. His
nickname was, `the Flea. I heard about him several months ago, but
figured Guy Swift took care of him on his side of the Island. In
other words, I thought Guy already raced him somewhere west of H-2
freeway and proved, you cant screw with American steel and that
Volkswagens have no place going up against V8’s in the first
place.
Without
a doubt that Bug was fast. I heard all kinds of roomers about the
Flea but never really believed much of what I heard second hand.
His 1967 Volkswagen Beetle could be compared to today’s Fast and
Furious. Like I said, it was a quick bug all right. It could keep
up with most V8’s if at least keeping them at a cars length
behind. Still, I thought Guy Swift had already shut him down
months earlier.
I
carefully thought about what would happen if I didn’t play this
race out. What would the consequences be if I just hung around the
beach and made believe I was part of the crowd, even better yet,
suppose I just turned around and went back to the gas station
where I always felt comfortable and safe?
While
weighing this scenario in my mind, in the background I could hear
the Flea, Whoop! Whoop! With every throaty-whoop came a low-pitch
murmur from the crowd that filled Sandy’s parking lot. There was
no way out of this despite a bad feeling. I had to go up to the
line with my coupe and finally meet this guy who seemed to have
90-weight gear oil for blood.
With
no preparations ready, capped up, street tires, and a blue bottle
of NOS that I’ve never used before for a passenger –
definitely not the makings for a winning race – I drove up to
the line.
Everything
was so unorganized; I couldn’t make out heads or tales who would
be flagging us to go.
I
grabbed the NOS bottle and placed it between my legs. Cracked open
the valve and made one complete counterclockwise turn. I couldn’t
remember what Guy said about how far to open it. By then it was
just a guess. Too much, you blow up? Too little, your motor will
stall? Damn what was it? One turn, or a half turn? I hope this is
right. The coupe was getting hot from sitting at idle too long. I
wish these guys would hurry up and pick who would be flagging.
Finally,
some guy walked between my coupe and the Flea; stood between the
two cars and held out a Zippo Lighter. I could see it shimmer
through the windshield from my headlights. Then with a flick of his
thumb, he lit it.
I
heard the Bug take off, that’s when I nailed my coupe. I knew no
matter how fast a Volkswagen could go; they’re always slow out
of the hole, and I’d get a good jump ahead no matter what. So
that second or two delay on my part wouldn’t count me out yet.
CONTINUED»
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