NHRA Drag Racing Royalty: Don Prudhomme Part II
8 months ago Racing Video
— THE STORY OF THE HOT WHEELS FUNNY CARS
— THE US ARMY GETS INVOLVED WITH MAJOR BACKING
— THE ORIGINAL HAULER TRUCKS FOUND AND RESTORED
Snake was honored to be a part, a permanent part, of the San Diego Automotive Museum (located in the beautiful Balboa Park region of the city). Museum CEO Lenny Leszczynski did the introduction and it was a fun night for all that attended! It’s a great thing to see this recognition of Don Prudhomme inside the museum, plus the exhibit adds exposure to the NHRA drag racing scene for visitors: www.sdautomuseum.org.
ARMY ARROW WITH ORIGINAL CREW CHIEF
One of the invited guests at the special Snake Exhibit opening party at the SDAM was his long-time crew chief Bob Brandt, who was an important part of the team during the championship Funny Car era. After the party, he talked about how well the Plymouth Arrow cars performed. He cited both the clutch management and fuel systems as being key to their total domination of the class – oh and also that there was a very good driver!
HOT WHEELS BARRACUDA
Don Prudhomme had heard about Hot Wheels toys from Mattel from his friend Tom McEwen. “I can still remember the first time McEwen mentioned Mattel to me,” Don wrote in his recent “My Life Beyond the 1320” autobiography book. “I was hanging out at Keith Black’s…I didn’t even know what he was talking about, I didn’t know about toys, but he had kids, they were into Hot Wheels.”
Snake didn’t at that time, in 1969, even think about going outside oil and cam companies to look for sponsorship. “I was doing fairly well, I was getting some good money from Wynn’s and getting a little more from Plymouth.” After a few meetings with the Mattel people, McEwen was really getting things rolling for a two-car “Snake and Mongoose” partnership.
“I thought McEwen was talking about dragsters, but they wanted Funny Cars,” recalled Prudhomme. Tom had run a Barracuda Funny Car in 1969 and Keith Black had relationships with both Dodge and Plymouth. Plus, Snake ran a 426 HEMI® engine in his ’69 Top Fuel Dragster, all leading them to Chrysler as the choice for the bodies of these Hot Wheels Funny Cars.
“It could’ve been any cars,” Prudhomme shared in the book. “But we had the relationship with [Chrysler’s Dick] Maxwell. They drew up these images once they knew what kinds of cars we wanted. It was a Barracuda and a Duster. We took those drawings to Plymouth and showed them what Hot Wheels was going to do. And immediately, they wanted their name on the quarter panel of the cars because their name would be on all the little toy cars Hot Wheels produced. Plymouth would be a part of that, and they paid us money and gave us cars to drive.”
With an Exhibition Engineering (Ron Scrima) chassis on a 118-inch wheelbase, the brand-new 1970 “Hot Wheels” Barracuda Funny Car was a high-dollar effort with numerous associate sponsors. A Keith Black HEMI engine with 6-71 supercharger was used, along with a B&M-modified TorqueFlite® automatic transmission. Prudhomme is on record that he never liked the car and it was very uncomfortable to drive, very cramped and awkward.
ORIGINAL ART FROM LARRY WOOD
When Larry Wood started working at Mattel in 1969 soon after he was given the assignment for coming up with the “Snake and Mongoose” Hot Wheels car designs for the upcoming 1970 selling season. Here’s the original Barracuda design he penned, which included a roof-mounted spoiler which proved to be a terrible aerodynamic addition…these were the early days of learning what works and what doesn’t work!
It was all about selling the 1/65th scale, 2.95-inch long Hot Wheels cars, and they featured “flip-top” bodies to add some realism on the yellow Snake ‘Cuda and red “Mongoose” Duster – they sold millions over the years!
LONG -LASTING MEDIA SENSATION FOR PLYMOUTH
Not happy with the original 1970 Barracuda Hot Wheels Funny Car (with its automatic transmission), Prudhomme commissioned John Buttera to build a more serious car, incorporating a narrow chassis, featuring a dragster-type roll cage, racing transmission, independent coil-over front suspension. It also ran on a 118-inch wheelbase, and in this photo, it has a 1971 grille painted on and “Keith Black Racing Engines” markings on the sides.
2017 saw the full-restored 1972 “Snake II’ ‘Cuda go through the Barrett-Jackson auction, selling for $220,000, a car that he drove back in the day to its top speed of 226 mph. He also ran the car on the AHRA (American Hot Rod Association) circuit besides NHRA, plus of course the match races with Mongoose’s Hot Wheels Duster.
