4/2/2007
Mopar Max’s resident Mopar racer and Tech guru is in the process of doing an interview with Russ Flagle, the owner of Indy Cylinder Head service and one of the seminal figures in the world of Mopar performance but the Jockster is currently on the road and his interview should show up sometime this week in the meantime we are going to run an edited version of an interview we did with famous Mopar team owner and tune Austin Coil which ran in our sister publication Drag Racing Online. Ed Note
Austin Coil’s position as the premier tuner of nitro funny cars is unquestioned. His accomplishments as John Force’s crew chief and tuner alone qualifies him for that honor, but Austin Coil made his mark as a fuel coupe tuner and car owner of Hemi-powered doorslammers and Funny Cars way before his career with John Force. He was one of the owners and the tuner of the legendary Chi-Town Hustler that won IHRA World Championships in the early ‘70’s with Ron Colson and Pete Williams driving. And the ’82 and ’83 NHRA Funny Car Championship with Frank Hawley between the pipes. They opened the 1982 season by winning the first three NHRA races of the year and went on to win the Winston World Championship plus the Big Bud Shootout at the U.S. Nationals. They also opened the 1983 season with three straight victories and also won the Winston World Championship that year.
Coil’s Mopar career began as a line mechanic at a Mopar Dealer and progressed to him owning and driving his own Hemi-powered Super Stocker as well as a driving the Chi-Town Hustler at a couple of races.
MM:: Give us a little history about your career: How you got started in drag racing, the first car you had and the first race you want to.
Austin Coil: Well, let's see. I was a dealer mechanic back in the '60s ( Park Chrysler-Plymouth in Chicago) . The first time I can remember going to a drag strip was shortly after I'd gotten my driver's license and had a car and a weekend with nothing to do. I drove out to the drag strip (Union Grove, WI) near Chicago and looked at the racing going on and I
came to find out that it was the last Sunday of the year the track was open before closing for the winter. But I thought, This looks like this would be really fun.
So, over the winter I put a car together. It was a '55 Chevy with a 348 big block Chevy in it and it ran in C-Gas. I went to the drag strip with it most Sundays the next year and just got creamed. I had no idea what I was doing and running in C/G was a pretty tough bill. After a year of that I have to admit I learned quite a bit and picked the pace of the car up nearly 2 seconds from when I started with it. During the following couple of years (1964-65) I ran a variety of “N.A.D.S.” , (National Association of Drag Strips) stocker classes which were somewhat modified cars and also ran Stock eliminator. I won a room full of trophies and had a little fun. Then in 1966 I bought myself a stick shift Hemi Mopar to run in AFX class.
