Originally published Saturday, July 19, 2008 at 12:00 AM
PrintDrag Racing | Racers feel the burn of high gas prices
Travel to race sites, along with gassing up for competition, is burden for teams, big and small.
Special to The Seattle Times
KENT — If you think escalating gasoline prices are affecting your budget, imagine what it has done to the drag-racing teams that travel to 24 sites across the country.
Tim Wilkerson, the leading Funny Car driver who has four wins this season despite having one of the smaller budgets on the circuit, estimates he'll roll up more than 45,000 miles just getting to the races.
And that's just the tip of the economic pressure slamming every team.
Drag racers typically use a fuel mixture of about 90 percent nitromethane and 10 percent methanol.
Last year when they raced at Pacific Raceways in Kent, nitro cost about $900 per drum, and teams typically go through two to three drums at each site. This year, it's up to $1,400 a drum, or about $50 a gallon, and rising.
Although nitromethane is not an oil-based product, the majority is produced in China. And in an effort to cut down pollution during the Olympic Games, production has been limited.
With supplies down, costs have gone up.
Wilkerson, 47, was on the phone Friday morning to main sponsor Dick Levi of Levi, Ray and Shoup, an information technology company, to try to get a couple more bucks to cover his costs.
"The price of this stuff is killing us," Wilkerson, 47, said as he poured nitromethane into his Funny Car tank through a funnel. "We really have to be careful with what we do. It's just out of hand."
The cost has meant little or no testing for Wilkerson.
"We're doing everything we can do to use less nitro," Wilkerson said. "We don't warm up as much. We don't test. We just go out and run."
While the price of gas affects everyone, it's even more costly to a big team like John Force Racing, which fields four Funny Cars. Force keeps 10 18-wheelers and a bus rolling throughout the season.
"We're on a budget right now," Force said. "We'll survive it, but it's really choking the little guy the most. It's hurting me and killing the little guy. We better find another million dollars quick."
Copyright © 2008 The Seattle Times Company
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