Duane Ruhl – It takes a village!
“Struggles? One right after another! Fix one and onto the next…if it was easy everyone would be doing it!” – Duane Ruhl
“I am driving the 92 Ford Mustang that all of my friends bought for me after I lost my first car. A big water leak caused it to spin sideways just past half track, about 150 mph, and it bounced off of both side walls and flipped off of the track into the grass pointing the way I had just came from. That was just over 4 years ago.
This [Mustang] was a rust free roller that they all chipped in to give to me. The amount of work and money put into it is staggering. I hope that they all like how it turned out. I tried to make it nice enough to show my appreciation for what they did for me!”
Smiles per Gallon
With the car sorted, Duane needed an equally staggering powerplant. He said this about the engine, “I don’t want to down play the power plant, but since it’s a new combo and the bugs are still being worked out, the et’s won’t be at its full potential, but we hope to get the twin 80mm turbos on the 555” bbc to put a smile on our face every day.” I’m sure twin 80mm turbos on a big block will certainly get some great smiles per gallon.
”As of today, the car has not made a hit on a track and has only done one (horrible) road test. It did hit the hub dyno at Redline Performance in Bloomington Illinois to see what it’s got, but a boost leak ended our day early. The numbers were promising to that point though…we will see if the radials and suspension set up can hold well enough to run a x.xx @ xxx.00!!! Hahaha” – Duane
Duane’s comment to his favorite part of these drag and drive events is “The thing that means the most to me doing these events, everyone is on the same page. We all have the same goal and want to do whatever we can to achieve it. Strangers will lend a hand to each other for absolutely no reason other than to make sure you can get it done too! As my co-pilot said on drag week last year, “it restores some of your faith in humanity”. My co-pilot is Mike Grossen. Midwest Drags will be his second ever drag n drive event as spectator on site and co pilot. He’s hooked!” I say it all the time, drag and drive will change your life.
“I have a lot of friends that chipped in to make this car happen.”-Duane
Shout outs…My buddy Mike Chenoweth! He put one of his projects on hold to get a cage and chassis in this one! He’s helped with every step of the project in some way or another! It wouldn’t be near the car it turned into with out his help.
Midwest Chassis, Eric and Kristy Vicary, BC and Kevin N, Jim and Kevin W who drove through torrential rain to drag this shell home from Maryland! Mike Grossen for body and paint help! And Everyone who chipped in on the roller, if I tried to name them all I’d miss someone for sure!” – Duane
“It takes a village” is fitting for Duane’s story. Congratulations to them and I look forward to meeting them in person at Midwest Drags 2022.