Bonneville Salt Flats - Our First Trip For over 61 years the Bonneville Salt Flats have been giving people "salt fever" during its annual Speed Week each August. This year Pikesan, Hetchspeed, and GreaseGirl met up at the flats to bring everyone at MyRideisMe.com a little taste of the salty stuff! And are you guys in for a treat!!! Not only is Speedweek home to land speed racings biggest event but its also one of the most amazing mix of cool people and cars you'll ever experience. So check back into MyRideisMe.com soon to catch a glimpse of some of the nearly 1000 pictures we took, coverage of build stories, records broken, life on the salt, and the people that make it all happen. We had the time of our lives out on the white stuff and we can't wait to share it with...

Bonneville Salt Flats: Welcome Home Bonnie! I think its only fitting that the first pic from Speedweek 2009 that we post is of our fearless leader, pikesan.  I'll let pikesan post most of the pics of his car "Bonnie" and her homecoming to the Salt Flats but, I took this cool rolling shot Saturday morning and wanted to share it with you all.  This was taken about 30 seconds after Bonnie and pikesan (suffering from a sever case of Salt Fever) made it onto the Salt for the first time.  What a cool moment! I switched to shutter priority mode on the D90 and started snapping pics while trying to drive (luckily the entry road is super wide). This shot inspires me to build my own roadster.  Well, that's it for now.  The MyRideisMe.com crew that made it out to the Salt (we missed you Swanee) for Speedweek 2009 will be sharing stories and a sizeable photo gallery.  It was also the first time pikesan, GreaseGirl and Hechtspeed met in person.  We had a great time and can't wait to share our experiences! Ok, this pic is just too good (imho)...

Bonneville Salt Flats Race Car: Traveling alone sucks. That's why I'm glad to have a traveling buddy for the long drive from Phoenix to Wendover, Utah for Speedweek on the Bonneville Salt Flats.  I'm towing my 1927 roadster, so I can't drive that fast so I fit right in with my 250mph partners on the road, "Bonnieville Bob" and his son Rocky. Their B/GMR modified roadster is a stretched 1927 roadster that's been as fast as 251 mph at Bonneville and that's just 4 mph off the record. Much more to come on these guys since I'll be shooting lots of pictures of all the race cars and picking Bob and Rocky's speed-brain for all they're worth! Look for us on the salt!  And if you know Bob, say hi right here by leaving a comment.    ...

Bonneville Salt Flats Perfect Pusher: As part of the crew at MyRideisMe.com leaves for the Salt today and I leave tomorrow, we can almost taste it, the Salt that is.  Here's a quick picture of one of the many push vehicles you'll see at Bonneville.  But, granted, this is not your typical pusher.  Most of the time you'll see trucks and big sedans giving their racecars a push start.  This blown Caddy Coupe takes the Push Vehicle to a whole new level and is definitely showing off, and everyone loved it!  This hot rod gets its pushing duties done in style. 1 more day and a wake up until we get out on the white stuff.  Can't wait.  Did I say I was...

The crew at MyRideisMe.com is getting very anxious to get to the Salt.  The Salt Fever has infected us and the only cure is to get our Salt fix.  Speedweek officially begins Thursday August 6th.  Racers can set up in the pit area and begin tech inspections.  We'll be bringing you readers great stories and photos from the event.  I thought I'd post this pic from last year at Speedweek.  A gorgeous belly tank lakester waiting in line to make a top speed blast down the salt.  Can't...

Speedweek begins this week (7 days and counting).  For this Internet Barn Find, we go across the pond to scope out a Steam Powered Streamliner.  Check out  British Steam Car Challenge website.  Take a few minutes and read up on this beauty of a racecar. The record for a steam powered land vehicle stands at 127.659 MPH according to this site.  The crazy part is this record was set in 1906.  It's about time this record gets beaten, don't you think?  Another tid bit of information from the steam car's website is the unofficial (not recognized by FIA) steam powered record is 145.607 MPH set in 1985, and that is the record the British Team is shooting for. Check out this youtube video linked from their site too.  Sounds crazy!!! [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkpdSeb2ya4&feature=player_embedded[/youtube]...

Words and Pics by Keith Harman (I only posted it for him!) In just over ten short years, the Goodwood Festival of Speed has become a worldwide ‘must-see’ for car enthusiasts from every genre and hobby, there is quite simply, nothing like it anywhere else in the world. Held at the sprawling Goodwood Estate in Southern England the show is a mass celebration of speed in all its wheeled forms where famous racing drivers past and present rub shoulders with fans and celebrities alike and glorious racing machines from collections all over the world are fired up and run in anger up the long winding hill from outside the stately home. No matter what your tastes in cars, there will always be something to marvel at. Held over three days, we managed to blag a couple of free tickets for this year's event and went along on the Friday to have a look, I'd heard that this year's American theme was NASCAR (it was Top Fuel dragsters last year and Bonneville before that) and so with British fans having never seen these cars in action, I was interested to...

