TAN Fan Blog-Billy Anderson

Photos Courtesy of Billy Anderson

Hi, my name is Billy Anderson, and I'm addicted to alcohol. Top Alcohol Racing that is!

Growing up, I was always a bigger fan of the Alcohol classes than the Nitro classes. I grew up in Massachusetts, about 45-minute drive from New England Dragway. My family and I would go to their major Funny Car events throughout the year, and the Alcohol cars were as big of a draw as the Nitro cars. Back in the early 1980's, the big battle was between Massachusetts' own Arnie Karp driving the Boston Strangler, against Nashua, NH's Dick Bill in the Bell Boys machine. Their battles at New England Dragway were epic. As the 80's went on, a good contingent of local Alcohol Funny Cars formed, names like Tony Arnone, Ronnie Taylor, Richard Polcaro, Billy Naves and Ed Parker were mainstays at the New England Dragway match races, even as the number of Nitro cars per event decreased due to the rising costs.

In 1992, New England Dragway moved to an IHRA track for two years, and then from 1998-2010. The divisional race they used to have moved to Lebanon Valley Dragway, and from 1995-2004, I attended that divisional race to see an open competition for the Alcohol Dragsters and Funny Cars. Those events were national event caliber, with many, many storylines throughout all of them, and great side-by-side racing. They were even attended by some big name touring drivers, including the late Darrell Russell.

For the Englishtown national event, my favorite round of all time was always the Saturday night round one of the Alcohol Dragsters and Funny Cars. It was always an exciting round, with so much potential, and possible upsets to be made. Also, the strategy of what pair Frank Manzo chose to be in was always a point of analysis. Sometimes it was the first; sometimes it was last.

Growing up in the New England area, I've always been very proud of my home Division 1. I think the alcohol racers in this area of the country are some of the best. I have gotten to experience races in the midwest and California, and will certainly not focus solely on the East Coast cars, though the events I attend this year will primarily be Division 1 events. I will try to comment on the events that are only accesible to me via internet and television. I will try to include relevant pictures with each article

For this blog, I would like to be able to not only write about the current events going on in the class, but also take some trips down memory lane in my notebook, and see what sort of gems I might uncover and recall. I hope you'll enjoy the journey with me.

Billy Anderson is a former writer for New England Dragway. Anderson resides in New York and can be found at many of the New England races in 2012. Follow Billy on Twitter at @DragRacingBilly.