Dirt
Frankie Taylor topping PDRA Pro
Extreme competition once again
By Lisa Collier
rankie “Mad Man” Taylor has been
in a self-proclaimed slump lately, but
with a runner up at the PDRA Texas
Nationals, followed by a win at the
PDRA Summer Drags, he seems to be rising
quickly back to the top of NAS Racing Pro Extreme competition.
in points, which is our best points position in
PDRA so far.”
Owner of Taylor Automotive in Dickinson,
Texas, Taylor still holds the quarter-mile blown,
full-bodied outlaw record at 5.47 at almost 264
miles per hour. Although he’s confident he could
go even faster with the knowledge he has gained
since setting the record in 2014, for now his focus remains beating the best in the world on the
eighth-mile.
“When we come out at Budds Creek it won’t
have the same gear, compression ratios, camshaft,”
“I’m adamant on getting the record back,” explains the Mad Man, who has held the PX record
at 3.65, 3.62, 3.59 and 3.58 seconds. “Competing
with the best means you have to beat the best. In
Michigan, we did just that, beating Jason Scruggs
and Brandon Snider on hole shots and turning
on the win light. Doing so put us number three
Taylor continues. “We’ll build
one motor back the same as
our usual setup, and the
other will be different. We
are trying to figure out what
Scruggs and Snider are doing to run big speed like
they are, without doing a lockup. A long time ago
with a clutch we went 204 without a lockup. It’s
kinda fun to do something different. Everybody
else is going to a lockup or that Liberty deal and
that’s just a lot of money. We just keep working on
our old stuff, trying to get it right. They showed
F
us it could be done. We just gotta go do work
now. Maybe we can repeat some of that stuff we
had back in 2010 where we had a good year and
ended up winning the championship. It would be
fun and rewarding for my whole team to do that.
A low budget team racing against these people
that have millions of dollars and unlimited funds
is quite phenomenal. Although, I do spend a lot
of money doing this stuff. I just don’t spend the
money they do.”
Taylor’s shoestring budget forces him to rely
on innovation to stay competitive. He’ll sell old
parts off his race car in order to buy new ones,
fix what can be fixed instead of replacing it, and
work on perfecting current technology before
delving into new.
Although the Mad Man is thrifty in comparison
to other professional racers, he is also aided by
partners that help makes his operation competitive. “We’ve got great people like Snap-On’s Benjy
Lapp, my wife Cindy, Andrew Alepa, Renegade
Oil and Fuel, Larry Jeffers Race Cars, my brother
and Crew Chief Paul, Jeremy Parsley, my daughter
Emily, and my son Scottie.”
Everyone knows Frankie Taylor as “Mad Man”
and it’s quite easy to see how the name fits. His
Texas drawl can run a mile a minute and no matter what he does, he’s all in. His driving style is
more never-say-die than play-it-safe. He’s bold
enough to try anything and likes to crisscross
the line of knowing when to quit. He once match
raced Scott Palmer’s Top Fuel Dragster in his
Larry Jeffers Corvette - and won. Still, the story
of how his nickname came to be might just be
one of the best Frankie Taylor stories that have
come out of his 26-years of racing.
“It was at a Super Chevy Show, back a long, long
time ago, back when I
was a nitrous racer,” Taylor tells the story, circa
1994. “We actually shook
the doors off of it and
busted out a window. We
put a piece of cardboard
in the window. When
we did that somebody
wrote ‘Mad Man’ across
the entire door. We proceeded to go 199 miles
per hour the next pass.
They didn’t catch it until
after we made the pass. So yeah we got in trouble.
After that, ‘Mad Man’ just stuck.”
Frankie “Mad Man” Taylor currently sits third
in NAS Racing Pro Extreme points behind Jason Scruggs and Brandon Snider, who currently
holds the elapsed time record at 3.486. Taylor
will have his work cut out for him in taking back
the record and championing the PDRA’s quickest
and fastest category, but with a larger-than-life
personality, stubborn determination and perhaps
a little streak of crazy, the Mad Man might just
have what it takes.
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46 | D r a g
I l l u s t r a t e d | DragIllustrated.com
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Issue 111
PHOTOS: JOE MCHUGH, DRAG ILLUSTRATED ARCHIVES
Small Budget; Big Personality