L. A. Street Racing Archive late 70's to ?

Does anyone remember this car ?

In early eighties we were cruising Van Nuys Blvd in my 67 El Co, (real cruising traffic was crawling) a maroon Volvo 4 door sedan is next to us, it's dropped in the front with stock steel wheels and dog dish hub caps, it has an Ed Pink sticker on the rear door window, as we look closer we notice that the rear wheels have been widened and it has an air cleaner just barley sticking through one side of the hood, he asked my partner riding shot gun it we want to race, we declined, as traffic started to move he left a space of about 3 car lengths in front of him, he gassed it and pulled the front wheels about 4" off the ground !!!!!!

Did anyone ever see this car run ????

 

We cruised there a bit, never saw that. Sounds real interesting though.

 

Hey, just remember: bottles are for babies! (whah!) Wish I had a buck for every time I heard that quote...

 

Bottle, what bottle? You just go ahead and find the bottle in that car. And they never did. What a fuckin Houdini you were Tark.

 

I got a phone call from 'TARK' today, telling me about this site. Cool - nice to see everyone coming out of the woodworks to post here! I've got a ton of pics, but they're all on 35mm prints. Mostly Tark & I at car-shows, OCIR and TI. I'll have to dig them out & scan 'em in.

Anyone remember the 70 Challenger, with no hood, that showed up at Bob's with the 392 hemi dropped into the engine compartment (with no motor mounts, it was just dropped into there!)? I don't remember who he set up a race with, but before long, we all headed over to Jefferson in Culver City. I was brave enough to stand at about half track & when the starter dropped, both cars took off. The Challenger threw it's dampner off right in front of me. I ran. The Challenger obviously shut down, but I didn't care - I was laughing so hard, my eyes were tearing up.

I'll never forget, seeing that car coast to the curb, the driver's buddies beating the bushes looking for the dampner, I don't know if they ever found it......

Anyone remember Camelot? I'll never forget the sight of him swaggering around holding a bottle (wrapped in a plain brown paper bag).....talking smack, trying to get someone to race him.

 

And, no one but Tark & I knew where the 'switch' was to turn on the NOS. Steve is clever, I gotta hand that to him.

 

Mike G. as in Golumbeski (sp) lived on Ventura Canyon near Woodman and worked at Ed Pinks shop ? That was the 1st " Pro Street " car I had ever seen.

I have a mag. that did a faeture on that car.

 

Exactly! But it was NOT a Pro-Street car. That's what was cool about it. It had an 8 1/2" rear wheel with about a 10.5 tire. He ran it on SS Cragars, Halibrands, and Centerlines. Switched every time he brought it out. If I remember, it had a tiny bubble on the rear 1/4 to clear the tire. I used to drive by that house every weekend on my way to my friend's house, and see all kinds of cool cars in the driveway. Including my old 70 1/2 Z-28 after being turned into a race car. Thumpin motor, huge hole in the floor for a Super Shifter, 4.88's, abbreviated exhaust, and slicks

 

What about "Vega High". The first BBC Vega owned by Mike Johnson. Black with gold stripes. Coucher did the frame work. It had the 482" out of the "Fly United" Corvette. "Popular Hot Rodding" claimed they would get the car in the nines. Even after an article appeared saying it ran nines, Coucher said the fastest they got it to run was 10:30's.

 

is this the ride...?.. much better looking with the cragars and old front.....

i've asked this before....but beings there are a couple other new guys on here.... anyone ever remember seeing a bright red early 80's supra with a stroker bb mopar with twin turbos..?..sleeper in ever sense of the word....
brandon

 

This is what we do!! I am national sales manger for Wolfgang Publications. My boss Tim Remus was just talking about doing a book on 70's street racing, please contact me so we can start to collect pics and stories

 

Yep, that's it. Mike and Coucher drove it out to Van Nuys on an "off" night. I liked it when it had the Cragars too and the old front end. Didn't care for the later model front end they installed before painting.

I heard some rich Dentist bought the car, totally stripped it and built a completely new car.

