“Who’s running?”
Shane started rattling off teams and names. As Conn worked on the engine with Shane, he glanced around the airstrip. Lancaster’s airport was basically for small planes, a skydiving school, and the occasional weekday commuter flight to Chicago or Pittsburgh. The weekend hobby pilots had an amicable relationship with the drag racing association. Occasionally they had to clear a taxi strip of cars finished with their runs so a private plane could land, but the announcer kept his ear tuned to the air traffic and just about anyone who flew in and out of the airstrip on a regular basis had the announcer’s cell phone. On one memorable occasion they’d had an engine-failure emergency landing, but as there was always a fire engine and ambulance on standby; a good chunk of the racers were off-duty firefighters, cops, or EMTs; and the cars were all designed to go very fast, very quickly, the crisis went like a textbook training exercise.
Between making adjustments to the fuel pump, he looked around the airstrip, seeing it through Cady’s eyes. A taxi strip flanked either side of the main runway; Conn, Shane, and Cady and the rest of Team McCool, along with the crews for the other cars were arrayed in a kind of pit row along the one closest to the airfield entrance while cars that had finished their runs cruised back to the pit along the other. Cars lined up to make their runs at the near end of the runway before rolling up the staging lanes to the burnout strip. Two cars revved their engines on the burnout strip, warming up their tires, sending the smell of hot rubber into the air.
He and Shane both stopped to watch the run. The cars roared down the track, engines revving into a high whine. Ten seconds, give or take—races won or lost in hundredths of a second. It was a sport of reflexes and speed, reputations solidified and legends made on less time than it took to blink. When they’d made the final adjustments, Conn rummaged through the trailer for his safety jacket and helmet.
“I’ve got that,” Cady said.
He looked over at her and found his jacket draped over her legs. “I’ll swap you,” he said, and shrugged out of his jacket. “Sure you’re not too cold?”
“Not at all.”
He zipped up the jacket and plucked his helmet from her outstretched hand. “Thanks. You don’t have to watch or anything,” he said. “Grab some tea. They’ve got portable heaters inside the hanger.”
“I wouldn’t miss this for anything,” she said. “It’s a dial-in night, right?”
“Yes,” he said.
Some races were straight head-to-head competitions, but Conn wasn’t here to race kids in their souped-up street cars. He was racing a time. 9.99 seconds. That was his dad’s best time in the ZL1. In dial-in, the focus was on the driver’s performance, the starts adjusted so that, theoretically, the cars would cross the finish line at the same time. It rewarded both the driver and the car’s consistency, not who had the most cash to buy the newest, best equipment. It was all about driver skill.
“What did you dial-in?” she asked, peering at the slip of paper in his hand.
“Nine point nine-nine.”
His dad’s best time. Conn had never broken ten seconds. A 9.99 finish would tie him with his father. Nine point nine-eight or faster would mean he’d “broken out”; he’d be disqualified from the race, but would’ve beaten his dad’s time.
Still carrying his jacket, Cady kept pace beside the ZL1 until he turned right to get in line for his run and she turned left to find a spot in the bleachers. They weren’t crowded, only family members, girlfriends, and die-hard fans willing to sit on backless metal bleachers in this weather. Cady got a good seat on the first row and draped his jacket over her knees again. She was looking around with interest, taking in the Christmas-tree starting system, the interval timers, the speed traps used to calculate top speed.
Shit. This was a stupid idea, leaving her protected only by her anonymity while he raced down a demon he’d never beat.
He rolled forward a few feet to prestaging, as another pair of cars left the line. Burn the tires to warm them up, roll to the starting line, watch the amber lights on the Christmas tree flash down in half-second increments. At the last one, he floored the accelerator and shot down the track. The bleachers passed in a blur. All he heard was the engine and his own breathing as he focused on a fast, clean run. Shit. He mistimed the shift from third to fourth! The GT beat him to the line, but in handicap racing all that mattered was staying under your time.