Houndog: Icon of Drag

Cars

If you were around in the seventies and ever went to Santa Pod: Hound Dog will mean a lot to you.

We’re not really sure why it held the imagination – the Brit funny car was spectacular alright – but every funny car was spectacular. The fact that she was a Custom Car magazine cover star must have helped.

And we suppose, around the time that Elvis expired, the association with the KING of rock and roll couldn’t have harmed the car’s populist appeal.

Hound Dog 9 is the one that sticks in my memory – being a magazine geek even at the age of nine made the Chevy Vega bodied brute stick. Apparently the team principle was Nobby Hills and he seems to have a noble history in British Drag Racing.

There was an irreverence to this kind of no-holds-barred motorsport that we hadn’t felt until we went to Dirt Quake last weekend – and the Hound Dog encapsulated the power and the glory of the 6 second quarter mile more than any other racer of the time.

Get along to Santa Pod and feel the earth move.



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