Say you’re a writer for a big automotive online publication and you get the chance to go to Frank Hawley’s Drag Racing School – but you’ve never been down a dragstrip in anything approaching real speed before. That’s exactly where Jalopnik’s Jason Torchinsky found himself recently – with an opportunity to learn at the hands of one of the finest teachers around, Frank Hawley. 

Torchinsky attended the Hawley Drag Racing School’s Media Day recently at Fontana and had the chance to hop behind the wheel of one of Hawley’s 550-horse dragsters, with lessons from Hawley and his band of experienced teachers, including none other than John Force Racing’s Robert Hight, Jeff Arend, and Fast Jack Beckman. 

We’ve all seen drag racing on TV, and we’ll have to assume that most (if not all) of you fine readers have been down the track at some point in your lives.

Knowing when to “go” is the easy part – the light turns green and it’s time to go. But knowing when to stop, especially if you’re in an unfamiliar car on an unfamiliar track – that’s another story altogether, and where Torchinsky completely failed, by not paying attention to the location of the finish line.

He failed so completely, in fact, that Hawley banned him from driving the car anymore during the course of the day.

Torchinsky’s column about the mishap is a hilarious read, and one we suggest you check out when you have a few minutes today. We’re glad to see that no one was physically harmed in the making of the video, but we have to wonder whether Torchinsky injured his shorts in the process.

Especially when we realize that the dragster ran 11’s and only trapped 118 MPH – we remember going nearly that fast in Mom’s Aerostar back in the day. Just the fact that he titled the video “meidiot” is enough to invoke laughter. As is watching the safety crew frantically trying to wave him down to stop in time.

Sorry about your luck, bro. For next time – there are flags marking the end of the track.

And the best quote of all…”[drag racing] is sort of like if there was a sport that had you build a ship in a bottle with glue and tweezers, and then blow it up. All while being timed.”