El Mirage Meet was fantastic!!!!

Posted on July 18, 2017January 30, 2020 by Steve Carpenter

18 Jul

OK, for those of you who don’t know what Dry Lake racing is, its something way back after WW2 that many people came to in California to run their ModelA’s B’s and T’s, a souped up Jalopy that ran as hard as it could to set some sort of record or at least get into the books as a fast Speed trials car, thus HOT RODS were born and as far back as 1948 The SCTA -Southern California Timing Association was Born.

For all to see and do, these dry lakes, be it El Mirage, Muroc or Harpers etc, was a fun and wide open place to take your Hot Rod out to and go flat out with no cops giving you a ticket.
Oh yeah, and for Motorcycles, man- we have come a long way as well, this chap ran 207 on a back up 205 and is now in the 200MPH club, how cool is that?

Here is some footage below that an SCTA member took of the 2015 meet, just to give you a little insight as to what goes on at the El Mirage dry lake.

Here is some more El Mirage footage for you to watch if you cannot make it to these events.

I never ever tire of this stuff and hope that you enjoy it as much too.

A super day out, I left at 4am and got here just before the Racing started and the temp was nice in the early hours but, soon warmed up.

Next up was actual footage I took with my Iphone, so forgive me for audio and not television standard filming, i was enjoying it too much to try too hard.

My mate Steve Ricketts- Fellow Brit- pushing the flying Swede out to the staging lanes. Thats

Håkan Karlen, a very cool Guy indeed and made me feel at home as soon as I arrived to the track at 6am.

Taking it all in as I set up the Eazy up and get cold drinks sorted before it gets too damn hot as it will be over 100 degree’s here in about an hour.

Motorcycles and Hot Rods pass All day, I had Jennifers Radio with me and tuned into the Control tower so i could hear who was racing and what machine they have, as well as what speed they hope to achieve of beat.

Here we are at the Staging lanes at El Mirage. With Steve Rockets and

Håkan Karlen

Staging lanes gets bloody hot and you hope nobody has a break down, or spin out as that can hold things up for a while.

Approaching the Race line, weather had turned up the heat too. Håkan Karlen

I am in the Push truck as the Flying Swede gets back on it in his 5 winchow chopped and channeled coupe. Hoping for a good run.

At then return lane, and a 183 MPH pass, hoping for more but spun a little.Håkan Karlen

Last run of the say, 1927 Model T with later Motor, sounded wicked on the pipe.

It was a superb day and lots to see and do, try and make it to a SCTA event as you may even get hooked into the sport like I am.

Below, Steve Rocketts Pushing the Flying swede Håkan Karlen in the staging lane, I helped push this coupe on the next go around, that is bloody heavy and my legs are still aching from pushing it. LOL!

Here is Håkan Karlen sat waiting to take his turn to fire the V8 up on this coupe and go into the 180’s.

The heat was only going up- so trying to stay cool is the main thing at El Mirage and hope that the cross winds do not pick up on the course.

The good thing about this event is that you can get so close to all the action, everybody is so friendly and more than happy to help, its great commeraderie for sure.

Below, wicked 29 Roadster getting set to take a run on the lake bed.

Plenty of Motorcycles too this time and another passion of mine as you well know, which has now lit a fire under my arse to maybe build a bike for the Dry lakes.

I loved some of the Motorcycles and the Rigs that towed them up to the track, check this combo out it was so cool to see.

I really enjoy coming out to the dry lakes, its less than 2 hours from our house and some of the best spectating around.

People starting their machines up and making sure they are running bang on , is fun to watch for me.

If you dig Nostalgia, then this event is right up your street, I saw so many cool machines, it took me ages to see it all as the lake is bloody huge if you are walking.

The bike above must of been going for the record of fastest towed motorcycle, as I saw that bike go up and down all day…behind that Mercedez.

The good thing about this lake bed is that you can get to so many different areas, the course is marked off well and Track Marshall’s all over the place to keep you in check.

The sound, the smell, the heat, the excitement, its all here at El Mirage dry lakes, so try and make a trip out here as it is so much fun.

Even Indians made a presence and that was great to watch going down the track.

Above- Supercharged 350cc “Red Baron” Getting set to take his turn at the start line.

Great to see this bike and Old Fella give it the Beanz and belt off down the track, I knew he would get a fair speed up eventually, as i noticed how tiny his Rear sprocket was.

Another Roadster getting ready for the off, Loved every minute of it here on Sunday.