If I were to tell you about a drag car that made about 1100 horsepower, weighed 2,550 lbs with driver and has run a best of 9.0 seconds at 170.97 mph in the quarter, would you think of a Honda Civic?    That's exactly what we have here.  This Civic hatchback is owned and built by Chris Miller from NRG Tech out of New York.  It started its automotive life as a commuter car getting high 30's mpg as all Civic's do. When you get right down to it, the Honda Civic can be compared to cars in the hot rod world like the Ford Falcon, Chevy Nova II or even 30's Ford Coupe.  What, "am I crazy" you ask?!  Yes I am, Car Crazy, but just follow me on this path for a minute.  Consider 30's Fords came with 4 cylinders and were the average Joe's vehicle (as average as a 1930's car owner was since they likely had more money than average...).  30's Fords are now seen with every V8 imaginable, go 200+ on Salt Flats, sub 10 seconds on the 1320 and now even the race track/autocross...

    ...that's right, 17 Days until Speedweek 2009 at the Bonneville International Speedway , "Worlds Fastest Speedway" in western Utah!  MyRideisMe.com will be at the salt in force.  This will be my third salt'venture.  I'll be accompanied by the MyRideisMe crew, pikesan, GreaseGirl and Swanee.  We've already got some stories lined up and plan to grab more.  What would you like to see from the salt?  Drop a comment below and let us know and we'll hunt it down!      ...

Leaving hard at Speedworld's Nostalgia Drags, this inline 6 powered Nostalgia Dragster's different but so right! I bumped into Wayne and this cool front engine dragster at the Nostalgia Drags here in AZ at Speedworld. Always on the lookout for something different, I couldn't help but notice the the six cylinder, a not-so-obvious choice for an engine, let alone in a vintage dragster. Travelling into Arizona from Alamogordo, NM for the drags, here's some info about Wayne's digger: I decided to build an inline car because I raced my Flathead car with the Denver Flathead Inline guys and saw there weren't many "Late inline" dragsters and when there were, they all ran Chevys... so I thought about the best engineered inline and came up with the Ford. (12 port head and very Strong bottom end). Chassis: 1968 Race Car Engineering (Woody Gilmore) 182" wheelbase. Engine: 1975 Ford 300 cu in, bored .030 with Weisco flat top forged pistons with zero deck clearance. Crankshaft: is out of an F-650 which is steel. Rods: Crower H- beam. Cam and lifters: Crower (flat tappet) Head: From a 240 cu in Ford (much...

Back for 2009 with Don Shumacher Racing, Ron Capps is in his fifth full season with Shoe's team driving the NAPA AUTO PARTS Dodge Charger R/T for the 2nd time and of course, his crew chief is long time friend, Ed “Ace” McCulloch. Born in San Luis Obispo Capps has always been a So-Cal guy and now lives with his wife and their daughter and son in Carlsbad, CA. With a B.S. in Software Engineering from Santa Clara college, Capps joined the NHRA super-team of Don Schumacher Racing, in 2005 to drive the Brut-sponsored Dodge Charger Funny Car. With Schumacher, he's won eight national events and finshed 2nd in 2005, 3rd in 2006, and 4th in 2007. He's hoping to turn that trend around for 2009 Capps joined DSR after driving for longtime friend and team owner Don Prudhomme. DSR is only the second Funny Car team for whom he’s driven since entering the nitro classes in 1995. Since 1995 Capps has collected 25 wins in 54 final rounds, in both Top Fuel and Funny Car. He's been close, but has never won it all after claiming that crown,...

Nitro Burning Model A Ford Coupe Twin blown 1930 Ford Coupe ready to run Nitro as seen at the 2009 So-Cal open house in Pomona, CA When Canada natives Ken and his partner Frank Bevacqua from Top Ten Hot Rods and Customs build a hot rod, they follow their motto: "Bad Done Good". That exactly describes their ground pounding, nitro burning, fuel injected, hemi powered, twin McCulloch blown, tube frame 1930 Ford Coupe. Do I have your attention? Built as Top Ten's calling card of badness, Frank told me he loves the funny cars and front engine diggers you usually see at the popular cacklefest events, but where are the coupes? At drag races and for the first time at the 2009 LA Roadster Show, cacklefests are awesome. If you've never seen and more importantly heard a "cacklefest" then you're missing out. Imagine 5-20 nitromethane or "fuel" burning beasts from the not-forgotten yester-year of drag racing's lined up, and lit up, usually at night or just dusk to see the signature yellow flames shooting from the exhaust pipes. You know you're in the right place when the push cars...