A day at the races. NHRA Nationals - Seattle

Juice · Aug 5, 2012

This was my first time ever seeing top fuel dragsters, it was definitely an amazing experience! This was also my first time photographing anything like this. Trying to keep up with cars that get up over 300mph in 4 seconds is tough!

Anyway, here are a few favorites of the day. Also, bonus points to any of you who can spot something totally out of the ordinary in top fuel races, I was fortunate to grab it on camera!

MLeeK · Aug 5, 2012

You are really heavy on the blacks here.
Oh, how I LOVE drag racing. I have a brother and father who raced SuperPro for years nationally. I can almost smell that NOS thinking about it. My eyes are burning from the alcohol.

nineoneeighttony · Aug 5, 2012

Look like ARMY jumped the gun on that one!!

charlie76 · Aug 5, 2012

I like the first one....and the mechanic one. I especially like the blurred spectators behind the hot exhaust in #1..very unique.

Juice · Aug 5, 2012

nineoneeighttony said:
Look like ARMY jumped the gun on that one!!

Yeah he did! He hasn't done that in 12 years, and it was only 1 of 4 red lights the whole season. A rare sight!

MLeeK said:
You are really heavy on the blacks here.
Oh, how I LOVE drag racing. I have a brother and father who raced SuperPro for years nationally. I can almost smell that NOS thinking about it. My eyes are burning from the alcohol.

NOS is a brand, stands for Nitrous Oxide Systems. Top fuel cars run on nitro methane, which is the fuel. Nitro methane requires less oxygen to burn than gasoline, so it can make a lot of power. Nitrous is an additive that gets more oxygen into the engine, so that more gasoline can be burned = more power!

charlie76 said:
I like the first one....and the mechanic one. I especially like the blurred spectators behind the hot exhaust in #1..very unique.

Thanks! I was kind of far away, so all of these are cropped, I'm pretty happy with how they came out!

SCraig · Aug 6, 2012

Juice said:
... Thanks! I was kind of far away, so all of these are cropped, I'm pretty happy with how they came out!

Be GLAD you were kind of far away. I went to the Arizona Nationals last fall and picked seats on the front row, about 100' down from the tree. Great spot for everything except Top Fuel and Funny Car. By the time they got to me they were already doing 100+ and being that close just magnified how much I had to move my head to keep up with them.

I started watching the track-side guys and noticed that they seldom even tried to get anything as it passed them. They shot the burnout and the launch, and then watched to see if anything happened down track.

It's a lot of fun though.

Railphotog · Aug 6, 2012

The NHRA Nationals were in Seattle? I though they were always held in Indianapolis, but I haven't paid attention to the races for so long. My one and only Nationals was in Indianapolis, 1966. Had the chance to shoot trackside at the Summer Nationals in NJ at at the Grand Nationals at Sanair in Quebec a few times. Hearing protection is a necessity!