DRAG CHALLENGE#1 – ONE DAY IS NOT ENOUGH! PART 1

Author : cmunroe

At what was arguably the largest attendance for a drag racing event at a local venue or race track on this, the solid ‘rock’, Drag Challenge #1 reinforced what I have always known.Our neighbors to the north (North America) and the north east (Europe) would sell any available soul to claim JDM. There is pride, honor and respect in JDM.

JDM is not an arbitrary union of three innocuous letters. On the contrary, JDM is a force-field. It is pleasure-delivering umbilical cord, a placebo’s foe! It is a motivational speaker, a doctrine, a philosophy, a tool of motorized socialization and most importantly, it is a way life – a culture.

But where others seek to lay claim despite questionable realities, we grin like an affable pet. Actions will mutilate words everywhere, except on a page, but if our allegiance to the JDM faith was ever questioned in a manufacturer/brand-loyalty court, we would summon aerial footage from the omnipresent drones and provide the judge with a suite at the covered stands resort powered by any machine which rumbled to the line at a Drag Challenge event!

Supligen’s Drag Challenge #1

Drag Challenge #1 was confirmation that we are not only disciples of the faith – WE ARE JDM! Choose a Japanese motoring icon – Honda Integra Type R – DC2/5, Honda Civic EF/EG, Honda CRX, Mitsubishi Evo – any iteration. Subaru WRX – choose a flavor- Swiffy had all of them! And the Kings and Emperors of horsepower/speed -Toyota Supra/Nissan Skyline. They were all present and accounted for at Drag Challenge#1, in numbers that would excite the revenue department!

Noteworthy machines sat proudly between their imaginary parallel lines of honor (parking spot) on valuable real estate – commencing at the junction of the main road and the unpaved soil at the entrance to Vernamfiled Motorsports Park – continued to where concrete met naked soil and here the number of machines multiplied like a swarm of invading honey-providers!

Machines, like branches, veered to the left, right and continued like tentacles to where the spectator points began. It was an infestation of machines, a plague, a rapidly replicating virus which infected its host with commendable, adorable, poise and stance!

Drag Challenge#1 was a fast machine orgy with a yet to be ascertained speed rating! It was an exercise in futility to capture an intimate, personal, visual journey with all the potent machines that were sunbathing in the glow of  luscious Clarendon sunshine. The time required to observe and allow appreciation for that which our Asian brothers built was simply not available within the hours and minutes assigned to a Drag Challenge day! And I was still in the parking lot!

As I walked towards the announcer’s table to observe the battles being waged, I could not help but think – One day is not enough!

Cecil Munroe Gleaner On-Line Writer

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