Mon, 10 Oct 2016, 16:33 PM Thanks Uncle Larry

By Bob Frey

Here I am with the FastNews crew. Rick Green behind me, Dave Gerard center and Larry far right.

I was talking on the phone the other day and when I got ready to hang up I said, "Ok, thanks Uncle Larry." Just as I did that Diana walked into the room and said, "Wow, after all these years that we've been married I never knew you had an Uncle Larry." When I told her that I didn't she said, "Well who was that and why did you call him Uncle Larry?" I told her that it was Larry Sullivan and I call him "Uncle" because it's better than calling him "that weird, old, cantankerous computer guy." Now don't get me wrong, when I say "weird" referring to Larry I mean it in the nicest, possible way, not like the "weird cat lady down the street who really is, well, weird (we all know a weird cat lady, don't we?). Anyway..

I've known Larry Sullivan for about twenty years and he has always been there to help me with any and all of my computer needs, and those who know me will tell you that those computer needs are many. For example, the first time I asked Larry to help me solve a computer problem he said, "Well, let's start with the basics. What kind of computer do you have?" When I said, "brown," he just laughed and said "this could take a while." And it did. But when we were through my problems were solved.for the time being. When I asked Larry how he knew so much about computers and he said "it's a lot of trial and a lot of errors." I knew about half of that and it wasn't the trial part.

To show you what Larry did for me let me go back about twenty years when I first decided to create files for every driver on the NHRA national event scene. I was working the television shows at that time and found it amazing that nobody could tell you what a certain driver's record was against another driver. Really! So I set out to create a file for every driver, and I did, and then after every race I would manually update each individual file. One day I was talking with Rick Green, Larry's partner in the Fast News Network (DragRaceCentral.com), the company that did all the on-line reporting of the NHRA national and divisional races. I told him that it was quite a job updating every file after every race. "Why don't you ask Larry to make a program for you that can do it automatically?" he said. "Larry can do that?" was my response. "Larry can do anything," Rick replied. So off I went to confront Uncle Larry with my latest problem. After I explained what I had in mind Larry just smiled and said, "This could take a while." And it did, about ten minutes. "See if this is what you are looking for," he said as he presented me with a file with all the drivers in it. And sure enough, it was.

Like every computer guy I know Larry was always thinking about how to create the better mousetrap. Even though they don't know him personally every racer who has gone down the track at an NHRA event for the past twenty years has Larry to thank for the on-line results that are posted at DragRaceCentral.com. Even the television folks at Fox Sports have Larry to thank for the stats that are provided to them every week. Larry has created files that show everything that a driver has done including all of his individual races, his head-to-head totals, every qualifying position and every low elapsed time and top speed he has ever recorded. As the expression goes "the list goes on" but suffice it to say that Larry has done more to bring our sport's reporting into the modern era than any other individual. Not bad for a guy who was often compared to one of the two old men sitting in the balcony on the Muppet's Show. Ok, so it was only Rick Green who referred to him as such (along with Larry's co-worker, Dave Gerard) but when you see a picture of Larry and the balcony guys I think you will agree that the resemblance is uncanny!

As I enjoy retirement I have had occasion to call on Larry to ask his advice and counsel when contemplating a new stat or a new file that I wanted to create. Often when I made a suggestion Larry would come back with his usual retort of "this could take a while." And when he did I knew I was in good hands. He never let me down.

Since around the first of the year Larry had been having some health problems and he wasn't able to go to the races like he had in the past. Still, I would reach out to him and we would talk for a while and then he would always say, "Ok, so what's your problem? Why did you really call?" He knew me so well. I'm glad to say that the last time we had that discussion I was able to tell him that I didn't have any problems and that I really just wanted to call to say hello, see how he was doing and thank him for everything he had done for me over the years. That call was on Monday of this past week, just a few days before he died.

Like it always does, life will go on now that Larry has passed, but believe me, it just won't be the same. I'll miss his infectious smile, his cranky attitude, his quick little barbs that he would throw at me when I asked what, for him, was a very elementary computer question, but most of all I'll miss his friendship. Larry helped me in so many ways and made me feel like a part of "the team" as he, Rick and the other great folks at DragRaceCentral did what they loved, and for that all I can say is "Thanks Uncle Larry."

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