1927 Roadster this time, long wheel base and this hauled arse all day, sounded so nice on the pipe at half track.

Harley with later Metric front end on is getting ready to be removed from trailer and run up the lake bed as fast as it can.

Seemed to be plenty of Model A’s at the course at this meet, which I love, since I own a 1928 A Bone.

Plenty going on in the Pits and look how close you can get to see all the action, a fantastic place to watch something you only get to see in magazines these days.

The Sun was just starting to get warm in the early hours, but by 1pm is was cooking us all where ever you stood.

Little Harley Davidson Sprint was getting into the action and saw this machine do a few Full passes too.

This Tiny 2 stroke turned a few heads and I was amazed at how tall the rider was, and secondly, how low the clip on’s were on the forks, new meaning to down in the dirt.

I loved this cameo Chevy Pick up with his Pit Bike on the front and little Harley racer in the back of the truck.

Above, this Harley was such a nice set up, plenty of time, sweat and tears must of gone into this little Speedster machine.

Another 350cc machine in the same class as others, looked to be a tough section to compete with but so much fun to watch and hear as they take off and get tucked into their little bikes.

Getting ready down the staging lanes for this Harley Davidson Sprint to make some dust and go for a Record.

WAAAAAAAGHHHH! WAAAAAAAAAGH! WAAAAAAAAAAAAAGHHHH!!!

Getting the final OK from the Marshalls and are all set to go down this Dry lake for all its worth.

Off he goes and hoping to get a good time as he blasts forward and towards the mountains of El Mirage dry lake.

Looks like Harley Davidson was well represented for this Sunday meet on the lake.

British Racing Green Triumph Thruxton bought these 2 to the lake bed.

This Fella seemed to be taking it all in his stride, and why not, what a fantastic feeling that must be out there man and machine. (Women too)

Little GS650 Getting scrutinized to make sure all is well, safe and within the parameters of whats allowed for that class of Motorcycle.

Above, I have no idea what Brand of Motorcycle this is but it sure is stealthy. And below a V Twin has a go up the Course and looks great.

The weather was really good, it is always Hot but the wind stayed down for the races, and am sure glad I attended this SCTA event at El Mirage.

You will see many styles of Cars, bikes and Hot Rods at the dry lakes, a lot of work has gone into this Modified special and was fun to watch too.

Above, the Push truck was very cool, a converted 1949 Studebaker Pick up, always loved the Spudbaker trucks but this is a cool push vehicle.

Giving it as much right hand as he can and these bikes are fun to watch and have me hooked thats for sure, just got to work out what class I would like to run in.

Must be such an exhilarating experience to be able to have an opportunity to have a go at this.

Roadster getting the Push, just love the whole racing experience here at El Mirage and in less than a month I will be in Utah for speed week at Bonneville.

Now thats low to the ground and even though it is fast, it must feel twice as fast and feel every bump on the track but a whole lot of fun for sure.

So next time you see an SCTA race posted, see if you can come along as I guarantee you will enjoy the whole experience at one of these meets.

So glad I got here early to see the pits and races start at 7am as its a lot cooler in the morning and less dust to start off with.

That is the start and the control tower where you can tune into 88.7 and hear the commentary where ever you have a radio.

Great photo to me as the Harley heads of, Lovely Roadster sat there on the left and a 1978 CB750 Honda sat far right.

On the gas and sounding great.. Below, My Royal Enfield as I was parked Mid track, you can just make out a Motorcycle on the track flat out.

So a super day, I arrived early to stay in the cool check the pits out and get a good spot to park my Van and, get the Royal Enfield out.

So stoked to make it here, always excited to come to this place and have to pinch myself sometimes to believe I am here.

Yup, the Brits are here, Both of us are Steve’s too, me and Steve Ricketts hang out in between races.

My buddy in the 59 Club Eduardo came to visit and brought along a couple of buddies from Finland Timo and his wife.

Hard to believe that I am here, you can Just make out a Motorcycle giving it the Beanz in the background.

Staging lanes as we push Hakans Coupe to the start for a 183 run along the Lake bed.

The Flying Swede ” Hakan Karlens Deuce Coupe is super reliable and consistent, that’s a well built Hot Rod right there.

Next stop Bonneville Utah for Speed week, will be seeing friends, maybe even wrenching a little too and my girlfriend is taking me out there as this is a life long trip I have wanted as a kid in the UK, and in 23 days, 15 hours and 31 seconds, Jennifer sun and I will be on our way to the Salt flats.

