Women of Drag Racing , Past & Present

 

 Drag Racing is a great sport because Men and Women can compete as equals . Both lanes are the same & they are both 1320 feet long . When the lights come down it is just human and machine , not Man or Woman in the other lane .  In my opinion , as a Drag Racing Fan I think Women have proven themselves in the sport and they need to be respected and honored . That's why I'm asking Women to participate in my page.  And I decided to do a history flashback on some great women in Drag Racing.   Without them there would be no Women  racing today.

 

Della Woods  is a professional AA/FC driver in the NHRA.  She was the first female driver in the five-second zone in the Funny Car class, and the first female driver to go to the semifinals at an NHRA national event. She held that record for almost 22 years.

Della Woods was inducted into the Michigan Motor Sports Hall of Fame in 1999, and the East Coast Drag Times Hall of Fame in 2015. In 2016, she was inducted into the Mopar Hall of Fame.

Della Woods and her brother Bernie Woods were from Lake Orion, Michigan.

 They campaigned match races during the 1960s and early 1970s, with Bernie as crew chief and Della as driver.  Della qualified for an NHRA AA/FC license in 1968 . It was signed by Roger Linamood, Don Garlits  and Don Kohler . Only to have the association revoke the license, saying it was too dangerous for a woman to run in that class.  Losing the license caused the brother-sister team to lose several match racing engagements, provoking Woods to call the NHRA and inform them that if they took her license they would have to take the all female driver's licenses as well.
After considerable pressure, the NHRA, AHRA and IHRA finally declared that when properly trained and equipped, that Women were equally capable as drivers in any Drag Racing category, including Funny Car and Top Fuel.

Della and Bernie were forced to quit racing due to finances in 1972. 

Della married De Nichols in 1976. And In 1982 Della Woods and De Nichols bought the famed Fighting Irish car, the only non Mopar car she drove, from Dick Rosberg .  Della licensed in Atlanta then started entering national events. They finished 20th in the final points standings after qualifying at only eight NHRA events. In 1986 she was in a serious crash at Firebird Raceway.  

The family team continued on successfully for several more years, until the costs of running a nitro Funny Car forced their retirement in 1989. 

In 1996 the couple got the bug to race again and  purchased the first 4-second Funny Car from Chuck Etchells. And the first to officially break the 300 mph barrier . Their on again racing career was short lived however. It ended with the high costs of today’s Nitro racing, and the lack of major sponsorship forced them into retirement.

During her career she was the first woman to go over 220, 230 and then 240 mph. In 1984 she won the Olympics of Drag Racing, an historic and prestigious event at Great Lakes Dragway.

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 Shirley Muldowney 

Shirley Muldowney  also known professionally as "Cha Cha" and the First Lady of Drag Racing . She was the first woman to receive a license from the NHRA to drive a Top Fuel Dragster. She won the NHRA Top Fuel championship in 1977, 1980, and 1982, becoming the first person to win  three Top Fuel titles. Shirley won a total of 18 NHRA national events. 

 

In 1958, Muldowney made her debut at Fonda Speedway. She obtained her NHRA pro license in 1965 and  competed in the 1969 and 1970 U.S. Nationals  with a twin engine dragster in Top Gas .  With Top Gas losing popularity, Muldowney switched to the Funny Car class, buying her first car from Connie Kalitta .

 

She stepped up to Top Fuel, getting her license in 1973 making her the first woman to do it , behind the wheel of Poncho Rendon's Dragster .                Don Garlits  signed her application, one of three signatures she needed to make it official, the other two were T.V. Tommy Ivo  and Connie Kalitta. From 1973 to 1977, she teamed up with Kalitta as the Bounty Hunter and Bounty Huntress in match races in a pair of Ford Mustang Funny Cars.  Shirley had  a Buttera chassis, and Connie's was  a Logghe.  

The Bounty Huntress Mustang caught fire at Dragway 42 in Ohio in 1973 and was destroyed .

At Columbus, Ohio, in 1976, Muldowney dominated Top Fuel, qualifying number one by 0.05 second, setting low elapsed time  and top speed of the meet, having the low ET in every round, breaking her own top speed record in the final, and winning the class. An unprecedented three NHRA Top Fuel Dragster world championships followed, in 1977, 1980, and 1982.  

 

 

A crash in 1984 crushed her hands, pelvis, and legs, necessitating half a dozen operations and 18 months of therapy. Muldowney was sidelined for a long period, but returned to the circuit in the late 1980s. She continued to race, mostly without major sponsorship, throughout the 1990s in IHRA competition, as well as match-racing events. She returned to the NHRA towards the end of her career, running select events until her retirement at the end of 2003.

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Carol Burkett "Bunny"

Caroline Burkett (May 29, 1945 – April 4, 2020) nicknamed "Bunny", was an Alcohol Funny Car driver. In 1986, Burkett became only the second woman to win a national title in a professional class, following Shirley Muldowney.  Burkett got her nickname, "Bunny" because she had been a  Playboy Club hostess.

Burkett was one of only a small number of women Drag Racing  in professional classes. She raced under both NHRA and IHRA . 

 She began racing in the 1960s, and in 2005 was still in the sport.

Burkett began racing in 1964 when her husband Mo bought her a stock 1964-1/2 Mustang, which was later replaced by a race-only 1967 Mustang that she raced in the Sportsman ranks. In 1973, Burkett began racing in Pro Stock with her Lil Cotton Bunny Ford Pinto, and then moved up to the Top Alcohol Funny Car ranks in 1976. During this period, Burkett was always interactive with the spectators and created a legion of fans with her outgoing approach and entertaining style of racing that also earned her many match races . 

By winning the 1986 IHRA alcohol Funny Car (A-F/C) national title, Burkett became only the second woman to win a national title in a professional class, following  Shirley Mulldowney.                1986 proved to be a banner season in other venues for Burkett as she won with national event triumphs at Darlington, Martin, and Rockingham, and the Division 2 season title with victories at the Warner Robbins & DeSoto and West Palm Beach tracks.

 In 1995 her career was interrupted when the car she was racing drifted into her lane causing a horrendous crash that resulted in two broken vertebrae, a broken wrist and a hairline fractured skull. After a year in recovery she returned to racing and amazingly continued to race Top Alcohol Funny Cars until the age of 70 in 2015.

Her last final round appearance was at the Cecil County Raceway in 2004. Burkett won many awards for her 55 years of drag racing competition and was most recently named as a Lifetime Achievement recipient for the 2020 Holley National Hot Rod Reunion, where she was honored posthumously.

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 Nitro Nancy Matter       

 Nostalgia Funny Car 

 

 Nancy's prior career was in the music industry , she put herself through engineering school and ended up in cassette and CD manufacturing. She ran the studio for the post production aspect of broadcasting manufacturing. That led to being a producer with the Disney Record Corporation.

 

Later on she started her own studio and now has about 70 gold and platinum records (that she worked on), and some Grammy's and Oscars.   

Nancy began her racing career bracket racing and crewed for the late Top Alcohol Funny Car racer Lou Gasparelli.

She ran a Alcohol Funny Car for 14 years, then in 2017 she switched to a 1977 Pontiac Trans AM Nostalgia Funny Car . 

Nancy continues to raise awareness for the American Valor Foundation, and helps with charity efforts for them.

Nancy can be seen in the Funny Car Chaos racing series .

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