Legendary chassisman Tommy Mauney had just constructed a trio of Chevy Lumina Pro Mods, and by“ Pro Mods” I mean these were the Funny Car bodies he took and cut out some doors, making them“ legal” to run in Pro Modified. Of course, this only lasted for a single season, as IHRA quickly revised the rulebook for 1993.

But it was on this particular weekend at Greer Dragway that I got my first look at these radical Funny Car-bodied“ doorslammers” from Mauney’ s TM Race Cars shop, located in Spartanburg... roughly a half-hour east of Greer. Mauney built one for himself, and the other two went to Michael Martin and Scotty Cannon, respectively, with Cannon winning the IHRA world championship with his.

Thirty-five years ago, I also began writing a weekly drag racing column and took photos for my local newspaper, so I always kept rolls of black-and-white film handy for my newspaper job. I had to dig deep into the archives for this month’ s column photo of Cannon roasting the tires at Greer on that fateful day back in 1992. This photo first appeared in my local newspaper

, the Lenoir News Topic, more than three decades ago. A few years after this pic was snapped, Mauney and Cannon returned to Greer – driving more traditional-looking Pro Mods – for a Saturday night match race, and you could hardly walk for all the spectators!

Many of the early Pro Mod racers on the East Coast honed their skills at Greer, and when Cannon went NHRA Funny Car racing in the late 1990s, he even brought his nitro flopper to Greer to dazzle the fans! The quality of talented racers that came out of this smalltown dragstrip has always been impressive, but there was this one particular season in the 1990s where five IHRA world champions were Greer regulars. Going back further, Gene Fulton raced here often with his Modified Corvette, and also his famous 1964 Chevy II wagon.

Mike Greer began racing here in the 1970s before going to work for the track in 1988, and then wound up buying the place a number of years later.

Throughout the track’ s 67-year

history, there’ s been many memorable happenings here, including the first-ever Southeast Gassers event in 2011, which yielded seven cars for the inaugural event. From that gathering exploded a touring series that has topped over 100 periodcorrect race cars for a single event.

“ Bret Kepner was announcing for us at our gasser events, and one time he called me several weeks before the event and asked if the name‘ Norman Peace’ rang a bell,” recalls Greer. Mike didn’ t know the fellow, but Kepner being the historian that he is, dug through all sorts of information until he found out who won the very first race at Greer Dragway in 1958, which was, of course, Norman Peace.

“ So, Bret says to me,‘ How cool would it be to track down Norman and invite him to the gasser race?’” So, Mike and a few others went to work with the mission of tracking down Mr. Peace, which they did, and he gladly accepted their invitation of being the guest of honor.“ Bret interviewed him on the starting line,” Greer says,“ and it absolutely made

Norman’ s day!”

While old-school events like these are right up Mike’ s alley, he’ ll still experiment with new trends. In fact, there’ s a 5.30 index race on the 2025 schedule for the first time.“ Them boys run first round right off the trailer without a practice run, and we don’ t give them a time slip all day... I couldn’ t have imagined such a thing a few years ago!” laughs Mike. Neither could he have envisioned street cars taking a 20-30-mile trip around town before returning to the track and ripping off 4-second-zone runs!

The track has long been a hotbed for competitive bracket racing and that hasn’ t changed, with nine WDRA points races on the schedule. Even the famous Turkey Trot race is now in its 51st running, albeit with a few scheduling changes over the years.“ We used to run it on Thanksgiving Day,” Greer says,“ but we were getting some pushback from the county, so we started having it on either the Saturday before or the Saturday after Thanksgiving. Then, as I got older and realized I didn’ t really like the cold, we moved it to October!”

Mike turns 70 this year, but tells me he’ s not ready to retire just yet. But when he is, he’ s got every confidence in his daughter, Alisha Alexander, who grew up racing here and can pretty much run the place with the best of them.

My list of visited dragstrips is holding steady at 167 for the moment, and in chronological order, Greer Dragway comes in at roughly the seventh track I ever stepped foot on. My memories here are fond ones, and it’ s always a pleasure to check back in and enjoy a Saturday at this legendary hangout that has so much history. DI