Author: Don

We have partnered up with our friends over at the Facebook group North American Gassers to bring you a special Tri-5 Gasser heads up race on Saturday Night July 8th at Rock’N’Race! Hang on the event schedule is coming out soon….not sure how we are going to fit it all in for one weekend!

Happy New Year to all!

As I sit here at the close of 2022 I ponder the year that past.  This time last year I was in solitary confinement; Quarantined from my family and people, on foreign soil, during our family holiday vacation.  Freedom is something we take for granted.  You sit and think about what really matters.  For me, family is the top of the list; Then friends and so on.  This year saw my father having a stroke and my father in law falling with Covid and being in a re-hab center for an extended period of time. Thankfully both have recovered!  Family and time seem to be what matters most!  My girls are starting their own lives and I have hit the double nickel.  Here is where I am going with this.

I have been at this Gasser Madness website/ Gasser Magazine Race Director/ Gasser crusade for over a decade now.  When I took over for Byron Stack, my vision was to create a format that would educate and unify a fractured genre by hosting events that kept the original gasser style format alive.  I have failed.  Gasser racing is more fractured now than ever before.  We made the effort to try a multi venue points race only to see a handful of loyal racers that made each race.  Most places we went we ran into friction about the rules we employ.  Hell even locally racers complained about our rules. Funny thing about those rules, most could be considered perjured from the NHRA 1967 rule book!   I do not wish to continue this crusade as such.

Starting in 2023 I will be changing the vision of Gasser Madness.  Gone will be hosting of all events with the exception of our signature event, Rock’N’Race.  This race will be getting a major facelift as well, starting with the website and the race format.  Also 2023 will see a new and improved Gasser Madness website.  We are going to remove all the racing classes, and install gasser building information for those that take the time to research their build.  Our main focus will be video coverage for gasser style events that are put on by other folks.  We will invest in some video equipment and build on our Youtube channel.  Since there will be little income from the loss of holding events.  Our swag department will have new items and discontinued items available to purchase to help offset the rising costs to keep the domain and website alive.  Like any business; if it does not continue on by being self-sustained, it will die.  We are not looking for donations (we would not say no however) but you can help!  Sure you could buy swag but I get it, car guys want to spend money on their car!  Simply go to our youtube channel and subscribe!  The more followers we get the better for the website!  Once we reach a certain number, income from Youtube will make enough to keep Gasser Madness alive for all to see!  We appreciate the effort of those that helped with the events in the past and the racers that kept their car within the guidelines that we published.  They will allow you to race at most nostalgia events in the country including Rock’N’Race.

We are going to do something different with Rock’N’Race this year.  As you know in the past we paid travel money to those Nostalgia Gas cars that pre-registered.  Now instead of the travel money,  we are going to have a free exhibition class for period correct race cars.  The cut off is 1957 for year of make for door cars.  Altereds and Front engine dragsters will also be considered.  This will be a pre-registered and entered only by a selection committee.  Guidelines for this will be released in the beginning of the New Year and registration will start on January 20^th.  This class will be capped at 200 cars and will be exhibition only.  Think of a hard core meltdown, No trophies, stickers, purse.  Just run what you brung and have fun!  There will still be other classes at Rock’N’Race that have actual racing with a purse including Nostalgia Gas. 

We do plan to keep Heritage Gas alive and plan to pursue a drag and drive event for these types of cars.  This will be a Gasser Madness group activity. 

Again we here at Gasser Madness wish you all nothing but the best in 2023 and beyond and we hope to see you, our racing family, at some events this summer!

Don Moyer

Gasser Madness

First we would like to wish you all a Happy Thanksgiving!

There are many changes coming to Gasser Madness after this past season, so stay tuned for the new year! For many years we were asked to do a points series and 2022 was the year. We are proud to announce that we had 104 different Gasser’s run the series this year. We feel that that is a great number considering that one of our bigger Gasser events was cancelled because of weather at Indy. In no particular order we congratulate Gregg Grubel for winning the Nostalgia Gas series, Bill Lile won the 1/8 mile Nostalgia quick Gas, and Harmony Glick won the Competition Gas series in a very tight race! We would like to congratulate all the racers for participating in the Gasser Madness series.

They said that gas was too expensive..

They said fewer cars would show up because Goodguys were right down the freeway in Columbus…

They said there wouldn’t be any race cars there because the 2 step was not permitted….

They said the event would be a wash because there was an 80% chance of rain on Friday….

They were wrong!

The 2022 version of Rock’N’Race was by far the smoothest and most organized event to date!  Gas expensive, no worries we had cars from Connecticut to Montana, Texas, Alabama, Florida and Canada!  I am sure I am missing some other far away states but they came! 

