It’s not uncommon to hear stories from enthusiasts and racing competitors on drawing inspiration from their parents, their friends, and even fellow enthusiasts on why they choose to participate in car activities.

The inspiration for this fresh drag-and-drive build of Steve Haefner came from another Oldsmobile Cutlass, one that had attendees at the Performance and Racing Industry (PRI) show doing a double take.

“I can’t lie; VP Racing’s Jason Rueckert car is what made me choose the G-body, and specifically the Oldsmobile,” said Haefner. Although the general stance, color and twin-turbo power are very close, Haefner’s ride has a few noticeable differences, including a drag-and-drive focus.

Hot Rod Magazine’s Fastest Street Car Shootout in 1992 was the first event to point the spotlight at dual purposes cars that could survive the street, as well as lay down impressive numbers on the track. Over a decade later, drag-and-drive got its start at Hot Rod Drag Week in 2005, taking a page from that iconic 1992 event and expanding on it.

Looking back at history can give us a clearer picture of what the future may hold, and that ideal plays into the most recent update on Tom Bailey’s ‘Sick Seconds 2.0’ ’69 Camaro, as Bailey will debut it with the fresh look at this week’s Performance & Racing Industry (PRI) show in Indianapolis, Indiana in the Gear Vendors Overdrive booth.

We’ve only got six days left before our current vehicle giveaway, the 1952 Nash wagon, which comes to an end on Sunday, December 15th 2024. Packing a fresh 396 cubic inch small block Chevy, with an extra 150 horsepower of nitrous onboard, the Nash could be your ticket to 9-second time slips!

But, in the spirit of the holiday season, we can’t wait any longer to show off our next giveaway car, a 1969 Chevrolet Camaro Indy Pace Car! And for the next six days, you can double your chances to win one of our cars!

He may have gotten his start in drag-and-drive with a 1970 Chevrolet Chevelle, but the black and red AMC Javelin of Bryant Goldstone has become a well known ride. Based on its percentage of events completed, class wins, and records broken and set, Goldstone has set the bar for the Unlimited Iron class.

But this week will bring the reveal of a new ride for Goldstone in 2025, as he takes aim on quicker times, and the Unlimited class.

What could Goldstone’s new ride be? The Performance & Racing Industry show in Indy will give us the first look at the new ride in the XS Power booth.

As one of the participants that’s attended every year of Sick Week presented by Gear Vendors Overdrive, Matt Lamphier has experienced the highs and lows of a drag-and-drive event. He won the hotly-contested 235 Outlaw Street Race class at Sick Week in 2022, but had the reversal of fortune the last two years of Sick Week. But Matt and his wife / co-pilot Meg have a plan for 2025 to return to winning ways.

One year after scoring a coveted Sick the Magazine class-winning orange helmet, Matt and the LS-swapped 1992 Mazda Miata known as “The Turtle” had the engine lock up less than an hour from his day two destination – Bradenton Motorsports Park. Last year he exploded an engine.

Can Matt and Meg find the magic from their 2022 Sick Week and collect a second helmet in 2025?

It’s not uncommon to see racers cross over into a drag-and-drive event from other forms of racing, including grudge racing, heads-up class and even bracket and index racing. Even some no-prep racers have made the jump to drag-and-drive.

But Allen Thompson will go a step further as he looks to rebuild his no-prep car to get it ready for next year’s Sick Week Presented by Gear Vendors Overdrive.

“This is the show where we play with cars, and you point and laugh. We call it Roadkill.” Those words were stated by David Freiburger in Episode 1 of the popular MotorTrend show ‘Roadkill’ which hit YouTube in early 2012. 

Nearly thirteen years and thirteen seasons after that first show was recorded, Mike Finnegan broke the news on Reddit that ‘Roadkill’ will not record a fourteenth season.

Getting Driven Racing Oil to join Sick the Mag for our 2024 event season was more than just a sponsorship; it was a chance for Driven to get feedback and possibly develop new oils.

“When we got together with Tom Bailey, it was because we saw the drag-and-drive segment exploding,” said Bill Alexander of Driven Racing Oil. “The demands of these rides can be different than any other market we’ve seen, and we wanted to get first-hand data and feedback from competitors to use in our analysis.”

Racers and automotive enthusiasts can be resourceful in more ways than one. If something isn’t available or built to tolerate a vehicle’s demands, there is normally another option. Even if that option is doing it yourself, where there’s a will, there’s a way, and that’s exactly how Isky Racing Cams got its start.

Now, over 70 years alter, ISKY Racing Cams continues to support enthusiasts, including in the drag-and-drive community.

When discussing the needs of drag-and-drive competitors, the need to fuel your ride properly is near the top of the list, as is the need for traction to get the best time slip possible. Tom Bailey put an emphasis on both these items when constructing the first Sick Week event in 2022, and VP Racing was on board right from the start.

“Tom recognized the need to take the drag-and-drive experience to the next level,” said Jason Rueckert of VP Racing. “We wanted to do our part to help that vision, and that started at Sick Week two years ago.”

The Summit Racing Equipment name brings decades of experience in the performance and racing landscape. But their introduction to the drag-and-drive community was through one of their valued employees. “I’ve always been a fan of drag-and-drive since the first year of Hot Rod Drag Week,” said Tommy Dupree of Summit Racing. “I went a few times when it was close to my home base.” That love for cars and trucks that could handle street and strip duty took the next step when Tommy encouraged Summit to get involved.  