BIG WIN AT INDY FOR ’73
Carefree Sugarless Gum joined in the sponsorship group for 1973, Snake’s Barracuda won the U.S. Nationals with it and it was a quick car, running a 6.27 at that race on the way to seeing victory at Indianapolis.
BRING IN THE ARMY
It was his friend and part-time agent Bob Kachler who helped him put together the lucrative Army sponsorship starting in 1974. This Barracuda won the Gatornationals with a 6.38 time at 225 mph, and also won the US Nationals at Indy running a 6.33 ET at 222.32 mph. With the “ARMY” lettering on the sides of his cars through the end of the 1980 season, this sponsorship program remains as one of the most dominating stretches in drag racing history.
PLYMOUTH ARROW BODY WAS A HIT FROM THE GET-GO
At its debut event, the 1977 NHRA Winternationals at Pomona, the brand-new ARMY Arrow qualified #1 with a 6.14 at 240.64 mph run, and won the event with an even better 6.03-second run at an amazing (at the time) 247.25 mph top-end charge. Slippery, yes, that new Arrow body. Besides winning on the track it was also featured in national advertising campaigns.
UPDATED WITH DODGE OMNI BODY
Switching to a new car for 1980 with a Dodge Omni body shell, and on the last year of the US Army deal, Snake saw victory at both the NHRA Gatornationals and the NHRA Summernationals.
While the 1981 car had a bold, bright, new “Pepsi Challenger” paint scheme, this was not a favorite car for Prudhomme, and while he did pick up two national event titles with it (Grandnationals, Summernationals), the car blew up, crashed and burned to the ground in one of the worst Funny Car fires of all-time during the end of a run at the OCIR track where the World Finals event had taken place.
It was the 35th Anniversary of Hot Wheels and to commemorate the occasion, on July 8, 2005, there was a special gathering and reception in Pomona highlighting “Snake and Mongoose” being in attendance, complete with the 1/25th scale models that matched the 1:1 cars in the background!
THE MOVIE ABOUT DON AND TOM
Don on the set of the movie with Jesse Williams (left) who played him, and Richard Blake to played Tom McEwen. Prudhomme supplied the Funny Cars used in the story (‘Cuda, Duster, Arrow) and both (Snake and Mongoose) Dodge ramp trucks for the film.
THE RIGS AND MOVIE CARS ON THE AUCTION BLOCK
In January 2014, with the two Dodge D700 Crew Cab truck car haulers and the Hot Wheels Funny Cars from the movie, the combo ran through the Barrett-Jackson Classic Car Auction, and with Don himself driving the Hot Wheels ’70 ‘Cuda into the tent and on up to the auction block. With Snake & Mongoose movie producer Robin Broidy in attendance (behind holding cell phone camera), long-time nitro wrench Donnie Couch (left-rear quarter panel) and Snake’s long-time friend Roland Leong standing alongside at the front of the car, it was an exciting moment! Yes, loud, 85-percent nitro and Prudhomme at the controls…historical car and historical moment! Bidding hit one million dollars, shy of the reserve. The four vehicles were then purchased for an undisclosed sum by NASCAR team owner Rick Hendrick.
DRAG RACING WAS VERY GOOD FOR THE SNAKE
In Don Prudhomme’s words: “I had the dream of becoming something and didn’t have much of an education and didn’t really realize at the time how important it was to me. I found my niche in drag racing.”
SNAKE’S THOUGHTS ON TOM MCEWEN
“McEwen was a real good friend in the early days and we hung out a lot together. But then we got involved in a business situation and I was probably the worst partner to have because I was really a really hot-headed guy. He was more laid-back but business-oriented. He’s the guy who took the Snake and Mongoose names and got them out there with Hot Wheels. He was the one who put that together. He’s a guy who’s done a tremendous amount for the sport.”
PRUDHOMME ON THE PLYMOUTH ARROW FUNNY CARS
“The ARMY car, a Plymouth Arrow, that was probably my best car. They (Funny Cars) were harder to drive (than a Top Fuel car) but more fun because it’s a short-wheelbase car and you’re sitting right behind the engine and with the closed aerodynamic body on the car, it was just more fun to drive.”
Here’s Snake driving the Dodge D700 one last time prior to it arriving at Barrett-Jackson:
Author: James Maxwell
