LAistory: Lions Drag Strip

Upwards of 250 all-out competition cars vie for the the money on Saturday night (where professionals go fast); then 400 or more stockers compete for trophies on Sunday, satisfying that urge to race which was the original reason for building the strip. Wednesday night grudge racing, a recent addition to Lions scheduling, settles those drive-in challenges on the strip, not on the Street. Lions is at times a pulsing, eardrum-bursting place. (1965) -The Story behind Lions

The show had it all. Hot Rods, Pro Stock, Fuel Altered; drag bikes, jet cars and Funny Cars. But the number #1 draw was always the Top Fuel Dragsters. These machines defied the laws of physics. Or perhaps they defined science and raw power. A mix of exotic fuels, a long chassis, weight transfer, injectors and a parachute. At the heart was an over sized engine. A power plant of enormous energy. Untamed horsepower. It took exceptional skill to control and pilot this engine for a quarter mile, from a dead stop to 250 miles an hour in about five seconds. A parachute and nerves of a bomb squad was what [it] took to stop it from launching into space. I am sure that every time one of these long beauties sputtered to a stop at the other end, a heart felt “thank you Lord…” was muttered under their breath.

That financial success was based upon the popularity of Saturday night "Date Night" racing at Lions. Master showman Mickey Thompson had lights installed in 1957 and attendance immediately doubled. Soon the Top Eliminator prize had gone from a $25 bond to a $1000 bond. Mickey no longer had to wait a week for his $75 paycheck and a complete paid staff had been hired. Under Mickey's leadership the place continued to innovate. In addition to the introduction of night racing, Lions had some other "firsts." Like replacing the flag-waving starter with the now-standard "Christmas Tree" starting light system. That original tree had only three lights in its sequence: one amber light for staging, one amber light for warning and one green/red for start/foul.

In 1970, Garlits, driving Swamp Rat XIII, a mainstream front engine, rear cockpit drag rail, had a catastrophic failure. The two speed transmission that Don was developing exploded and took a piece of Garlits' right foot. While he was in the hospital a Florida native Don Lafferty finished out the rest of the season. He returned to Pomona in 1971 with Swamp Rat XIV, a brand new rear engine, front cockpit drag rail. Rear-engine dragsters like Swamp Rat XIV have since become mainstream in drag racing.

All of this innovation, lack of adequate safety and the sheer numbers of cars that congregated at Lions (because it's proximity to the ocean meant incredible air and power-producing capabilities), came at a price. In fact, by the time Lions reached the mid-1960s, it had claimed more lives than in all previous years of the Indianapolis 500. When it closed, more than 18 are known to have perished there, some famous and others anonymous.

Back in the mid-1950s, when organized drag racing was pulling itself up by the bootstraps, there was a counter culture in the LA Illegal street racing was becoming a big, BIG problem. I was asked to speak to a forum produced by the LAPD. The street racers were loosely organized, but they did have some neat jackets and t-shirts. They were called the Brotherhood of Street Racers and were lead by their "Wally Parks" -- a moose of a guy called "Big Willie" Robinson and his wife Tomiko. We tried to get the BSR guys to come to LADS (as it was known then - Lions Associated Drag Strip). The vast majority of their cars could not pass tech inspection but they did draw as many as 500 cars at their races... usually in the industrial area of East LA. There was one guy who did start coming to LADS to race. He was called "Charley the Painter." He drove a highly modified Dodge pickup that had a couple of haphazard ladders and paint cans (all thoroughly secured) hanging in the back. He received a ticket once for street racing and came to court. Now most of the other street racers were young guys wearing greased back hair and tee shirts but Charley was probably in his early to mid-'60s and wearing his painter's overalls, his usual racing uniform. The judge expressed surprise that Charley was in court for street racing. Charley's laid back response was "After I hit second gear, there wasn't any race." I think he was fined $14 or something, but won $20 for winning the street race.

[Motorcycles] ran on different days. There was even a period of time they ran stocks on Wednesday nights. Most times Saturdays were the big fuel and gas classes and then Sundays they would run stock and other classes. I was there most Sundays when they let the bikes run. The guy behind the offical in the striped shirt in the photo was Jack Murphy. He co-ordinated the bike classes and matchups. I have a photo of me on my 1966 Yamaha 80 at Lions. It ran about the same times as the old VW beetles.

Then the signs came down. First to go was the "Last Drag Race" banner at the starting line. Twenty guys fought for it, but two emerged from the fray and carried it off. Then came the 30-foot-long blue-on-yellow "Lions Drag Strip" sign. It had to be broken down into three pieces and carted off by three different pairs of fans. And then a mad struggle for the lane markers. Meanwhile, up in the timing tower, staffers were grabbing such relics of past glory as the "Authorized Personnel Only" sign on the timing booth door. Some fool was even trying to pry the Coca-Cola sign off the snack booth. And an attempt was made at prying up the starting line. It failed. That was one tough mother of a starting line. It took over an hour for the huge crowd to slowly file out of Lions for the very last time. Only the winning racers remained behind. They were waiting for The Last Payout.

In retrospect, I'd have to say that the Last Drag Race at Lions remains one of my very fondest memories, if more than just a little bit bittersweet. I'll never forget the sounds, sights and smells of that place. The "rare air" that would flow in from the harbor after the sun went down. The odors of the oil refinery, shooting range and landfill (all of which bordered the facility) were quite obnoxious, but boy how I miss them now. The good times (of which there were many) and the bad times (of which there were too many) came flooding back. I'd watched my first drag racing hero, Leonard Harris, perish before my very eyes there a few years earlier, and saw far too many other good men lose their lives or become horribly injured before modern safety equipment and systems had evolved. Still, whenever I think of Lions, I get a very warm and fuzzy feeling. I'll never forget that magic place, or the dozens of friends I made there over the years. Every once in a while, I drive by the site on the San Diego Freeway, and the memories come flooding back. To me, Lions was drag racing's Camelot. I've been to and raced at a lot of tracks around the world, but none had the magic that Lions did. Sad to say, but there will never be another place like Lions Drag Strip. It's just not possible in this day and age, and never will be again.