Drag Racing Performance Facts

The fastest top fuelers can attain terminal speeds of over 330 mph (530 km/h) while covering the quarter mile (402m) distance in roughly 4.5 seconds. It is often related that Top Fuel dragsters are the fastest accelerating vehicles on Earth; quicker even than the space shuttle launch vehicle or catapult-assisted jet fighter (however this ignores the rocket dragsters). In fact, if you take a vehicle travelling at a steady 200 mph (322 km/h) as it is crossing the start line, a top fuel dragster starting from a dead stop at the same moment will beat it to the finish line one quarter of a mile (402 m) away. Additionally, through the use of large multiple braking parachutes, the astounding performance of 0 to 330 mph (531 km/h) and then back to 0 in 20 seconds can be obtained.

The faster categories of drag racing are an impressive spectacle, with engines of over 6000 horsepower (4.5 MW) and noise outputs to match, cars that look like bizarre parodies of standard street cars (funny cars), and the ritual of burnouts where, prior to the actual timed run, the competitors cause their wheels to spin while stationary or moving slowly, thus heating up the tyres and laying down a sticky coat of rubber on the track surface ( which may have been coated with VHT Trackbite or similar to increase traction) to get optimum grip on the all-important initial launch.

Drag-racing has traditionally been the domain of big - usually American - cars with high-capacity engines. However, the power to weight ratio of lighter, usually imported, cars has allowed them to be successful when their engines are modified and bodies lightened. The Volkswagen Beetle was one of the first to be exploited this way. Recently there has been an increase in Sport Compact racing, where smaller cars, especially Japanese, but recently some American and European, are raced. Use of a turbocharger or supercharger is very common, and often necessary to break through the 12-second quarter-mile barrier.

In 2001, the NHRA formed the Sport Compact category featuring such cars, and while Toyota, Honda, Nissan, and Subaru are very popular, the NHRA has also permitted General Motors, Ford, and DaimlerChrysler cars to participate in Sport Compact.

With NHRA rule changes in recent years making Pro Stock cars more compact, a change from a 500 cubic inch V8 engine to a modified factory four or six cylinder double overhead camshaft engine can easily convert a Pro Stock car to Sport Compact Pro Rear Wheel Drive car. The cars are separated by performance, and since 2003 categories have been split based on the car's drive wheels. Ironically, most NHRA Sport Compact records for elapsed time and speed are held by General Motors cars, rather than the imports.

One of the negative side-effects of sport compact drag-racing is that the cheaper cars involved are often raced (illegally) on the street, where they cause trouble, with many drivers making a public nuisance of themselves. Illegal street-racing was glamorised in the movie 'The Fast and the Furious'.