Hope to see some of you there, should be a great time and will blog about that one when I get back.

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed this.

Bonneville’s Speed Week is Cancelled for Second year

Posted on July 21, 2015January 30, 2020 by Steve Carpenter

21 Jul

SPEED WEEK 2015

HAS BEEN CANCELLED

The SCTA President/Race Director Bill Lattin & the BNI Chairman Roy Creel spent this morning (July 20th) on the salt. The most they could find was 2 1/4 miles of salt suitable for a safe race course. The rest of the salt flats

are either wet or wet and muddy. If the wet salt gets

dry, future events could be possible.

The Nugget will be refunding for reservations for one week

BNI Membership Form .

Racers at Bonneville Salt Flats Pepper Potash Firm With Complaints

WENDOVER, Utah—Are the Bonneville Salt Flats turning into the Bonneville Mud Flats?

Hot rodders who race on them think they are. The expanse of whiteness—hard, flat and fast—has shrunk, they say. The crystalline surface that smashers of land-speed records have made their hallowed ground for nearly a century seems slushy and thin.

The culprit, the hot rodders are convinced, is potash. The potash here is potassium chloride, a kind of salt. It is used in fertilizer, gunpowder and lethal injections.

Just south of the salt crust, across Interstate 80, there’s a single potash mine. The mine sucks brine from under the flats, extracts the tiny percentage of potash, and lets the rest dry out into waste heaps of table salt. So much salt has been removed, the racers believe, that the crust itself is disappearing.

“See our tire tracks?” Larry Volk was saying one windy July day. Mr. Volk, a 70-year-old hot rodder, is chairman of a group called Save the Salt. He had eased his Ford F-150 onto the flats in search of a course for Speed Week, where hundreds of vehicles of different sorts strain to go as fast as they can. This year’s events are to begin Aug. 13.

The tire tracks were light gray, the color of wet wallboard. “That’s mud,” said Mr. Volk. He got out and jabbed at the goop with a screwdriver. “All we want,” he said, “is the salt they take off put back on.”

South of I-80, the excavators of Intrepid Potash Inc., were digging at a moonscape of canals and man-made lakes. Its 48 workers ship 100,000 tons of potash a year at $500 a ton. From their side of the road, the salt crust’s plight doesn’t look so cut and dried.

Speed thrills, but to potash miners, potash thrills, too. “It supports life on Earth,” said Hugh Harvey, an Intrepid executive spending a day at the mine. He placed a potash granule on the tip of his tongue and grinned. “It lights up the mouth,” he said.

Intrepid hardly sells any of its salt waste. At $15 a ton, it isn’t worth the trouble. “To be perceived as helpful,” as Mr. Harvey puts it, the mine already pipes tons of it back onto the flats. The rest of the salt, standing in the rain, will dissolve back into the flats, Mr. Harvey says, in a few hundred years.

That isn’t fast enough for the hot rodders. They want the mine to pump a lot more salt a lot faster, and they want the owner of the salt flats—the federal government—to mandate it, now and forever.

After years of delay blamed on budgets, the Bureau of Land Management is soon to decide—possibly before Speed Week starts—and won’t say a thing yet. But two of the BLM’s geologists—who took the flats’ most up-to-date measurements—have just retired. Their calculations have left them asking the bed-rock question: Has the salt, in fact, been shrinking—or hasn’t it?

“What’s normal?” said Bill White, 68. He was standing on a berm in the warm wind, looking over the salt with his fellow geologist, Jim Kohler, who is 65. Said Mr. Kohler, “What’s back to normal?”

The flats have been around since Lake Bonneville dried up 14,000 years ago. The first speed record, set in 1914 by Teddy Tetzlaff in his Blitzen Benz, was followed by the first potash mine in 1917, a response to German gunpowder superiority in World War I.

Potash mining took off in the 1930s, hot rodding in 1949. The two coexisted until the 1960s, when the racers say they began having trouble finding a 13-mile straightaway of hard, thick salt.

Experts confirmed it. In 1988, the BLM, which is part of the Interior Department, said the crust was shrinking by 1% a year. In 1989, Save the Salt was formed. In 1997, after years of campaigning, it persuaded the potash miners to voluntarily put some salt back.

At the time, Reilly Chemical Inc. owned the mine. For five years, Reilly pumped brine under I-80 and onto the crust. Intrepid bought Reilly in 2004. While Mr. Harvey says it doubted the effectiveness of the pumping, Intrepid kept it up, just not so fast. In all, it reckons, the mine has dumped 8.2 million tons of salt onto the flats—enough to fill 81,176 hoppers in a train 911 miles long.

