Drag Illustrated Issue 113, September 2016 | Page 38
Dirt
lane was more textured than the left lane. They
did a good scrape but you still see more texture
in the right lane than the left lane. That is half
of the battle as to why so few cars went down the
right lane in Q1 and Q2.”
This kind of evaluation is critical as an event
progresses and Miglizzi uses a suite of tools to
give his team every advantage. He is not the only
track specialist on tour but observers can see him
continuously talking with other crew chiefs, track
workers, other driver or riders throughout the
day. They are swapping tips, observations and
opinions. All this information is recorded in a
spiral notebook that Miglizzi never puts down. It
is attached to his hip along with about 40 pounds
of equipment he uses to make constant measurements of track conditions. The job has stayed
the same, but the tools have definitely improved
his abilities.
“I used to lay on the ground to do my initial
evaluation of the depth of rubber. You would know
when the track was 80-degrees or 120- degrees
when you are laying on it. I actually switched
to the creeper at an event it was raining all the
time and the ground was wet. Now I use it all the
time and I can roll around and it actually shows
me how good the bond is on the track. If the
creeper is pulling up rubber when I am rolling
then I know the rubber doesn’t have a very good
bond,” says Miglizzi.
“I also use Traxxas radio controlled cars to
check for humps and dips. You don’t run them
fast you use them as a marker. The process has
been sped up by hours now. I think Bernie Fedderly was the first crew chief to use a temperature
gun. We used to just put our hand on the track
and see if it was cold or hot. One day Bernie has a
temp gun and everyone was like how dang simple
was that. Super smart,” adds Miglizzi.
Track evaluation is not a perfect science and
Mother Nature often throws a wrench into everyone’s plans. Miglizzi does pride himself on
getting the most accurate reads on the track and
passing that information on to the crew chiefs.
Seeing a JFR Camaro Funny Car blast down the
track in 3.8-seconds is always nice but most of
the time the conditions don’t cooperate to give
teams that option.
“The most satisfying part of my job is being
correct with my opinions. Sometimes it might
not be a successful run but thank goodness I was
correct in my evaluation. Out there we don’t even
want to be one gram off. One little washer could
be a gram and a half. Blue sky and five minutes
of clouds that is three grams or a cloudy day and
five minutes of blue sky is a couple three grams so
I can’t imagine being one gram off. Being correct
is the best thing,” sums up Miglizzi.
The veteran track expert does have some behind the wheel drag racing experience. A few
years ago he went through Frank Hawley’s Drag
Racing School since they were an L&T Clutch
customer. After a couple of aborted runs Hawley
suggested Miglizzi let loose and run his Funny Car
out to half-track. The experience was both eyeopening for the clutch expert and left a forever
memory for Miglizzi’s to remember when he is
passing along his track judgements.
“On the third run Hawley told me to just drive
it to 400-feet so I did. It felt like the stoutest
roller coaster that I have ever experienced. I was
shocked at how hard it was pulling. I thought I
was on a rocket but we looked at the video and
it looks like I left in third gear. It was pitifully
slow. I realized how awesome all the drivers are
because it felt like a rocket and it looked like a
slug,” confesses Miglizzi.
DI DI DI
DI DI DI DI
DI DI DI
38 | D r a g
I l l u s t r a t e d | DragIllustrated.com
Issue 113
PHOTOS: JOHN FORCE RACING
LANNY MIGLIZZI