Finish Line Comes Early

During the first Eisenhower administration, Sheriff “Mac” McKernan had a dangerous problem with young people racing hot rods on Kern County’s rural roads around here. So he helped the kids form a nonprofit group and arranged for them to drag race legally and safely on a taxiway of this town’s little-used airport.

For 51 years, three generations of local families have gathered at what purports to be the world’s oldest continuously operated drag strip. At times reaching 200 mph, their homemade dragsters flashed, roared and sometimes sputtered down that quarter-mile of pavement, earning unquantifiable glory and uncounted memories. The racers paid rent to the airport and donated other funds, such as race entry fees, to local charities such as the Boy Scouts or someone needing an organ transplant.

California has long been known for its love of cars and culture of speed; the National Hot Rod Assn. isn’t headquartered here by accident. But although Inyokern Airport is still little-used, airport security has new meaning today, and the Inyokern drag races are coming to a sudden stop.

Transportation Security Administration officials don’t object. But after half a century of apparently looking the other way, the Federal Aviation Administration has threatened the airfield’s certification and federal funding if non-aviation activity such as drag racing continues beyond the next meet, a major regional race for young drivers set for Friday and Saturday.

An FAA inspector issued the order recently after a routine inspection of the county-owned and -operated airport, a move that puzzled and saddened locals.

“We’re just regular working folks in an isolated place,” said Dennis Garrett, a 70-year-old racer who helped found the local Dust Devils Car Club and today is its president. “Our families have a stake in the community, and along comes this L.A. guy with no offer to sit down and issues his shutdown orders. This isn’t some international airport, you know.”

Indeed, the 1,660-acre Inyokern Airport’s scarce private aviation activities and three daily flights to LAX are so widely spaced the terminal is often locked. Someone drives the sun-baked, wind-blown runways most mornings to shoo away coyotes. And the official baggage claim area for IYK is a folding table.

Airport manager Nancy Bass is in such a difficult position, she’s decided to retire in December. She’s charged with maximizing airport revenue. But there are only so many rental hangar spots and so much demand for aviation gas. And the parking -- long- and short-term -- is free of charge.

Bass helps make ends meet by charging the club $1,000 per racing day. And there is occasional income from film producers who cherish the old-fashioned buildings, unobstructed mountain vistas and sunny days.

“Runways and taxiways were built to serve aviation,” Tony Garcia, an FAA airport compliance specialist, wrote in the desist order after a spring inspection. “If racing promoters are allowed to use airport infrastructure, they are, in effect, [forgoing] their own investment in a racetrack and, instead, being allowed to capitalize on the public’s investment that was intended to exclusively serve aviation.”

But Garcia’s letter (“use of runways, taxiways, or ramps for non-aeronautical purposes is inappropriate”) seems to threaten filming too.

An FAA spokesman, Donn Walker, acknowledges that the FAA allows movie and commercial filming at LAX but said his agency has previously expressed disapproval of drag racing, an airport use that appears exclusive to Inyokern.

“These activities have always not been allowed,” Walker said. “This is a small airport in an out-of-the-way place, and now we’d like this activity to desist.”

For decades, the airport temporarily closed Taxiway A six or seven weekends a year. Although flight operations could continue on other taxiways and all three runways, drag-racers and their families, from as far as Arizona, would compete in quarter-mile races lasting 6 seconds on up.

The timing equipment and cars are more sophisticated today, but the drag racer’s collegiality survives, with competitors helping one another fine-tune their machines and children following in the tire tracks of their parents.

“It’s a nice family atmosphere,” said Steve Parsons, a 40-year-old perennial local champion who has gone on to win major races at other tracks.

Parsons and other Dust Devils often spoke to shop classes in Ridgecrest schools, urging students to visit the taxiway for special “high school days” when safe, legal racing could be taught off the streets. The club’s public address system was also available for loan to local clubs and parades.

“So many things don’t work in our society,” Parsons said. “Yet here’s something positive that does, and some guy wants to crush it. I don’t understand.”

Club members, praised by airport manager Bass for their cooperation and civic involvement, appear to have no appeal or alternative. The airport can’t operate without certification by the FAA, which expressed no interest in compromise or negotiation. And the racers can’t race here without the strip.

So they’ll give up their passionate pastime or save more money to haul their vehicles to Bakersfield or Nevada tracks occasionally. Without the strip’s outlet for youthful competitive juices, most fear a rise in the illegal street racing that prompted the track’s founding in the first place.

“How ironic,” Garrett said, “that we got started by the sheriff in one branch of government and now we get killed by feds in another.”

Over the years, the Dust Devils invested thousands of dollars in the airport, including gravel pathways, cables and water lines, while keeping a caring eye on the often-unoccupied buildings.

To meet racing insurance requirements, nearly 20 years ago volunteers erected two guardrails begged from other tracks. The FAA wants those obstacles removed this fall.

The Dust Devils are a frugal bunch involved in a very expensive sport; to support their passion, they’ve even sold sponsorships on hubcaps.

“We’re registered nonprofit despite our best efforts,” said Harold Owens, who is such a dedicated racer that he stores cylinder heads in his bedroom to keep them clean. “Drag racing helps me get rid of all my extra cash.”

Volunteers eventually raised enough money to buy modern timing equipment, which the club sometimes rents to other tracks.

One member, Cecil Wiles, even spent part of his honeymoon hauling the equipment and his new bride to a track in Wyoming.

“I’d rather be working on my cars than almost anything,” said Wiles, who regularly works overtime to finance his racing. His entire family -- two sons, wife and father-in-law -- was involved.

In fact, 17-year-old Garrett Wiles got his National Hot Rod Assn. drag racing license before his California driver’s license.

“As soon as you race once,” said the teen, who pours most of his Taco Bell earnings into parts, “when the car launches and the front wheels pop up, you know how awesome it is. Plus you make so many friends there.”

The three Wiles generations can often be found together day or night smoothing a homemade gear-shifter, planning a new paint job or installing a transmission and sharing plans for that next run that might be perfect.

“You’re always dreaming,” said Cecil Wiles, who has given up competitive driving for the joys of endless mechanical preparations. “Always hoping. Something usually goes wrong. But you’re always hoping.”

Garrett Wiles would like to become a pro driver after high school graduation and a planned stint in the Air Force. Like his father and older brother, Cecil Jr., Garrett has refined a pre-race ritual.

“First, I put on my fire suit,” he said, “and the helmet. I guide the car into the staging lane. I do my burnout to heat up the tires and back up into place. Then I touch my forehead, my right shoulder, my chin and the steering handles. I say a little prayer and I’m ready to go.”

He’s already guided one of his dad’s 19-foot, $30,000 vehicles nearly 170 mph down the airport’s quarter-mile.

“People say the race is so short,” Garrett Wiles said. “But for those seven seconds or so, the noise, the power, the vibrations and smells, the adrenaline, it’s just so wonderful. It’s like you can see the air-stream flowing by. Even the parachute jerk feels good.”

But then comes one of the best times at the old Inyokern airport: “The whole family is there,” he said, “and everyone talks about that run until the next one.”