What happened? Not much.

Checking the old measurements, the geologists found errors. They recalibrated the old figures and matched them with their own new ones. It turned out that the flats hadn’t changed in 16 years. The crust was as thick in 2004—two feet, more or less—after years of pumping, as it was in 1988, after decades of mining.

As for the area of the flats, it fluctuates with rainfall, but its raceable surface still covered about 35 square miles.

The big surprise was that the brine pumped from the potash mine had no effect at all. It barely added to the salt’s thickness or expanse. It dribbled right through the crust and into the desert’s aquifer—a sea no amount of pumping will ever fill up.

“We just gather facts,” says Mr. White.

The racers don’t buy it. They’re certain the salt has gone mucky since Intrepid slowed down its pumps.

If the BLM won’t force the mine to keep pumping, they say they’ll go to Congress and the courts. They haven’t brought in any outside geologists, but they have brought in a lawyer, Russ Deane, to argue their case. “There’s a history of abuse on the flats,” he says.

The BLM’s retired geologists blame the weather. In dry years, they have noticed, race reports call the salt fast; in wet years, it’s slow.

Mr. Kohler and Mr. White were rolling over the flats in their Ford Explorer, leaving gray tire tracks. What about that mud? Doesn’t it mean that the crust has thinned to nothing?

“That’s a misconception,” said Mr. Kohler.

Mr. White stopped the car. Mr. Kohler got out, crouched and scraped at the ooze with a pick. “It’s not mud,” he said. “It’s surface gypsum, windblown and waterborne.” The damp gypsum was merely coating the crust’s surface. Mr. Kohler hacked into it with his pick, and a chunk of hard salt flew up.

“That’s the crust,” said Mr. White. “About two-feet thick here. I’m skeptical that’s ever going to disappear.”

Mr. Kohler stood and shaded his eyes in the glare. “Is this place doomed?” he said. “I don’t think so. The activities out here—mining or racing—won’t change it much. These salt flats will still have a salt crust. And they’ll still be flat.”

Last week, we reported that the 2015 Speed Week at the Bonneville Salt Flats was in danger of canceling due to the poor conditions of the salt surface after recent heavy rains. Over the weekend, Southern California Timing Association (SCTA) visited the site to scope out a usable race course for Speed Week. According to a source that is close with SCTA, 260 out of 338 Speed Week entries voted on a web survey that they would continue to race this year if a single three mile short course could be used. Unfortunately, with input from the Bureau of Land Management, the poor salt conditions lead SCTA to cancel the 2015 Speed Week. On SCTA’s Facebook page, they stated that, “The SCTA President/Race Director Bill Lattin & the BNI Chairman spent this morning (July 20th) on the salt. The most they could find was 2 1/4 miles of salt suitable for a safe race course. The rest of the salt flats are either wet or wet and muddy. If the wet salt gets dry, future events could be possible.” HOT ROD spoke to Bill Lattin, who told us that, “Going towards the big end of the big miles, it gets really rough. And before that, it’s too wet; a bunch of people are getting stuck.”

While we were expecting the announcement on July 22, conditions were bad enough to warrant a quick decision by SCTA. While the 2015 Speed Week has been cancelled, Lattin confirmed that SCTA is still planning to run the World Finals race from September 29 to October 2, 2015. Racers are disappointed, but are looking towards the positives. Andy Leach from Cal Customs was going to bring out a brand new build, a ’34 Chevy stretched to run Comp Coupe and powered by a 427 LS. He says, “We’re a little bummed, but it does give us more time to prep the car for the World Finals.” Steve Watt of Maxwell Industries, where the Speed Demon Team streamliner is being built, was disappointed at the news but not disheartened. “It will give us plenty of time for next year.” The team was going to work down to the wire to get the Speed Demon Team streamliner to Bonneville to defend the HOT ROD trophy no matter what kind of track the SCTA was able to prep for Speed Week. With the event cancelled Watt is focusing on getting test runs of the new streamliner, which is considerably lighter and has new data acquisition capability. Stay tuned to HOT ROD News for future Bonneville Salt Flats racing news. While you mule on today’s Speed Week news, take a throwback to Roadkill Episode 20, where Freiburger and Finnegan rebuild a land speed racing 1981 Camaro, and attempt to run at the 2013 Speed Week with the then-new Chevy ramp truck! This early Roadkill episode is true to the name when things don’t go as planned on the salt flats.