Fast-Track Grandma : Woman, 72, Fulfills Lifelong Dream by Putting Pedal to the Metal in Drag Race

When 72-year-old Letcha Pollard harnessed herself into a yellow Chevy dragster with a 350-cubic-inch engine and lined up against a rival less than half her age, she was determined to win.

Shouts of “Go grandma!” and “Oh my God!” rang out from the crowd at the Malibu Speed Zone in City of Industry.

The race was the culmination of a lifelong ambition for Pollard, a dream that she had since she raced a Model A Ford down Rosecrans Avenue in Compton decades ago.

“I just want to live every day to the fullest,” said Pollard, who dressed for the occasion in a red jumpsuit with white stripes.

Pollard’s opponent, a 32-year-old construction foreman named John Meyer, didn’t seem to mind that the crowd might boo him off the track if he won. He wasn’t about to throw the race, even though Pollard is his wife’s grandmother.

It was going to be a “heads-up race,” he said. The two had been playfully trash-talking about their duel for months. “The best person wins.”

The racers’ 18-foot “Eliminator” dragsters were fixed to a steel rail to prevent wrecks. The steering wheels were useless, but the throttle could rocket them to 70 mph in about three seconds.

As the drivers smiled for a TV camera, the crowd grew restless with the delay. “What did we have, an oil spill on the road,” razzed a leather-necked man wearing a foam hat that said “Old Fart.” People laughed.

Finally, the starting lights flicked on. Pollard and Meyer worked their throttles--the dual exhausts letting loose a guttural propane-powered growl.

The lights went orange, then green. The engines roared as the racing slicks gripped the pavement without a squeak.

The drivers’ heads lurched back as the cars shot forward. The skin on the racers’ faces rippled in the wind.

Meyer pulled ahead, heading fast into the setting sun over the nearby Pomona Freeway. Then he dusted his wife’s grandmother.

The scoreboard said the grandmother of six fouled on her start.

But Pollard had two more chances. The dragsters were pulled back to the starting line. Unfortunately for her, Meyer was relentless. He smoked her both times.

The crowd went easy on him. “I was kind of expecting the crowd to boo,” Meyer said. “She was the obvious favorite. . . . She better practice up some more for the next time we come.”

Pollard, a Southern California native who now lives in Nampa, Idaho, said she had a great time despite her finish. “I loved it,” she said. “One more time and I would have beat him.”

Then, showing just a tinge of disappointment, she added: “I thought [the car] would have gone a hundred.”

Instead, she barely went faster than the state speed limit. “You can drive faster than that on the freeway.”