FEATURE - From the Tower by Bob Frey

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Thu, 5 Jun 2003, 07:51 PM

Things Could Get Interesting In Division 5

By Bob Frey

Brand does a burnout.

For years the Division 5 Top Alcohol Funny Car championship belonged to Vern Moats. The gritty veteran had won the title so many years that they thought about naming it after him. OK, so that’s a bit of a stretch, but when you are the main guy for fifteen years it certainly seems like nobody else is winning anything in the division. Of course, lately, guys like Kirk Williams, Cy Chesterman and Randy Fleming have taken their turn at the top and now the division seems to be about as wide open as ever. As the heart of the drag racing season gets underway and with the addition of a new player in the field, 2003 should be the most exciting year in a while in the land of the “high and mighty.”

Dale Brand is the latest guy to throw his helmet into the battle for the D-5 championship, and based on what he did on the IHRA trail, which includes five national event wins and a national record and a third place finish in the standings, the other competitors should take this challenge seriously. “We ran well over there,” Dale said, “and then decided to come and run on the NHRA tour. It’s something I’ve always wanted to do.” Dale began thinking about competing on the NHRA circuit years ago after he attended his first national event, the inaugural race at Heartland Park Topeka in 1989 and fourteen years later he was making his first serious effort at an NHRA race at that very same track. Dale competed at the O’Reilly Summernationals a few weeks ago and the end result was a very strong number six qualifying spot. Although that was followed up by a disappointing first round loss Dale was still pleased with his showing. “We ran so well in qualifying and thought we could step it up on race day, but we just missed the call,” Dale said. “We’ll know better next time. We have to learn every time we go out there if we want to compete at this level.”

Cory checks out engine during warm up.
When Dale talks about “we” he basically means everyone in his family. His wife, Tana, and two boys, Eric and Cory, are all vital parts of the team. “Eric acts as the crew chief when we’re at the track and Cory does a lot of the work on the car. It’s a great way to spend time with the family.” The guy who used to race a Zeeker-chassied Dodge Daytona in the bracket classes now has the best of everything and he intends to approach his racing the same way that he does his business, Co-Line Metal Stamping. “We started out very small in the business back in 1979 and we’ve grown it into a company that serves the automobile, recreational, agricultural and industrial fields.” Now operating from a 125,000 square foot facility in Sully, Iowa, Co-Line specializes in metal stamping and fabrication as well as tool and die manufacturing. “Both our business and our racing have come a long way and we intend to make both things better in the years ahead.”

Eric is crew chief.
Dale began bracket racing several years ago with a ’69 Dodge Charger with a 440 cubic inch engine. He ran a couple of divisional races with it but mainly campaigned it at the local tracks in and around his home town. >From there he stepped up to the IHRA Funny Car ranks where he proceeded to set the national record in the class, but all along he knew that he wanted to compete with the top stars in the class on the NHRA circuit. “I enjoyed racing at the IHRA events and that gave me a great place to start, but all of the top drivers in the sport are here and I want to prove that I belong in that group,” he said. To that end he has purchased a new Pontiac bodied funny car and enlisted the talents on one of the best alcohol drivers / tuners in the sport to help him out. “We have a Brad Anderson combination in the car and Randy Anderson has been a huge help to us. We’ve learned a lot from him.” Randy was at the track in Topeka when Dale ran his 5.718 in qualifying and has been on the phone helping at other events. “We ran a 5.67 at the Division 3 points race in Joliet and that showed us that we can run with the big guys.” Now all he needs to do is get the consistency that comes with experience and Dale could be a real factor in the class.

Dale prepares to warm the car.
When I walked up to his car, I saw the word “Rail” printed on the side of the driver’s window. Based on that I expected to see a guy who was built like, well, me, but Dale Brand is anything but that. “As a child I was kind of skinny and I got the name ‘Rail’ a long time ago and it kind of stuck,” Dale said. With the name “Rail,” you would almost expect to find a guy who wanted to run a dragster, but Dale said that he has always had his sights set on a funny car. “After I watched my first race back in ’89 I said that I wanted to be running a really competitive car by the time I was forty,” he said. “I missed by a few years, but not by much.” You can’t blame a guy who has taken a business from a 1,000 foot shop that specialized in locks for animal yards to its present state for missing his racing goals by a few years, can you? “The business has gone very well and it’s enabled us to do this at the level we want,” Dale said. And that level is at the top of the pack in the alcohol funny car class.

Dale Brand has yet to win an NHRA event, either national or divisional, but anyone who knows him knows that it’s just a matter of time. Everything that he has been involved with has been a success, from his business to his IHRA racing career and there’s no reason to believe that his latest endeavor won’t follow suit. He’ll get a chance this weekend with the Division 5 race in Brainerd, Minnesota, where he’ll get a severe test from Mr. Moats and all of the other D-5 hitters. “We just want to make a nice showing and prove to everyone that we can compete at this level,” he said. If he does, things could get very interesting in Division 5 very soon.