Hot Rod Street Racing

ON ANY STREET - AFTER DARK-MOSTLY (but not always)
By Phil Sedlock

Almost everyone who grew up in the late 50’s and during the 60’s as well is very much aware of the meaning of the term “Crusin” and the sometimes nefarious term “Street Racing”.  Crusin has been described in various ways over the years. But the art of traveling from one venue to another in search of either something to do or someone to hang out with appears to have become the accepted definition. Well, in the “old days” as one moved from location to location it was inevitable that a vehicle would be stopped at a traffic light. Street racing was the art of meeting at said stop light, which, of course sometimes resulted in a “Contest of Speed”. It was all about who had the ability to get from one stop light to the next in the shortest amount of time. Sort of like a “mini” drag race. On almost any Friday and or Saturday night you could find any number of these little speed contests going on. (Of course no one EVER went beyond the posted speed limit!)

The average scenario went something like this: Two vehicles would pull up to a traffic light and look each other over, sizing each other up. Maybe one driver would ask the other: “what are ya runnin’? “ The answer might come back something like this: “AM-FM stereo, vibrasonic sound system and…” About then the light would change to green and both cars would be gone in an instant. It was anybody’s guess who would win as most of the vehicles were relatively stock and driven by non-professionals. “Sporting events” such as this took place on almost every main street in the Detroit Metro Area. The two most remembered locations for these “transactions” are of course Woodward north of Detroit and Telegraph to the west and south of the city. For many of the participants these “events” were simply looked at as practice for the weekly Saturday night or Sunday at Detroit Dragway or at either Milan or Motor City Dragway. Running your car on the street was looked upon by many as an unofficial method of running time trails. There was one important difference between the street and she strip. Concrete (for the most part) versus blacktop. Blacktop had more give and would allow the tires to brake loose and spin before something like an axel, driveshaft or transmission would brake. That was the big reason that the local drag strips had asphalt surfaces and also the reason that most of the breakage occurred on the street and not on the strip (well, for me anyway).

Rumor has it that on one Saturday, long ago, after dark, a White ’57 Thunderbird showed up at the Big Boy’s on Telegraph south of Plymouth (near the old Coon Brother’s Rambler store). He was sounding mean as he tooled through the parking lot looking for a race. Everyone there knew that he had much more that the stock 312 under the hood, it rumbled and thumped like a built big block. As the ’57 Bird pulled through a ’61 Ford that ran Modified Production at the strip pulled out after him and followed him to the light at Plymouth Road. They met and lined up heading north, waiting for the light to change. It turned green with a blink and in a flash the Bird was gone. Before the ’61 made it across the intersection the little Bird was past the Detroit Diesel sign and disappearing rapidly to the north. All the driver of the Ford saw was the two large round taillights quickly becoming one and then disappearing into the distance beyond the bridge.

The following day, a Sunday, the driver of the ’61 was at Motor City Dragway in New Baltimore. He was watching the entrants come in through the inspection lanes and low and behold, he sees the same white 1957 Thunderbird that dusted him off the night before. The ’57 is now on a trailer and the engine is covered by a completely different hood. The car was sporting a large bubble hood with the designation “427 – S.O.H.C.” on the side. Later when the Bird was in the pits the driver of the ’61 went over and inspected the car to be sure that it was the same one he had seen the night before– it was, the owner confirmed that he had the car out on Telegraph the night before. (With the exception of the hood and a dual quad tunnel ram intake that is.) That morning when the Bird made its first pass down the strip it was damp from morning sprinkles and the car was un-tuned from the previous evening. It went down the track turning a 10.57 E.T. Not bad for an un-tuned car on a wet track! Shows you what a person could run up against out there just playing around on a quiet weekend evening! 

Another rumor relates to how the now famous George DeLorean used Woodward as his private testing track for the prototype of the G.T.O.  However, I shall leave that story is for someone more versed in G.M. lore to relate at some future date.

Back in the 60’s there was a local hang-out called Gieger’s on the north side of Grand River located in between Telegraph Road and Seven Mile Road. It was a popular Drive-In for the west side kids. At one time around ‘64 or ‘65 there was a young lady who owned a six cylinder Nash Rambler. Well about the same time there was this fellow who had a similar vehicle. However, his car had a V-8 with more than a little work done to it. Word on the street was that he worked for a local Rambler dealership. And he had convinced the owner of the dealership to back him at the drag strip by helping him finance the building of the race car. Well as the storey goes, the girl saw this car similar to hers cruise through the drive in and decided that she wanted to race it. The fellow just looked at her and said words to the effect that if your car can do what mine can do, then I’ll race you. He then proceeded to pull out of the drive and onto Grand River. He stopped and break torqued the vehicle to the max. When he “Hit it” the car pulled the front wheels about six inches off of the ground and leaving a screen of tire smoke shot down the street for a block or so and turned. When he returned to the drive in the young lady just sunk low behind her steering wheel and said nothing about cars for the rest of the evening. 

Yet another story from those days relates as to how a young man with a small block1965 Chevelle would entice someone to race him, loose and then return later that night seeking a rematch. This individual would get into a “contest of speed” loose the race and then tell the opponent that he needed to go home and “get a tune-up”. While at “home” he and his partner would swap out the relatively stock small block Chevy V-8 for a Booth-Aarons prepared motor and then head back to Woodward for a rematch. These boys were said to be able to change out the motor in under an hour. This scenario worked well until the other local drivers caught on to the swap.  

As the story goes, one day during the summer of 1964 two vehicles attempted to travel from Northwest Detroit out the Grand River X-Way to Kensington Metro Park in the quickest manner possible. That of course being FAST! One was a 1959 Ford and the other was a 1959 Chevy. Both were black, the Ford had a six cylinder and the Chevy had a 283 V-8, the Ford was a stick and the Chevy was an automatic. As the vehicles approached the magic 100 mph mark they were side by side and the drivers were yelling taunting remarks at each other. However, the big fins of the Chevy presented the drivers with a problem that they were unprepared for. Somewhere around 100 mph the air got under those big flat wide fins and started to lift the rear of the Chevy causing it to float and swerve from side to side. The Ford driver saw this and backed off immediately, as soon as the Chevy driver felt that his car was unstable he too pulled the plug thus avoiding any problems. The two drivers, their cars and their passengers made it to the lake and back that day. However the Chevy was soon sold, maybe for a black’57 Ford?

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