Mason Dixon Dragway, Rocking Chair Nationals – When you go to a nostalgia drag racing event, you can be sure you’ll find some vintage iron there on display and also on the track. One of those cars that make you sit up and take notice is the red metalflake competition coupe of Dale Broderick. He’s been racing this car for awhile, and shared that he’s raced it at such notable tracks as Englishtown, Indy, Bowling Green, Atco, Cecil County, Budds Creek, Capital, Colonial Beach, VMP, and of course, Mason Dixon Dragway where we’re at today. The small-block powered hot rod has durable engine with solid components that keeps it on the track. Of course, being “Jack-Approved” doesn’t hurt, either. When a car gets around like that, raced by the same guy, you know there’s a special connection between the car and driver. It’s time to learn how this story all began.

According to Dale, “It goes back aways, 28 years ago, me and a buddy of mine, we’re looking for an old car to fool with because we always fooled with old cars. There was a car at the DC armory called “Little Stinker” run by a guy named [Linwood] Buddy Morris. I helped do some paint work on it back in the early 80s and then, you know, got into other stuff. We found out that the car was in Virginia, we didn’t know where, so we kind of gave up. We’re going through old Hot Rod magazines and I saw a ‘50 Austin in there with a Douglas Speed Sport decal, and I said ‘let me call them and find out about that car.’ I called them and said ‘Let me speak to the oldest guy there.’ “

The ”oldest guy there” was able to aim Broderick towards the president of the Ramrods, who had control of the car. The next step of the journey came when a guy who Dale worked with had the phone number and Dale made the call. As Dale would tell it, “I called him and asked about the Austin and he said ‘we crashed that thing but a guy in our club has an old dragster just sitting in the back of the shop.’ “ This wouldn’t just be any old shop, but the one where the well-known alcohol dragster, the “Chicken Choker” was kept. Broderick and his friend went to look at it and as Dale recalls, “We got there it was just wheels, tires, and a chassis. The chrome work was pretty nice on it. No motor, no tranny,  I said ‘Well, I’ll ask my buddy and let my buddy think about it for a couple days.’”

After some thought, Broderick’s friend decided to pass on the car, but Dale decided to buy it for himself, returning the next week and paying $2300 for it. Not a bad price considering the included wheels were real Halibrands!

Now it was time to find parts to bring the car to life, and that’s when this story takes a turn. As Dale recalls, “I went to a car show and from here to that wood line (Dale points to a wood line not too far away) I see this little altered, the one we were originally looking for sitting on a trailer and I knew right away what it was. It had a 6-cylinder Ford in it, it’s cool, and I needed parts, so I went over to him said ‘Man I’ve been looking for this car. Where in Virginia do you live? He says, ‘Well Do you know where Calhoun Speed is? I said, ‘Yeah I’m about 12 miles from Calhoun speed’ and he says ‘I live in a neighborhood behind there’ so the whole time it is within 12-15 miles of the house.” Broderick ended up buying the car he was after $1800, including the helmet and the fuel mask.

When it became time to make this car all his own, Dale, a self-professed metalflake nut, took the ’48 Fiat body and covered it with the red metalflake/lace design you see today. It’s a true testimony to the quality of work Broderick does to see this 28 year old paint job looking like it’s brand new right before your eyes.

That pretty much covers the story of the car, but what of Dale’s pit crew? No matter how much you enjoy the visual spectacle of this car and his burnouts, you can’t help but notice the capable young lady who backs him up into the groove at the starting line. There’s a pretty good story there, too!

As for how long his wife, Lisa, has been his pit crew, Dale recalls, “We’ve been doing for that for maybe five years. We got engaged at Indy on the big screen. Not many people can say that. Judy [Bear] set that up for us when we were at Indy one year for the Hot Rod Junction.”   

Lisa remembers how it started for her as she reminisced how the Gore family and Eastside Speedway played a part in how she got interested in this life she now lives, “That was my home track. I’d been going there since I was a teenager and I used to work at the track I was on the clean-up truck and then I was up in the drag tower every Friday night Sunday and I just grew up in it. Dickey [Gore] just let me in free and let me hang out in the tower and do whatever I needed to do and when one of the girls wasn’t available at the drag tower to do the time slips, they were handwritten time slips back then, I filled in for her and Dickey actually paid me to do that. It was a blessed time in my life.

As for how they actually met, Dale explains, “We met at Mr Gore’s birthday party, maybe it was the 100^th.”

Lisa would add to that saying, “Yeah, we met there, and we’re just talking then, you know we weren’t seeing each other, but I knew who he was and I just went up and talked to him about racing and stuff. I remember when we pulled into the parking lot for the Gore’s party, his truck was sitting there and I thought ‘What a cool looking car,’ and so we just start talking. I think I first backed him up at VMP and I never backed up a race car before in my life and so I thought, ‘okay, I hope I do this right.’

She obviously did it right, as Dale would add, “She does it all. She tows me to the start line. She starts the car. She gets me dressed (to which Lisa would explain, “You can’t you can’t get dressed outside the car he’s got to get dressed in the car you know, the jacket, helmet, and all that stuff.”). She comes down and picks me up.”

The next time you see these guys at the track, take a moment to ponder just how this car not only lasted for 28 years, it was responsible for bringing together a great couple. Head on out to the drag strip and watch this car go down the track with its’ capable pilot and backup girl. Maybe you can catch some of the same magic they’ve found.

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