Mickey Thompson Picture Thread

Why was Mickey Thompson and his wife murdered????

 

Mickey beating Art Malone in Garlits's car, Bakersfield, '60. I was standing on the fire engine at the top end and the place went wild when Thompson won. Story I heard was that Thompson fired after Malone, then a crew member added fuel on the starting line, holding up Malone, who was wearing a bubble face shield. Fumes got inside the shield, affecting Malone, who was late off the line, losing the race. Don't know if it was true, we couldn't really see the starting line from where we were. But it sounds like something Thompson would do...he was clever!

 

Yup, these appear to be identical to the ones i posted

 

His monocoque chassis F/C must have been a righteous pain in the ass to maintain...

 

Bad deal with bad business partner. Hired thugs shot Trudy first in front of Mickey then they shot him. My belief is that the thugs were then eliminated to wash out the trail.

 

There's a HAMB thread that mentions his sister's later justice work, and the trial that followed.

 

That's really sad. Hope they got everyone involved and fried them.

 

There were two "fuuny cars" one was red and the other blue. I believe "on the gas" drove the blue car that was mainly titanium. I saw them both @ Bristol international "thunder valley" in 1969. CKC from San Antonio beat the blue car in the funny car semi. AHRA convinced CKC to "retire" or some such and Mickey's car was into the final...where he won. Again Danny Ongais drove. I believe the CKC team made out Financially. Long time ago...

 

This is what the previous picture of MT on the mini bike should look like. Everything was reversed in the first picture. If you look at the sign in the background it says M/T.

 

3 months before the US Nationals, Mickey had the twin at San Gabriel for testing. The car never got to the Nationals. Mickey stopped by Bonneville on the way, and set the fastest speed of the meet at 294. He went home and began building the Challenger.

 

Here is a shot of his other twin.

 

The Monster. It suffered from design flaws. If it didn't break, it had traction problems. Ivo's twin Buicks on gas were the right horsepower for the design. Two blown Pontiacs on fuel were too much. Mickey didn't mess with it too long.

 

M/Ts 1965 Indy effort.

 

These 2 spectacular color pics surfaced a few years ago. The person who put them on the net did not really know what he had. These are the only 2 known color pics of the #2 HEMI Pontiac digger brought to Indy in 1962. The #1 car, also HEMI Pontiac powered, that Jack Chrisman drove was a white Dragmaster. It was photographed a lot and won Top Elimintor and low ET of the weekend. That Pontiac, put away each and every Chrysler HEMI, as well as any other powerplant, at the Nationals! This would include Don Garlits.
With the #1 car getting so much attention, the #2 HEMI Pontiac digger, seemed to get overlooked. It looked much more modern than the winning dragmaster car.
From what I have gathered, this blue car was wrecked sometime later in the year at Long Beach when it broke a rear wheel during a wheelstand and hit the building/tower near the left lane.
If anyone else have pics of this car, or info on its history, please share. I am a historian on M/T Pontiac related and HEMI Pontiac in particular. Always looking for more info and pics.
The HEMI Pontiac was not a copy of a 392 head as many think. Hot Rod had a poor technical article on this car in Nov 1962 with much wrong info.
The HEMI Pontiac head was designed with a clean slate. It did share valve covers with a 392 though. Perhaps that may be why people think the heads are similar. In my collection, have the only complete running exisiting HEMI Pontiac engine purchased from M/T in 1963. Also have a small stash of heads. Building a 2nd HEMI Pontiac for my nostalgia AAFD too. Neat stuff.

 

And I always thought it was because Mickey was left handed

 

One of my all time heros. He could and did do it all. 'cause of him, I've had a lifetime love of Pontiacs.

 

I own one of Mickeys off road cars. We restored it from 2011 thru 2014 and raced it at the 2014 NORRA Mexican 1000 vintage race. Same result, was leading and we DNF'ed. It went back into retirement after that but then got coaxed to bring it out to race the vintage class at the 2016 MINT 400 in Las Vegas and ended up winning our class. Good times.

Mickey Thompson's 1978 Challenger IV class 1 unlimited.

1978...


2014 NORRA Mexican 1000 (Baja Mexico)...


2016 MINT 400....

 

For sale. PM me if interested. Thanks-