We might need to re think the show area as we were running out of room!  We know what to do and it will be better next year.  Moving the Hauler’Back Trucking Stage to the hill with the car show and vendors was a huge success!  Cleveland Audio stepped up their game, and the bands could be heard all the way to the end of the track!  Fans went from watching racing, to car show, to watching the band all within a few yards of each other.  Racers could watch the bands and hear the bands while in the staging lanes!  Speaking of staging lanes, the addition of Racer Rich in the tower along with Dragway 42 providing a staff member at the rear of staging, made things move way better than previous years!

Here is what I will say about the no 2 step rule; I did not hear any cheating in any division.  The car count did not suffer that much.  The starting line sounded like the late 60’s.  If your “nostalgia event/group” permits 2 steps it is just another modern race. 

Thursday the pits were about 75% full!  It looked great and that is what makes doing these events rewarding.  Most of these guys/gals get it and will have fun no matter the weather!  Fans these days watch the weatherman and we all know that is the best job in the world!  They can be 75% wrong and that would be considered good.  Friday it was supposed to get a break from about 4-8 then rain till about 2am….we got half a cycle in then the skies started to drizzle on us.  Whenever it stopped the 42 crew worked their butts off to get the track ready only to have it drizzle again.  It never rained hard, but it was enough to keep the track empty.  Then when the bands started to play, so did the racing!  The flag girl contest sponsored by the Choppers Hot Rod Association was a big hit and the girls did a great job.  We wanted to get everyone a couple of rounds of test and tune.   As per the schedule we had our first round of qualifying for the Funny Cars and AA/GS.  Unfortunately one funny car had a transmission failure and yours truly 33 Willys ripped all the teeth off the ring gear.   We finished the second cycle around 10 and did not do the Gambler’s Race.  I decided that working the crew super late didn’t make sense when Saturday is the bid day and we were starting 2 hours earlier to get everyone more track time on Saturday to make up for the rain delay on Friday. 

Saturday was about as perfect a day as you could ask for!  The track went hot at 8 am and made noise till midnight!  That is 16 hours of racing!   We got the gamblers race in because we care about our charity!  We won’t know for a few days how much we raised for UH Rainbow Babies Children’s Cancer Research but we were glad to add it to the schedule.  Larry Dixon and his 2 seat Nitro Top Fuel Dragster nailed 2 great passes.  All the divisions and classes put on a great exhibition of heads up racing with many close races!  I believe the Perfect Convertor Muscle Car class was the biggest class this year but I have not gone over any numbers as of yet.  We will get winner circle pictures and car show winners posted in the next couple of weeks.  We printed more event shirts this year than ever before and still sold out by 10:30am on Saturday.  We don’t even start selling them until noon on Friday.  I also noticed the swapmeet keeps getting better as well!  I saw a super cool FED for sale and even a 33 willys!  I did score a 3^rd member with 35 spline spool for my 33 however the axles did not fit the swap score so we were dead for in the water for the weekend.

Sunday the weather was again near perfect and we did not mess around after the marathon Saturday.  We started eliminations at 10 am and secured the track by 3pm!  We got everyone on the road with a smile on their faces.

I couldn’t do this without the help of my friends: Wayne and Pam, Tech by committee performed by Richie, Matt, Shannon, Wayne and Scott, Our little compound of chefs Oscar, Tom, Bill, Kim, Pam, Dan, Heather, and Michelle. Thanks for making sure I eat even if it is midnight.  The Slick Devils taking care of business with the car show field, and the pics along with the presentations.  My crew Jacin, Squirrel, Jeremy and Ashley doing their best to get the Hart Automotive coupe back on track.  Servicing the fuel system when we were finished was a huge help!

  Every year a little more gets completed at this massive venue.  Trees were added and racers were excited to see light poles and power stations going in the pits.  The Matchams and provided us with such a fantastic venue for Rock’N’Race.  Ron had that track on kill when so many other facilities around the country are running out of VHT: Kudos to an owner that manages his own track surface and the crew with him.  The safety squad did a fantastic job when they were needed.  Best year ever in by the girls in the tower!   We had a bunch of photographers at this event and I am excited to see all the images they produce.  We racers only see our cars through their eyes!  I also want to thank all the food venders that provided for the photographers in the hospitality loge!  I would also like to point out that I looked at the menus and I am happy that I did not see any price gouging!   I have been getting rave reviews for the bands on stage and I know the sound was great.  Also thank you to Alan Ward on the PA, Joe Rossman for color commentator, John Sarver from CKIW for the live feed and great interviews!  Thanks Bob Riggle of Hemi Underglass fame for hanging out and signing autographs.  Larry Dixon and crew for bringing top fuel to our crowd, nothing like it!  Mike Charlton for making a pass on a jet powered motorcycle!

