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Here's a story about a Rookie Drag Racer, Shige Suganuma (Boss from here under) and the Mooneyes Dragster II. The story starts in the summer of year 2000, after a lesson on alcohol funny cars in Bakersfield, CA, Boss came back to Japan. No one ever could of known what was going to happen. Nothing happened for a little less than two years, until Boss came back from his business trip in March of 2002. He had gotten sunburned pretty well, but like a panda bear. Almost like baklava marksﾉ hmmﾉ Boss had a grin, not a evil grin, but an accomplished sort of grin on his face and in his hand was a heap of photos. He showed us the photos, and they were of the Mooneyes Dragster II and as its driver Shige Suganuma, Boss. |
| On March 4th, on the Carlsbad Raceway did a test run to get a feel of the car and the strip, and on the 10th, at the Bakersfield Nostalgia Drag Race ﾒMarch Meetﾓ ran an Exhibition race. |
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Revell 社のスケールモデル
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| Dean Moon, the starter of Mooneyes, built the dragster back in the early 60s. It was based on the Gas Dragster built in 59. Deanﾕs style was to make cars not only fast, but nice look at. That concept lives on today at Mooneyes. In 62, it won the NHRA Winternational ﾒAﾓ Gas Dragster Class by 9.33 ET / 160.14 mph with Gary Cagle as the driver. In 63, Dante Deuce and the US Drag Race team took it to England to do a few exhibition races. In 66, it almost came to Japan to be sold to a Moon Distributor but never made it, and now is at the Dan Garlits Drag Race Museum in Florida. |  |
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So whats that yellow thing in the pictures one might ask. Well instead of bring and resuscitating the old Dragster, we made a clone. The Mooneyes Dragster II. Built exactly like the original, with the original mechanic team, and by the same safety regulations. Jim Nelson was called in and invited to drive this monster in 1996, and he made a personal best at 10.41 ET / 146 mph. But because of old age, Jim had to let go of the Dragster. | |
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Carlsbad
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Goodguys March
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| Bringing the story back to the topic, and to keep this short, Boss became the 5th dragster driver for the Dragster II. Dean Moon, Gary Cagle, Dante Deuce, Jim Nelson, and Shige Suganuma. Shake Down best time was 11.36 ET / 151 mph, and exhibition race time was 12.33 ET / 150 mph. |
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Photo: DAYTONA
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