Sad news for car guys/gals who love to run the quarter mile.

[DEAR _JOHN]

Houston Raceway Park is history and being torn down at this time.

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/new...n-17882635.php

I have so many memories of racing the car down the quarter mile. Mine started in 2005 and it's fun, but a lot of people don't have any idea how fun it is until you make a few passes down the strip. HRP had the advantage of being almost sea level and the guys who prepped the track always did a superb job of making it sticky as hell. The bad thing about being close to sea level is when running at night, the humidity would set in and this makes the air heavier and the strip ran from south to north which means on the rare occasion we had good cold air (negative DA) we would usually be running into a headwind.

One thing I started doing is avoiding the Friday night races and starting going to track rentals. Sometimes on a Friday night, it would take 2 hours to make a pass and if you blew your launch, you hollered FUCK, then got back in line, hood opened because engines hate hot air. With a rental if you blew your launch or blew the run, you would be making another pass within 10 minutes.

At least my last pass was a memorable one, I ran a 9.9 in a Hellcat with a pulley/tune/drag radials and it was 100% street legal and not wrecked out and held together with duct tape. It looked and smelled new and was always hand washed and waxed. It was just in 2005 in a Pontiac my goal was to get into the 12's. How times have changed. Another way times had changed is that I always thought drag radials went on the back (I had never raced a front wheel drive car) and one night I saw a Honda with the drag radials on the front. I had to think about that for a minute of so before reasoning kicked in. Another thing, a car may look and sound fast, but the proof is the time slip as to whether it's fast or not.

Now it seems like every thug who has a Hellcat is taking part of closing down intersections and having all sorts of wrecks or running over people.

The funniest thing I saw was 2 guys in new Porsches running the quarter mile, but they didn't know what they were doing and they ended up in the sand barrier after running past the end of the strip.

[IAmThem]

I been there once never put anything on the track. I use to race my Busa at a track closer to where I stay fun times

[R1966]

Definitely sad news. Ran my car there maybe 20 or so years ago...low 12's/high 11's at the time. Also used to go to the NHRA events.

[MalaysiaInTheCity]

What???? I wonder what they put there now💔😔

[R1966]

according to the chronicle article linked in DJ's post, an industrial park

[kerwil]

Yeah this is sad. I'm wondering is the sport of drag racing starting to fade out. It looks like it is in the state of Texas.

[R1966]

maybe just Houston...I think the NHRA still runs an event outside of Dallas (in Ennis). IMO, the overall car scene in Houston isn't what it used to be.

Not sure where the street racing is now...years ago (early-mid 80's), used to run off of Rankin road or outside the 610 loop on Westheimer (before it was built up). Would do the lower Westheimer cruise and then head out to race.

[DEAR _JOHN]

maybe just Houston...I think the NHRA still runs an event outside of Dallas (in Ennis). IMO, the overall car scene in Houston isn't what it used to be.

Not sure where the street racing is now...years ago (early-mid 80's), used to run off of Rankin road or outside the 610 loop on Westheimer (before it was built up). Would do the lower Westheimer cruise and then head out to race.

There is a nice strip in Evadale, about 15 miles north of Vidor, and there is one up near Lufkin (https://pinevalleyraceway.com/) which I've never been to. Just remember Houston Raceway Park was a world class strip, while Evadale and the one in Lufkin are local ones. It's unfair to Evadale to compare it to HRP. The one in Evadale is well run, but compared to driving out to Baytown, a long ass drive. I usually ran times close to HRP at Evadale, but I hated that strip out past Sealy, where I usually ran about .2 slower in comparable conditions. I think the strip in Sealy (Lone Star) has been closed to the public and rentals for awhile.

[DocHoliday]

With Biden pushing EV’s, what excitement would there be at a drag strip? Tear it down and build a wind farm to help power the EV’s being shoved in our garages.