Thank you Mickey Thompson Tires, Perfect Converter, WAC Kustoms, Kenda Tires, Choppers Hot Rod Association, Slick Devils, Summit Racing Equipment I-X Piston Powered Cleveland Auto-Rama, 911 Clothing and Collectibles, East Coast Air Brush, Gellner Engineering, Merchants of Speed, Here Comes Kovach Media Blasting and Cleaning, Hood Rats, The Foat, Gasser Magazine, Cruzin Times, Drag List, Mikes Transmissions, WINT EGRITY Radio, and everyone else that helps out throughout the year.

Last but not least, my family for putting up with me each year for the time I spend doing this, and you, the fans and racers for being part of it!  My marketing style relies on assembling an event that exceeds your expectations so you tell other folks.  Every year Rock’N’Race gets bigger and better!

Thank you!

Every year we have the Gasser Appreciation race at Summit Motorsports Park during the Blue Suede Cruise. We call it that because in Drag Racing, this facility is the best of the best! Bill Bader changed the whole racing world with the reconstruction and business model that he introduced to racing. Norwalk Raceway was the 3rd track in Northern Ohio in 1974 when Bill purchased it. Now it is one of the best in the world and by far our favorite! I tend to call it the disney world of drag racing. From racer experience to fan experience there is no equal. Bill saw a strong vision to make it to the top, and was such a great man that he accomplished that and has raised an awesome family that has continued and expanded his success! I have had the pleasure of talking with Bill Sr. on a couple occasions and I will cherish those conversations for as long as I am around. God Speed Bill Bader Sr.

Our signature event is coming up quick, and today, May 30th is the last day you can pre-register your car. By pre-registering your car, is saves you time when you come to the track, it saves you money, and if you qualify, pays you some Gas money for travel! Now an added bonus we have a limited number of Resin Gasser Models that we are giving to pre-registered racers, and car show participants! You can still register online at the Foat. Simple is go to our events page and click on the orange ticket. Pay with a credit card and you are ready to go. Need more info about Rock’N’Race check out the website for info and updates. www.rocknrace.website

This Friday and Saturday!

FRIDAY, MAY 6 – Time trials and qualifying Index race for Nostalgia Gas

9 a.m. – Racer gates open.

3 p.m. –Tech inspection.

4 p.m. – Spectator gates open

.5 p.m. – Time trials and qualifying.

SATURDAY, MAY 7 – “THE BIG DAY” –

Nostalgia drags, car show, pin-up girl contest, music

7 a.m. – Racer gates open.

8 a.m. – Spectator gates open; Tech inspection.

9 a.m. – Final time trial and qualifying session for racers.

9 a.m.-2 p.m. – Car show entry – 1969-and-older – located to the right of the concession stands/pavilion. Car show judging begins at noon.

Noon – Drag racing opening ceremonies.2:30 p.m. –

Pin-up girl contest on the midway, next to car show. Car show awards immediately follow contest.

5 p.m. – All final rounds of drag racing.

SPECTATOR AND CAR SHOW ADMISSIONOne-day adult (Friday or Saturday) — $25 at the gate.

Weekend adult (Friday and Saturday) — $40.Children 12 and under – Free.

Car show entry — $25 for car and driver.

To add your name to the Mother Road Rendezvous email list or enter the car show or pin-up girl contest, please contact: jbisci@wwtraceway.com.

As 2022 Race season approaches, there is a guideline change and a procedure change.

Guideline Change

The change is for Competition Gas. Since Competition Gas can be interpreted to include any car manufactured in the Us from 1967 back, it has been determined that this needed to be stated; “Specific body styles associated with Gas Class Racing from the past will only be permitted.  For example: 1930’s-1960’s, Uni-body cars like the Chevy II, Falcon, and Rambler American, Opel GT and Cadets etc.  NO Pony Cars, Muscle Cars, Super Stock Ect.  All straight axle outlaw style car will be considered.”  This will permit folks that have gasser style vehicles that do not meet the Nostalgia Gas requirements, an option to compete in this division.

Procedure Change

Last season we enforced weighing cars without drivers for class designation.  Our research told us that this is the way things were done in the 50’s and 60’s.  It made sense to us as well.  What we did not account for was the fact that almost ever competitor has a large engine!  We in effect had 2 major classes and one smaller class.  NHRA changed to weighing car and driver in the 70’s.  We have decided that there are a couple reasons we will switch to cars will be weighed with driver as raced.  This change should open the classes for a better product for our fans. This change will also level the playing field for drivers.  This change does not apply for Heritage Gas.

Every year we consider constructive criticism/praise for how we do things around here. These changes are partially in due to you, our participants and fans!  Thank you for being part of our events!