 

In defense of the magazine "lies". It still was a fast SOB for it's time. And, being the 1st "big tire" car I'd seen, it was really impressive looking

 

That's a different incarnation from what I remember. But, THAT is a great looking car. Keep in mind, I've never been crazy about Vegas. But, the one pictured? PERFECT

 

just something about that stance, the deep backspaced wheels and 14x32's hanging underneath....with a stack setup ..it'd be over the top...(as it seems like the same article had it pictured that way too...and something about a clutch-turbo, too) i remember a couple of these cars that were local...full on drag cars ...one was prabably from the early to mid 70's...and the other was when i was getting out of high school in 89....the last was a 377 / hemi 4 speed / dana 60 car ....gray primer ...scalloped firewall to clear the mag...and no hood.... he won that night at the dragstrip.... and the car hasn't left his shop since.... and wouldn't sell it a couple years after that... neat car.... brandon

 

AIN'T no 14x32's in that picture you posted. THAT'S what I like about it. I still don't believe that picture you posted is of Vega High. I'm gonna dig into my pics now

 

OK, here's BOTH Vegas in mention with "Vega High" in the Foreground (it's owner, Mike Johnson, on the left leaning on Mike Golembeski's Vega), and Mike G's Vega in the backround(standing on the right). The picture was taken on the famous Van Nuys Blvd's Jack in the Box, just North of Vanowen St. One of those is me in the background (holla)

 

HERE'S the "Vega High" I remember from the street races back when. Why? Because it's THE one. PS-claiming 10.30's, instead of the aforementioned 9's

 

One Wednesday night, on Van Nuys Blvd, I met a couple of guys with a 67' Mustang Coupe with a Big Block. I set up a race on Vanowen with my 65' Malibu Big Block. The Mustang got 3 cars.

We took off with the Mustang 3 cars out. At 5000 rpm, the motor shut off. When the rpms dropped, the motor re-fired so I shifted to 2nd. The mustang was pulling away by then. At 5000 rpms, the motor shut off again. WTF????
Then it dawned on me, I forgot to switch my rev limiter to 8000. I shifted to 3rd, cranked the rev limiter to 10,000, caught and passed the Mustang like gangbusters. Hit 4th and coasted.

Man, were those guys screaming. They swore I had nitrous that I used in 3rd gear. They wouldn't pay until I showed them the motor.

 

got anymore shots of the yellow one with the halibrands...? brandon

 

I went to jail one night for oiling down that ally. I was 17 and the informed me that had some one been injured or killed from an errant car, I would have went down for involuntary vehicler man slaughter. Yikes! They made me go the local fire station for six months for safety training. Guys started taking me to Van Nuys when I was 13 cause I'd find out where the races were gonna be and report back. Van Nuys was nuts back then. I stopped street racing when the
drug dealers infested the seen. The whole deal got real unsafe. I remember one night "Bottle Bob" unknowingly hit his "juice" switch getting out of his corvette.
While he was in the croud behind the bank putting together a race, his motor was filling with "the gas". When he got back in the car to go race, he hit the ignition switch and sent the carb and hood into orbit. Scared the piss out of everyone. Man it was alot of fun until the late 80's or so.

 

I'll look

 

Didn't Rick Ball end up with that Vega?

 

where else , but california would you find a street race vega with polished halibrands......gotta love it....

 

Jeff Lironis got it, and parted it out. It was so long ago, I don't remember who got the body

 

I went to St Genevieve High School in Panarama City on Roscoe. My mom was driving me home one afternoon from football practice and
that yellow/black vega came out of a side street in front of us. I nearly crapped myself. I made her follow it west on roscoe as long as
we could. For awhile in the 80's there were alot of them around, usuall small tire kinda ragitty things. We used to call them "V8 Vegina's", sorry about the x-rated phrase but it always cracked me up. However there were a few of em like these that were bad ass.

 

In the 70's, I hung out at Jim Lirones house on the weekends. It was a block up Hazeltine from St Gen's High School. A lot went on at that house. Four street racing roomates, Jim's brother Jeff, me, and whoever would stop by knowing there was all of us hanging out. One of those roomates was Steve Johnson, who now races Pro-Stock bikes in NHRA for about 20 years. I got some funny stories about him that I'll keep to myself for now. Another one of our good friends who'd stop by regularly was Larry Dixon, of Top Fuel fame. He was a young kid that worked at Van Nuys Service Center, a highly respected speed shop around here years ago. And his Dad had already made a helluva name for himself by then too. Story- When I moved to Socal in 69 from New York, I took one Hot Rod magazine on the plane to read with Dixon Sr on the cover. Who knew I'd become good friends with him and his son not too many years later. I still have that magazine somewhere with the label showing my New York address in Brooklyn. PS-the yellow Vega lived just a few short blocks east of St Gen's

 

Panneton. Is that you Rick?

 

Yep! I should be making pistons right now, but this is addicting.