Tom Bailey Claims the 2023 America’s Fastest Street Car Title

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For the second straight year and the sixth time in HOT ROD Drag Week Presented by Gear Vendors Overdrive history, Tom Bailey has been crowned with America's Fastest Street Car title by capturing the Overall win, in addition to winning the Unlimited category. His impressive accomplishments put him at the top of the list for the most Overall wins, a title he shared with Larry Larson for a year.

Bailey completed the week by posting a 6.7149 average over the five-day, nearly 1,000-mile road trip, visiting tracks in South Carolina, North Carolina, and Tennessee.

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The pathway to the HOT ROD Drag Week victory was one filled with plenty of bumps in the roadway, figuratively and literally. Bailey's pre-event testing could've gone better, the first problem being breaking a pair of exhaust valves three days before he planned to get on the road to South Carolina. The repairs were easy, and he got back on track on Thursday so he could knock the dust off his beloved Sick Seconds 1.0. That is when a larger problem reared its ugly head. The Chevy engine spun a few rod bearings, a normal maintenance item that Bailey admitted they should've changed but didn't.

Related: America's Fastest Street Car Winner 2022

It took 24 hours to get the engine repaired and installed in Sick Seconds 1.0, the 1969 Chevy Camaro that Bailey drove to win his first Drag Week back in 2013. In fact, it is the tenth anniversary of that win, the reason Bailey put this car back in service. He last ran this Camaro at a Mid-West Drags event in 2020 and at Roadkill Nights. The team hit the road to Darlington Dragway a few hours later than planned, but rolled in Sunday morning with plenty of time to make tech.

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The opening day of competition turned out to be a race against the track surface. Bailey aborted a few runs before getting it together late in the day. The twin-turbocharged Camaro blasted off to a 6.75 at 203 mph, allowing Bailey and Steve Morris to hit the road north to Rockingham Dragway. Normally it is a short 60-mile drive, however, HOT ROD officials designed a 175-mile route. Day two solidified Bailey as the leader when he unleashed his best run of the week, a 6.54 at 215 mph, making it look easy compared to his opening salvo of runs just 24 hours earlier.

The third day brought the traveling drag racing circuit to Thunder Valley Dragway in Tennessee. The facility is one of the nicest tracks on the NHRA pro tour, but Bailey couldn't unleash everything he has under the hood because of a broken wheelie-bar. It wasn't critical, but they couldn't get after it as hard as the car is capable of running. The team collected a piece of paper that reads 6.77 at 200 mph and hit the road.

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The wheelie-bar repair was just one of two problems that Bailey and Morris needed to fix. An unusual sound on the road tour prompted the team to check the valvetrain and find four stuck exhaust valves. Morris, who doubles as co-pilot, had the parts in the utility trailer but lacked the specialty valvespring compressor tool. A call to Stevie "Fast" Jackson, a prominent NHRA Pro Mod racer who was local, netted the tools needed to handle the fix in their hotel's parking lot. The night ended at 4 a.m. with the big-block Chevy ready for action and one more drive later that day.

Carolina Dragway, known by the locals as House of Hook, lived up to its name for many of the racers, allowing them to run their quickest runs of the week. Bailey decided to make one run and move down the road back to Darlington Dragway; his strategy was to minimize wear-and-tear on the parts, and simply stay ahead of the competition, namely Bryant Goldstone who was ranked second in the Overall rankings. Sick Seconds 1.0 worked its way down-track effortlessly, and the chutes blossomed early as the scoreboard showed 6.80 at just 182 mph. It moved Bailey's four-day average to 6.7177, nearly solidifying his leader position heading into the final day of competition.

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The sun rose on Darlington Dragway as Sick Second 1.0 sat silent at the hotel, Bailey dreaming of his unprecedented sixth Overall title that was within his reach. He made just one run to put his stamp of approval on his 2023 efforts. The first result was a 6.704, solidifying his 6.7149 average and locking up his Unlimited and Overall titles.

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