The 1997 Run & Gun sponsored and promoted by Kit Car Illustrated .magazine drew 67 entrants from across the US and Canada. Cobra replicas dominated the three-day event, held July 30 through August 1st, with nearly 50 Snakes showing up. The event was held at the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course in Lexington, Ohio and at Dragway 42 outside West Salem, Ohio.
 A few of the many "Snakes" form
a snake line of their own while waiting for their turn to let
it loose on the drag strip. |
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 Nearly 50 Cobras turned out for the 1997
Run & Gun. Here the drivers are waiting patiently in their
respective lanes-- representing the different classes of cars--for
the drag racing to begin. |
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 Two Cobras run together at the road course.
During warmup laps the cars ran together but were not permitted
to pass, for safety reasons. During the timed runs, when drivers
had the track all to themselves, they had the opportunity to
run their cars at speed. |
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 This dazzling GT 40 looked a little out of
place on the drag strip on day one of the Run & Gun, but
the same car wowed the crowd the next day at the Mid Ohio road
course. |
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Mother nature cooperated with beautiful blue skies and temperatures in the mid-eighties. "Our goal," .according to Dean Hoskins of D&D Corvette, who assisted in choreographing the event,"was to put on a fun event and not kill anybody." The folks from D&D succeeded with only one slight accident marring the otherwise terrific event. Stacy Pendergrast of Austin, Texas, usually a hands-down favorite at past events, jammed his Cobra into the retaining tires on the last turn at the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course during his first timed run. Fortunately Stacy suffered no more than some sore muscle--and perhaps a bruised ego--but his car will require a new front end and a new steering wheel. Stacy says he bent the wheel with his hands when he hit the tires at nearly 70 mph!
Lauri Kallio of MidStates Cobras was a crowd favorite in his baby blue and white striped car that he drove all the way from his hometown of Hooper, Nebraska. Lauri's car sported the number 80, which also happens to be his age! Great guy!
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The biggest success story comes from Dennis Olthoff of Superformance Replicars in Salisbury, North Carolina. It seems that the Superformance car suffered some slight damage to the crankshaft during the drag racing event on Thursday. Dennis says that "we elected to not run the engine anymore so that we would not do any more harm to the block." Fortunately, Bill Parham of Southern Automotive was on hand with a spare small-block. The Superformance team, along with Bill, spent most of Thursday night in the parking lot of the motel pulling the old engine, swapping heads and intake manifold, dropping in the new block and buttoning up the car just in time to qualify on Friday and win the Street B road race and Top Dog Street Class!
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 Class A Street-Mike Staehler |
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| Class B Street-Jackie Nitler |
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| Class C Street-Neil Smalley |
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| Class D Street-Coley Brown |
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| Class A Pro-Rick Long |
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| Class B Pro-Greg Lapointe |
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| Quick 8 Street-Bob Self |
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| Quick 8 Pro-Greg Lapointe |
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| Class | First Place | Second Place |
| A Street | Mike McCann | Kieth Rohr |
| B Street | Dennis Olthoff | Matt Adams |
| C Street | Brian Washington | Neil Smalley |
| D Street | Coley Brown | not recorded |
| A Pro | Rick Long | Jim McCann |
| B Pro | Eric Noble | Lucas Rea |
Just today (18 August 1997) we received a detailed message from Contemporary Classic Motor Car Company (manufacturers of the Contemporary 427SC and 289FIA Cobras), that provided these additional details regarding Contemporary's remarkable showing at the event:
Top Dog Pro award: ..Rick Long, Contemporary 427SC
Drag Racing, Winner, Class A Street: Mike Staehler, Contemporary 427SC
Drag Racing, Winner, Class A Pro: Rick Long, Contemporary 427SC
Road Course, Winner, Class A Street: Mike McCann, Contemporary 427SC
Road Course, Winner, Class A Pro: Rick Long, Contemporary 427SC
Road Course, Runner-Up, Class A pro: Jim McCann, Contemporary 427SC
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