The smack talk started more than two decades ago, centered around a controversial article in the Nov. '84 issue of Muscle Car Review on the 50 fastest musclecars of all time. For a multitude of reasons, that's an impossible list to compile, especially roughly 15 years after the traditional musclecars became used cars. MCR used road-test data from old issues of Motor Trend, Car & Driver, and other magazines to ensure as much accuracy as possible, but it still bit them.
As expected, the magazine was deluged with letters and phone calls from irate musclecar loyalists, the loudest group being the Chrysler Hemi lovers. See, MCR said the '70 Buick GS Stage 1 was the third fastest (with a 13.38 quarter-mile e.t.) and the fastest Hemi-powered musclecar, a 13.50-second '68 Charger, was back in fifth place.
Mopar guys screamed "Foul!" at the suggestion that grandpa's Buick was quicker than their race-derived Elephant, and the debate went nuclear. Two guys in particular, Hemi loyalist Roy Badie and Buick lover Rich Lasseter, were the loudest, so MCR arranged a shootout between them. Badie brought his mostly stock (headers and a cam) Hemi GTX and Lasseter brought his '70 Stage 1. The main difference was that Lasseter and his Buick were seasoned NHRA Stock Eliminator veterans, and they handed the Hemi its rearend on a plate, running 12.30 to the Plymouth's 13.03.
That just poured lemon juice in the Hemi guys' open wounds. Once again, MCR was deluged with letters demanding a rematch, so the magazine organized Hemi versus Buick, Round Two. This time, MCR contacted the presidents of both the GS Club of America and the National Hemi Owners Association and told them to bring out their best, unmodified cars for the race; both cars would be closely inspected by the other camp for legitimacy. So Brian Thomas' '68 Hemi Road Runner took on Bob Lindquist's '70 GS Stage 1. The two black cars ran for bragging rights at Beech Bend Raceway in Bowling Green, Kentucky. After plenty of drama, the Hemi won this time, with a 12.62 to the Buick's 12.85.
And once again, the letters came. In the ensuing years, MCR tried to organize Hemi versus Buick, Round Three. It never materialized, but the war of words raged on. In 2001, Dave Dudek , who had been following the controversy, bought a Hemi Road Runner and went onto a popular Buick Web site and threw down a challenge to race the fastest "stock" Stage 1 the club could put together. They accepted, it was to happen at the Buick Nats, MCR said it would be there, and the message boards lit up. Then, Dudek was seen running 11.50s, and the Buick guys pulled out. For five years, the debate continued, but nothing came of it . . . until HOT ROD threw the smackdown.
We wanted to put an end to the debate once and for all, so we invited Dudek and the King of the Buicks, Greg Gessler and his '72 Stage 1, to race best two out of three for bragging rights. And to make the cars quicker than the Factory Appearing Stock Tire (F.A.S.T.) class they normally race in, we allowed them to run on slicks. The rule said any tire can be used as long as it fits in the stock wheelwell and is on a stock-type wheel, which could be widened to fit the tire. This was about who was quickest, plain and simple. After lots of consideration, Gessler decided he didn't want to race the Hemi car on slicks, so the call went out to Buickland, and eventually Jim Rodgers bit.
The race was scheduled for Sunday, September 10, 2006, at Cordova Dragway Park in Cordova, Illinois, to coincide with the first day of HOT ROD's Drag Week(tm). To make it even more interesting, we invited the F.A.S.T. series' reigning e.t. champ, Wayne Nelson and his '69 L88 Corvette, to race heads-up against the winner of the Hemi versus Buick Showdown.
All three cars showed up as promised, and as soon as they were unloaded, the racers inspected each other's cars to make sure they were legit. The only areas of concern were with the Buick, which had a half-inch aluminum fuel line and a Holley regulator when the F.A.S.T. rules call for all stock stuff. Rodgers is not a F.A.S.T. class racer, however, and Dudek and Nelson didn't think it was a big enough performance advantage to bounce him for it, so they gave the car a tentative thumbs-up. They did not catch the heads, which turned out to be TA Performance aluminum units that are not F.A.S.T.-legal.
"We didn't know exactly what he was going to bring," Nelson said about the Buick. "Dave and I were a little apprehensive about what he had on the table, since we had never seen the car run."
Dudek concurred, saying, "I know that Jim Rodgers is a serious racer and has a low-9-second Buick, so he's not new to going fast or heads-up racing. Really, I don't know a whole lot about the car or the guy."
Rodgers kept his car's potential a secret during the three test passes, but when it hoisted the left front wheel on the first launch, it was clear it was a player. Rodgers' hired driver, Gary Laughlin of St. Charles, Missouri, lifted during the pass to avoid showing his hand, and on the next two test passes, the car bogged and stumbled its way down the track.
Meanwhile, with the traction his car sorely needed thanks to the slicks, Dudek ran an unholy 10.33 and a 10.35 in the test session. Nelson's Vette was already a proven 10-second car, running a best of 10.59 at 130 mph in F.A.S.T. trim on rock-hard bias-ply tires, so Rodgers' Buick had its work cut out for it. After the test and tune and before the first race, Rodgers and his crew were figuring out what was wrong with the car, and we nearly ran out of track time. But Rodgers finally rolled the car into the burnout box, and we were set for action.