United Flathead Racing Association - UFRA

The United Flathead Racing Association was an organization that started in 1970 for flathead dragsters and an occasional flathead gasser. It was started by Larry Lee and Wayne Talley and ended up growing to 28 flathead dragsters with monthly races at such tracks as Orange County, Irwindale, Palmdale, Holtville, Carlsbad, Fremont, Vegas, and Tuscan. The finals were held at the Antique Nationals, the same event we all know and love today.

It included legendary racers such as John Bradley, Tony Miglizzi, and McCloskey and Jordan.

The competition of the club advanced the design and engineering of high HP flatheads. With John Bradleys 4-port engine, Joe Taylors homemade injection, and Tony Miglizzi with his 1 inch stroked flathead, and custom made transmission which enabled todays flathead dragster to run mid 7's in the 1/4 mile.

The UFRA also has foreign exchange program where they would send a member car to such places as New Zealand and England, and they would send one of their cars to them.

The club had major sponsors such Valvoline Oil, Justice Bros, Iskendarian Cams, and others.

My dad joined the club in 1974 with his flathead dragster, "The Antique Doll" that i have a thread here on the Hamb with

My dad and I are starting the UFRA back up. We have been tracking down many of the original cars, and we still have good friends that were in the organization that actively run the cars.

The original club only allowed flathead fords, but we are opening it up to any flathead:flathead ford v8, inline, big bore cadillac, and 4 bangers.

As of right now it is mainly So-cal/West Coast since thats where the events will be, and the Antique Nationals is held. But we are hoping for further expansion to back east and the flathead world.

We are in the beginning stages of the forming the club, and we are getting positive feedback from flathead owners and tracks/Nostalgia Race organizers.

We are going to hold a meet and greet soon, meeting new members and their cars, discuss the future of the club, bench race, and talk flatheads!

PM if you have any interest or any questions.

Enjoy these photos from the original UFRA scrapbook, and reminisce and the good ol' days of racing!

 

"O" wait til my friend Roseville Carl see this

 

Just WOW, thank you for the thread!

 

SWEET Thread! Thank You! Makes me want to find an FED and use one of the 3 8BA's I have hangin' around (guess I should finish my 29 Model A truck first, though). Spent quite a bit of time at OCIR back in the day (drags and the Bug-In). You know, back when there were bunches of eucalyptus and orange trees all over O.C...

 

Wow! Very cool! Best of luck with getting the club going again- should be exciting!

 

Yeee this is a coool thread. Hope fore more

 

I read this D' then I found this car in the classifieds..........
http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=623880

 

Yeah, he actually contacted me about the dragster awhile back (my wanted add) and my dad recognized it as Mike Swifts dragster (small world eh?) Funny thing is, my dad sold that chassis at the Long Beach Swap Meet during the UFRA days (my dad took the picture of the chassis being unloaded from the trailer, my dads funny car body was on top... wish he still had that!!!!)

So I was happy to inform him the history on the chassis, and send some pictures his way.

It would be fun to get that chassis and put another flathead, but to many projects now...

 

WOW!!!!!
that is cool, way cool...
does anybody know what power they have more or less and what compression?

 

Great post! Brings back a lot of memories of the 80s here on the East Coast when we could field a few flathead cars for nostalgia events. Ron SanGiovanni had a rail, our rail, Reg Bernier's rail, Charlie Overfelt's altered, and some others depending on what state we were in. Nothing like the West Coast but still fun! "Hey mister, how come your motor has 8 spark plugs and six exhaust pipes?"

 

Wow, what a treat. Goes well with the morning coffee. Thanks for the effort, and the memories. It was a great little circuit. When did it go dark? I know by the late 70's that several mini circuits were beginning to fade away for a variety of reasons.

 

This is why I HAMB!!

 

Great to see the revival of interest in this stuff. Ours only has six cylinders, but it's definitely a flattie.

 

It went dark mid to late 80's? I'm not positive about that.

Glad everyone is enjoying it! And I hope this brings all the flathead race cars out of the woodwork, and get some races going

 

As long as them heads have no valves in them, that's all we ask for!

 

myself and a couple guys are interested in the UFRA coming to the east coast, we are all from north carolina and were wondering if there is a sertain date that a show or meet and greet would be held somewhere over here...lots of flathead addicts in our area...anyway, looking foward to it.

 

Damn D great pics, you know I'm in, keep it going I will let Fred know also....
All I can say is wow............

 

GREAT thread!

Finally THE thread for us FED flathead guys!

Thanks.

Br
Kjell

...............................
Taildragger&fenderless

 

Excellent thread!! I remember watching most if not all of those Flathead dragsters running at OCIR, old Irwindale [if I am not mistaken] and at LA County in my younger years. Sure brings back great memories of precious time I spent with my dad. Thanks for posting the photos!