As most of you already know, we've run a few HPP Pavement Pounder Shootouts at Norwalk Raceway Park (NRP) in years past. The combination of location, quality of the facility, and the expert track prep make it a great choice for the variety of Pontiacs we cover. If anyone is going to hook up and run their best 60-foots, it's likely to happen at Norwalk.
NRP is also home to the Ames Performance Pontiac Nationals, the largest Pontiac event in the nation. As such, it attracts a huge number of Pontiac racecars, making it easy for us to coordinate racers to feature.
Over the past few years, HPP's editor and Pete Woodruff of Super Duty Promotions casually discussed the possibility of a shootout to coincide with the Ames Performance Pontiac Nats at the famed facility. Then Bill Bader Jr. called to say the track was interested in having HPP host a shootout, and Bill and Pete even had the date in mind: the Thursday before the Ames Performance Pontiac Nats. How could we refuse a chance to do another shootout on a well-prepped track at the invite of the track owner?
With the help of Bill and the staff at Norwalk Raceway Park and Super Duty Promotion's Pete and Andrea Woodruff, the event came off without a hitch. Everyone had plenty of time to make as many passes as they wanted, even with the threat of rain coming in the late afternoon. We had a total of 16 cars participate, though this time, there were several others who couldn't make it to the starting line for one reason or another. Not to worry, we always try to reschedule.
Speaking of the weather, it was much like one expects in northern Ohio in early August: hot and hazy with a high temperature of 92 and a relative humidity of 47 percent. It was cooler in the morning, but by the afternoon, when most of the runs were made, the effective elevation reached 3,900 feet, which receives a correction factor of 0.9523 for e.t. and 1.0507 for trap speed. The Strip Tuning Log includes the correction for the best pass only (based on e.t.). To convert the other runs, multiply the e.t. or mph by its factor to arrive at the corrected figures.
For our first installation of the Norwalk shootout, we present four traditional Pontiac racecars, all quite different in approach but all sporting 455 power in some form. The combinations are mild to wild and include Portland, Michigan's Dan Jensen and his Pure Stock Drags-prepped '71 T-37; Topeka, Kansas, natives Kevin and Deloris Constant with their tube-frame and street-legal '85 Grand Am; Lorin and Greg Budzinski's street/strip '81 Grand Prix; and Larry Snyder's race-only '77 Firebird Formula.