Hey gang..
Well,,,,, Allen was right, there was something amist in the DFW area. I got a call from yours truly Doug S. from the Daytona/Superbird club a couple of months ago.
Thanks Doug !!!
He asked if I would like to participate in a photoshoot for Motor Trend's Classic magazine, a new quarterly magazine out now on classic iron. It was going to be an article on the homologated cars of the '69 and '70 Grand National Series (what NASCAR called their Sprint Cup then). Well,, heck yeah !!!!!! :2thumbs:
With many phone calls from Preston (Motor Trend contact/writer) and AJ(Photographer), a date of the 27th of April was selected, at NASCAR's Texas Motor Speedway. We were originally supposed to do it last month, but the track didn't want anything outside of the normal Sprint Cup race activitiy happening prior to it's April 9th Samsung Mobile 500 race. There were four cars at the photoshoot:
'69 Charger Daytona: mine
'69 Ford Talladega: Marty's
'69 Mercury Cyclone Spoiler: Marty's
'70 Plymouth Superbird: Greg's
I went with my good friend Scotty and son Josh. Needless to say, we were very excited and unsure what to expect, both of the shoot and the weather. Just during that morning and the day before the Dallas/Ft.Worth (DFW) area was experience very bad weather, hail and tornados. I called Allen (xs29j8Bullitt ) for a visit and a potential place to leave the Daytona in the event weather over night became bad. Allen told me to come on up! So, the three of us with the Daytona loaded up headed North. Of course, we ran into 3 big thunderstorms on the way between Houston and Ft. Worth, but it was all good, no hail !!!
We all arrived at Allen's house before dark, unloaded the Daytona, visited and toured his "establishment" in awe. It brought back a lot of good memories for me. I've known Allen a LONG time and remember seeing his Mopars when I was active duty stationed at Carswell AFB as a young airman back in the mid 80's... Then we headed off to Chedder's for a nice dinner. We didn't get back to the hotel until pretty late and it was after midnight before we got to bed. AJ, the photographer, wanted us all at the track by 6:15am !!! Luckily, Allen called me at 5:00am wondering where I was... I forget to set the alarm for 4:30am and had it for 5 !!! Oppppssssss... Thanks again Allen.
Turns out AJ wanted shots of the cars at Sunrise. Boy, is he right. I saw some of the photo's he took and they were awesome...
We started the day off by pulling into the Sprint Cup pits/garage for a little cleaning action ( I had a lot of road grim on the ole' girl after the storms ). A special thank you to my team/pit crew for the cleaning. As I was getting to know the photographer (AJ) and Motor Trend write (Preston), my buddies were hard at work on the Daytona getting it rady for the day.. Josh got his payment from me in letting him drive his first classic mopar, a Daytona nonetheless, on a NASCAR track !! Needless to say he was very happy and I scored brownie-points with Mom (Kim)..
After which, we head out to pit row... We couldn't have asked for a more perfect morning....
Scotty (to the right, my wingman for 2 tours of Iraq) and Josh (my step-son). Both had a blast and I'm glad I was able, through Doug, to give them a good time.
Well, most of the day was split into sessions of movement shots and stills, both individually and as pairs and groups. He paired the myself and the Superbird along with the Ford and Mercury.
Some more of the Winged Warriors..
Cool shot of gasoline row. Wouldn't I have loved to fill up there... :icon_smile_big:
Here's the track custodian explaining to us he's there to nothing more than babysit the track, it's ours... Literally for the whole day !!! There was only the 4 of us and believe me you, I took full advantage of it..
(details later)
Come in from one of my laps..
Here are some various shots prior to individual engine/interior/exterior still shots..
Here's a couple of videos of the 4 of us during a tandem moving photoshoot and me..
Me coming off a lap...
Scott with me getting up some speed.. There were a couple of laps where I did somewhere between 120mph and 125mph down the backstretch coming out of turn 2. The Daytona had amazing acceleration with the 4.10's and top end with the GearVendor turned on.. Amazing !! The car was like a train on tracks, perfectly smooth and held whatever groove on the turns I wanted, whether it be low or high. Now I know what it feels like to have the car squatting down with the aerodynamics of the car. I could feel it starting at about 100mph. The Daytona had more in her, but I was relucted at first because of a blow out fear of my right front (
) or other situations where there was maintainence crews out detailing the walls... But, the thrill of unrestricted speeds was awesome. :drool5: I'll never forget it.......
Josh's cool suggestion...
Then AJ wanted some at the start/finish line...
In the garage, there were some older Cup cars, I'm assuming "MAYBE" they were there for the Driving Experience program? Regardless, I had to get some of the Daytona next to the cars... A little comparison of the "original" wing and then that of the "car of the tomorrow"....
On the way out, I had to "pretend" I was filling up for the next race...
and of course.. I saw the gates open to Victory Circle... I just had too..
Here we're leaving the track down through the turn1/2 tunnel..
With the suggestion of Ken, we tried a local small town favorite, Outlaw Burgers...
Cool Shadow on our way home...
back home..
OK,, burnout action...
Enjoy..... It was a BLAST !!!
69_Daytona
I'll try to watch the vids during the rest of lunch, but it is awesome enough with just the pics!!