Legendary racer “Dyno Don” Nicholson passes away
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1/24/2006
Don Nicholson,
1927-2006
Legendary drag racer "Dyno Don" Nicholson passed away Jan. 24 after a long battle with Alzheimer’s disease. Originally a circle-track roadster campaigner in the late 1940s and then a participant in dry-lakes racing in El Mirage, Calif., and Bonneville, Utah, Nicholson went on to become a pioneer in Stock, Factory Experimental, Funny Car, and Pro Stock competition. He was voted No. 18 on the list of NHRA's Top 50 Drivers in 2001. He was 78.
Because his career spanned the 1960s and 1970s when there were relatively few NHRA national events on the calendar, the bulk of Nicholson’s wins came in match race competition, where he usually won more than 90 percent of his races. Nicholson holds the record for final-round appearances in the most NHRA eliminator categories, scoring either wins or runner-up efforts in Funny Car, Pro Stock, Super, Comp, Stock, and Street.
Nicholson was the first Ford campaigner to win a national event in Pro Stock, at the 1971 Summernationals, and he earned the NHRA Pro Stock championship title in 1977 at the age of 50.
Nicholson earned his "Dyno" nickname as one of the first to utilize the benefits of a chassis dyno, which he operated at a Chevrolet dealership in Pasadena, Calif., in the late 1950s. By the time that NHRA announced it would hold its first Winternationals at Pomona Raceway in 1961, he was ready to put his well-honed skills to use.
Nicholson not only won the Stock title at the '61 Winternationals, but he also defended his title in 1962 to become a household name in drag racing circles throughout the country.
When Chevrolet dropped its factory backing in 1963, Nicholson jumped to an A/Factory Experimental Mercury Comet in 1964 and enjoyed a match race winning percentage in excess of 90 percent that year. Nicholson was also among the first to use narrow rims to accentuate the wrinkled-sidewall effect on the tires in the mid-1960s. He recorded the first 10-second runs for a doorslammer with his '64 A/FX Comet and was also the first to begin lifting the front wheels off the ground on gear changes.
The cars were declared illegal for NHRA competition, but their nine-second performances easily outclassed the 10-second potential of the NHRA-legal Ford and Mercury entries. When Ford subsequently disallowed its cars from competing against the new Mopar "Funny Cars," Nicholson faced a serious loss in match race income.
"Dyno Don" Nicholson was regarded as one of the sport's best drivers and won the NHRA Pro Stock World Championship in 1977.
Nicholson converted his A/FX Comet into a Funny Car by altering the wheelbase and adding fuel injection and nitromethane fuel. Weeks later, he defeated the swiftest Mopar entry, the Ramchargers Dodge, in a pivotal match race with 9.30, 150-mph clockings. Mercury's racing manager, Al Turner, had the foresight to envision where the whole Funny Car phenomenon was headed, and he accordingly commissioned the Logghe Bros., of Detroit, to build tube-chassis Comets with one-piece flip-top bodies for the 1966 season.
This gave Nicholson such a performance advantage that the only driver who had the potential to defeat him was his protégé and Comet teammate, Eddie Schartman. Today's Funny Cars still use the same flip-top format that was established by Nicholson's Eliminator I Comet. Nicholson was virtually undefeated in 1966 and recorded the first Funny Car seven-second clocking at Martin, Mich., late that summer.
Nicholson enjoyed another banner season in 1967 with his Eliminator II, but when Funny Cars switched to supercharged engines late that year, Nicholson became concerned with the danger of blower explosions and engine fires. After completing the 1968 season with his 7.3-second Eliminator Cougar, Nicholson teamed with Sox & Martin, Bill Jenkins, and Dick Landy to form a match race circuit with carbureted, four-speed-equipped heads-up Super Stock cars, a throwback to the original A/FX vehicles of the mid-1960s.
Nicholson converted Jerry Harvey's 1966 A/FX Mustang into a heads-up Super Stocker and drove it to a victory in Street at the 1969 Springnationals while campaigning the car in A/MP. The popularity of the heads-up nine-second entries on the match race circuit prompted NHRA to create the Pro Stock category in 1970.
Competing with a hastily prepared Ford Maverick that was built in just seven days, Nicholson qualified for the Winternationals but fell to the overwhelming number of Dodge and Plymouth entries. He became dominant on the match race circuit, however, and during one August stretch ran up a streak of 45 consecutive round-wins. Working with assistants Earl Wade and Dave McGrane, he perfected the SOHC 427 Hemi combination and became Ford's first Pro Stock winner with his victory at the 1971 Summernationals.
Nicholson switched to a 351-Cleveland small-block-powered Ford Pinto in 1972, and the move eventually rewarded him with three consecutive wins at the AHRA Winternationals and NHRA Winternationals and Gatornationals to open up the 1973 season.
He was runner-up at the 1974 U.S. Nationals and 1976 Summernationals as a warm-up to his championship campaign of 1977. He won the Gatornationals, Springnationals, and U.S. Nationals in five final-round appearances in 1977 to claim the Winston title.
Nicholson continued to campaign with his Ford entries through the 1980 season. He made a comeback effort in 1984 with an Oldsmobile before retiring from Pro Stock at age 57. In 1988, however, he returned to drag racing with a nostalgia version of his 7.5-second, 152-mph Chevy Bel Air, and he made a brief attempt in Pro Stock Truck competition in 1998 and 1999.
Nicholson earned the Car Craft All-star Drag Racing Team Ollie Award in 1977 and was Funny Car Driver of the Year in 1967. He has been inducted into the International Drag Racing Hall of Fame in Ocala, Fla., and the Motorsports Hall of Fame in Novi, Mich. Nicholson was most recently honored as the grand marshal of the California Hot Rod Reunion in 1997.
A memorial celebration of Nicholson's life will be held Monday, Jan. 30, at The Wally Parks NHRA Motorsports Museum presented by the Automobile Club of Southern California in Pomona, Calif. Doors will open at 6 p.m. and the program will begin at 7 p.m. The event is open to the public.
In lieu of flowers, the Nicholson family has requested that donations be made either to the NHRA Musuem or to the Motorsports Hall of Fame in Novi, Mich.
R.I.P
