Page 17 has some good mickey thompson stories but most of the thread is authored by the reno racers who raced or worked on "blind man's bluff" which later became "critical mass".
Here's a funny story about them making an airboat with a hopped up corvair engine and putting it into the back of an engineless truck they pulled from weeds in the back so they could test it.
A mount was built and the engine was installed, there was plenty of ground clearance for the propeller, hanging off the rear of this old truck. We mounted a fuel tank, battery, etc, and we were ready to give it a test, so I called Mickey. He must have ran at full speed from his office to the race shop, because he was there in a flash, huffing and puffing. Man, this is the kind of thing that really turned him on! He conned Fritz Voight (sp) an old timer who had driven dragsters, and worked for Mickey to be , I guess you call it "designated driver", although there was no intention of driving this thing, just wanted someone to hold the brakes just in case this jury rigged thing tried to move. Mickey jumped up on the truck bed with a look of shear joy in his eyes. Jim Ward checked him out on the switches, starter button, and the hand throttle from an old Stearman or something. Mick fired it up, and it was running pretty good, but there was a serious vibration. He shut it down, and I told him that the prop wasn't tracking right. We pulled the prop through, measuring the tip from a point on the truck bed, and sure enough, it was off by just over a quarter of an inch. Somehow the machinist who made the prop hub had drilled the prop bolt holes off center. Ward and I wandered off to a local sandwich shop for some lunch, and when we got back the problem had been resolved, and Mick was ready to give it another shot. She lit right off and was running smooth. After the engine got a little heat in it Mick started jacking the throttle, really cranking up some RPM's. We had not given a thought to the fact that the prop was facing into the race shop, and the door was open, and parts and pieces were flying everywhere. We waved to Mick to shut the damned thing off. Since the old truck had no engine a bunch of onlookers pushed it out into the street. Fritz wasn't very happy with that situation because he knew Mickey, and knew that this was not a good omen. The Mick climbed aboard again, and lit it off and started giving her some throttle, and the old truck brakes wouldn't hold, it started creeping forward, and Mick just kept adding power. Fritz had no choice but to let off the brakes and try to steer the thing. Off they went, Mickey standing on the flat bed holding onto the motor mount and Fritz trying his best to miss parked cars, and disappeared around a corner. We could no longer see them, but could hear Mick getting off and off the throttle. Shortly we saw them go by, up at a cross street, and they disappeared again. This went on for 15 or 20 minutes, and we could hear Mick get off the throttle, and finally we saw them coming towards the race shop. Mick shut the Corvair off, and Fritz somehow had enough brakes to get it stopped. Mickey was smiling like a Cheshire cat, and poor ol' Fritz was steaming. He was mad enough to strangle Mick, but when he heard all of us cheering and yelling, he calmed down. He had survived a "Mickey Deal" and our cheering must have brought back old memories of his glory days of winning drag races. He fell into the mood of things and started strutting around with a big smile. "He was the hero of the day" again.
