Randy Walker and The Walker Autoworks Worlds Fastest El Camino kicks off the 2007 season bye setting the new West Coast Hot Rod Et Record at 6.41 and winning the event.

Lets turn back the clock. Our last race of the year the Street Car Super Nationals yielded the results we were striving for all year long. After a long hard year that tested our patience, knowledge and of course our bank account we put together our best runs of 6.56, 6.55 and a 6.54 consecutively. With the truck loaded up in the trailer we left Las Vegas Motor Speedway with high hopes for the year to come.

            The off season brought some changes to the ElCamino. We did not want to do too much to the truck because of the promising end to last year. We made some front end changes to help the air flow over and around the large frontal area of the truck. Also we changed the hood scoop to a larger more aero dynamic model to help feed more air to the Edelbrock  Nitrous injected Walker Autoworks  760 cubic inch engine. We did put the engine on the dyno to find out what the engine liked as far as timing and jetting. Since we design and build our own engines we wanted to find out where we were against the competition. Let’s just say we were very happy with our engine.

            The first race of the 2007 year brings us to Speedworld in Surprise Arizona. With this event there were a couple of unknown’s. First the track in the past had really fallen behind in safety measures to protect the racers and the pits were really run down. Let me just say that the new operator Bill Botelho has fixed the issues and he plans to do more. Also the other unknown was the new association we are running in called the West Coast Hot Rod Association. This was there first race ever. The organization was put together by racers for racers. They offer classes from Pro Street to Open Comp. From the time we came into the gate to park the race rig on Friday to we loaded up and were one of the last to leave on Sunday we were very happy how professionally, friendly and smooth the event went. More regarding the WCHR later.

            After unloading the car on Friday afternoon we had planed to get a test run in before qualifying on Saturday. Our first hit was ugly. The car left the line and immediately went into tire shake. The car made a left turn and Randy had to get out of it. Our Crew Chief Duane Walker let us know that we were going to make a quick change and get right back up to the starting line. When getting back to the pits the team started to work. With Duane in the can, Matt Loutsenhizer taking care of the back half of the car, Ron Nayfack maintaining the Nitrous bottles and me taking all the notes we get the Elcamino back in the lanes in roughly a half hour. The second hit gave us better results; we made it sixty feet and then went into tire shake. Better but still not what we wanted. We rushed back to the pits and readied the car as the time before. By the time we were ready, the lanes were closed for the day. The promoter West Coast Hot Rod stepped in and purchased another hour of track time for all racers to get another hit in. This third hit found what we were looking for. We got off the line with a 1.01 sixty foot time. By the time we took the last hit the track had cooled down and would not hold the power down track. “Randy said that it felt great until it got to about 330 foot mark and got loose and had to let out”. When talking to Duane he said that “I’m very happy going into qualifying on Saturday,  all I wanted it to do is get off the line and not shake the tire’s, we can tune the clutch for the top end tomorrow when we have some more heat in the track”.

            After a great dinner and a good night’s sleep at a local resort named Club Stonebreaker we headed to the track on Saturday Morning with high hopes. We started wear we left off on Friday. Our first Qualifying run gave us a 6.71 at 204. Now that we have a full run on the computer Duane can tune the clutch and Randy can tune up the motor to give us the #’s we know we can run. The second round of qualifying came and we moved to the #1 qualifying spot with a 6.48 @ 212mph on just two stages of our Edelbrock Nitrous system. Our glory was short lived when team WFO posted a 6.44et to move to #1. For the third round we new that we needed to run quicker then 6.44. To do that we decided to use the third stage of nitrous. Randy wired in the third stage and we headed to the lanes. Duane told me before the run that it would run a 6.43 and sure enough it ran a 6.43et @ 212 mph which put us back at # 1. WFO did not make the third round of Qualifying and that left us at #1 through three rounds. The fourth round would not disappoint anyone. We decided to wait and see WFO run before we ran to see if they could best our time. They came out and ran an awesome 6.36 at 221. We new we had our work cut out for us. Our final pass was a 6.41 at 214mph which left us in the # 2 spot. For eliminations.

            Sunday came and the tension was in the air. With only four cars for the first event of the new organization we new that we had to win the first round and have low ET for lane choice. All though both lanes looked good the right lane seems to have more rubber on it for a better track surface. In the first round we had Art Hodges of Simi Valley CA a veteran racer that runs in the IHRA Mountain Motor Class of Pro Stock.  At the drop of the tree Hodges got the jump on Randy but by the 330 mark Randy was out in front and pulling away with an ET of 6.44 @ 212mph to Hodges Letting off 7.56/136 for the first round win. With our fingers crossed WFO won the first round but ran a tire shaking 7.20et. We had lane choice for the final round. With both teams emptying the tool box for the final round. WFO was hooking up there fourth stage of Nitrous and we were putting a larger tune up in our third stage. The final round was here with WFO in the left lane and our Walker Autoworks ElCamino in the right. The green light dropped, it looked like WFO got the jump but turned on the red light. The race was close with our winning 6.46 to there 6.50to take home the $6000.00 winners purse and set the ET record at 6.41.

            The first race of the year and the first race of the WCHR by the tone of the competitors in the pits it was a huge success. With that Walker Autoworks has decided to compete for the championship in the West Coast Hot Rod Association. Our 2007 schedule will consist of all 6 WCHRA races and selected races in the PSCA.

Walker Racing would like to thank the following sponsors:

Walker Autoworks Racing Engines

Edelbrock Nitrous systems,  

Platinum Landscape            

Mickey Thompson Tires,     

ISC Racers Tape,                 

Orme Brothers,                    

Torco Race Fuels,                

Jennings Cylinder Heads

Carb Shop

Vrbancic Brothers Racing Engines and Dyno

Lamb Components