In-N-Out Burger Pomona Dragstrip

History

The Choppers of Pomona car club, helped by people in the Pomona Police Department and the city government, leased the Los Angeles County Fair parking lot for drag racing in 1952. The lot was gravel, so they paved it with donated money, and sometime in the second half of 1952 they started weekly races on the quarter mile. On an April 11-12 weekend the Southern California Drag Championships were held there, the first multi-day drag race of its kind, planned to repeat every six months. After that, weekly races ran under the Pomona Valley Timing Association. Hot Rod Magazine ran photos of early events in December 1952 (pages 14-17) and June 1953 (pages 24-27). In 1956 the strip shut down for a few months to fix and repave a dip in the track.

NHRA’s fuel ban covered most California strips, but on March 9, 1958 Pomona ran a fuel program under the SCTA and the Rusetta Timing Association. Bob Brissette won top fuel eliminator at 137.49 mph, and Tommy Ivo took top gas eliminator at 136 mph with the meet’s best ET of 9.88 seconds. NHRA held its first Winternationals at Pomona in 1961. Billed as the Big Go West, it drew 67,000 people over three days, and Jack Chrisman won top eliminator in the Howard Cam twin-engined AA/D over Tom McEwen. At the 1963 Winternationals Don Garlits beat Art Malone at 8.26 seconds and 186.32 mph. Two people died at the 1971 Winternationals: ‘Sneaky’ Pete Robinson, and Kathy Marie Russell, the wife of a fuel dragster driver, who was hit by a race car warming up in the pits.