The drag-and-drive community started with one event, Hot Rod Drag Week, in 2005. That event has grown into a movement with a large community of participants and fans, over 40 different events across multiple countries, and influenced thousands of car and truck builds to prove they can survive the street and the strip torture tests known by many as drag-and-drive.

There are a only a select few that have seen it all since the beginning, and Rick Johnson with Gear Vendors Overdrive is one of those people.

The 1987 Volvo wagon of Mikael Borggren became a staple on several drag-and-drive events, first cracking the 6-second mark at Hot Rod Drag Week in 2021. But he started to make his mark in the no-prep world in the last few years, and also captured a trio of Roadkill Nights Small Tire victories.

First introduced at the 2022 edition of Sick Week for those that wanted to join the fun and drive without the worry of drag strip passes, the Summit Racing Equipment Sick Ward Presented by PEAK Performance is a great way for enthusiasts to join us for a full week of fun on Sick Week.

With a history of running competitive heads-up radial racing, Lamar Swindoll Jr. is used to the pressure that can come with producing repeatable performance and getting to the finish line on time. After producing mid 8-second elapsed times on both Sick Week and Sick Summer, Lamar decided it was time to turn up the wick for next month’s Edelbrock Sick 66.

This colorful 1976 Chevrolet Nova has already secured a class victory at Hot Rod Drag Week in 2022, along with a pair of top three finishes at Sick Week in 2002 and 2023.

But for Drag Week in 2023, Jerry and Matt Sweet rolled to the starting line on day one packing a new engine combination north of 800 cubic inches, putting the Nova into the 7-second zone for the first time in competition. They didn't finish the week last year; will they complete the task this time around?

During this year’s Sick Summer Presented by Motion Raceworks, Frank Webb shot onto our radars on day two with a massive triple-wheelie from his 1978 Ford Fairmont.

It got Webb and the Ford a lot of attention, but it also resulted in a trip to the tower looking for a replacement Aeromotive mechanical fuel pump, when the wheelie claimed his pump. Would it be the second-straight DNF for the 7-second Ford?

It was less than a month ago that Brett LaSala put ‘Snot Rocket 2.0’, his low 6-second street-legal 2012 Mustang, up for sale. Plans for a new car, ‘Snot Rocket 3.0’, were underway at Moore Race Chassis, and Brett mentioned it would be ready for a Sick Week 2025 debut.

But that timeline might be updated a little bit after a video dropped showing the new Moore Race Chassis .

After making a solid impression (and several big wheelies) in an 1983 Chevrolet Malibu station wagon during 2022 and 2023, including the 2023 edition of Sick Week, Colin Gee started thinking about a new car build for drag-and-drive duty.

Little did he know that just over a year after he started that build, it would have a blown-up engine, then Colin sold the car, and started on another build just this month!

One of the players in the top three at this year’s Rowdy Radial class at Sick Week Presented by Gear Vendors Overdrive was Kolby Bouck, and although his 2017 Mustang showed consistent 5.0-second performance, he has decided to raise his game for the 2025 edition of Sick Week.

After doing his first drag-and-drive in 2018, Chris VanWerden was asked by father Rick about building an A/FX (Factory Experimental) ride for drag-and-drive gasser use. Just over 5 years later, they can see the finish line on the '65 Dodge build.

After pushing his first ‘Snot Rocket’ Ford Mustang into the 6-second range at over 200 mph, Brett LaSala made the jump in 2022 to a lighter chassis to pursue his next set of goals.

After two years, multiple victories and becoming a record-holder in the drag-and-drive scene, the ‘Snot Rocket 2.0’ 2012 Mustang has gone up for sale.

There are so many things you can focus on as part of a drag-and-drive, and one that I’m diving into today is the tight competition that comes with the Hot Rod Drag Week Street Race class, as well as the Rocky Mountain Race Week Limited Street class, Sick Week and Sick Summer’s 275 Street Race and Sick Street Race classes, and the Midwest Drags Street Race classes.

Despite appearances that things are good on the surface, a racer’s mind can be a hamster wheel of thoughts both good and bad on their next run. In Colin Gee’s case, he started thinking about the 1983 Chevrolet Malibu station wagon he had finished in 2023, and his goals for the future.

The Stark family first joined the drag-and-drive community at the 2019 edition of Rocky Mountain Race Week, with father Tom Stark wielding the shifter handle in his ‘55 Chevy wagon stick shift entry. But just three later, son Blayne and daughter MaCayla moved into the driver’s seat.

The drag-and-drive calendar has greatly expanded since the original drag-and-drive, Hot Rod Drag Week, first made an appearance in 2005. But do all the events, both big and small, stay true to the original concept David Freiburger created?

With the increase in the number of drag-and-drive events in the last three years, it’s becoming more commonplace to see competitors at more than one event during a calendar year. There are several that have made their mark in the drag-and-drive world, and one of the top ones is Bryant Goldstone.

What does one have to do with the other, and how does it sound like both rides might be even more fun than before? It all started when Jonathan Whitaker took his ‘93 Ford Mustang Cobra on this year’s Sick Week Presented by Gear Vendors Overdrive.

Although Hot Rod Drag Week didn’t start out with the intention of making their Street Race classes into an index-based competition, that’s become the norm. Rocky Mountain Race Week and Sick Week-Sick Summer followed suit, and the competition to run that 8.500 perfect pass is heating up.