It was one of those quiet, traffic-free nights when I was on my way home after a date. I passed Second Street because the curve and end of the freeway was only a couple of blocks from my house. A pair of headlights came up on me quickly. I immediately went into the paranoia of mid-teen-in-car-angst. I thought, "Cops!" Even thought I hadn't done anything to merit a stop, the cops didn't need too much to initiate a stop in those days. I was hoping the red lights wouldn't come on. The headlights moved up next to me and slowed down. It was a buddy of mine. A buddy who had a burning question he had been bugging me with for weeks. "Whose car was fastest?"

One of the few claims to "Cool" I ever had in high school was the fact that I could drive around in a 1955 Chevy 210 with a V-8 and three-speed. Okay, it was my dad's car. He bought it new in Virginia and was extremely proud of it. I learned to drive in it (at age fourteen), went on my first unchaperoned date in it, and laid down my first strip of rubber in it... and continued to at almost every stop sign in town as soon as I had my license.

My buddy's entry was his dad's car, as well. A 1955 Pontiac Star Chief. He had a bigger motor - 287 cubic inches vs my 265 - but he had an automatic transmission. The legend of the day said that automatics used too much horsepower to make them work...I don't know, might even be true...but in 1963 it was axiomatic. There were other differences. My dad's car was pretty much a "plane Jane" Chevy...his was a Star Chief, one of Pontiac's best with all the whistles and bells that were available. Conventional wisdom said his car was probably gonna be the faster of the two...but I had way more "cool points" for being in a '55 Chevy. Anyway, in the middle of a chilly night on the backside of El Cajon about a mile from the end of the freeway seemed like a good time and place to settle the question once and for all. We stopped right there side by side and tried to figure out a fair way to start off. I have to admit something at this point. I had been in cars involved in drag races. I had started drag races from the ground and from inside a car...as a passenger. But until this incident, I had never been in a real drag race. We decided to count down together real loud and at "zero" we would punch it.

"Zero" came and we went. He got more tire squeal than I did but we were pretty even starting out. I don't know if that crud about automatic transmissions was true or not, but they can sure shift quicker. He got a little jump at the bottom of second gear, but the Chevy was really strong in second and by the time I was ready to shift into third I had half a fender on him. Once in high gear, it's all about horsepower and he definitely had the edge there. I was able to hold him off for awhile, but he had a couple miles per hour more on the top end and was slowly pulling away. But very slowly. And I was not willing to concede defeat quite yet. Besides, the thrill was amazing, roaring along, side by side, motors screaming and wind howling and...and then there was those reflecting arrows pointing out that the race had darn well better be over because the straight was quickly being replaced with a sharp left curve. We both got on the brakes hard. I pulled in front of him as the lanes narrowed and we both rode the brakes and turned hard and both came out of the curve with our hearts racing and our hair on fire. My adrenaline was pumping so hard I could barely sit still in the car.

I turned right onto Greenfield and drove a couple hundred yards to a side street and turned around. He passed me going the other way and turned into the same driveway. I got back to the corner of Greenfield and the highway and waited from him to catch up. I wanted to yell and laugh and share the experience with him. But he didn't catch up. I could see his headlights back by the side street. They were a little off, not pointing where they should have been. I waited for a few minutes then decided to go back and see what he was doing.

When I got to the side street and my headlights lit up the intersection, I could see what the problem was. His right front tire was turned all the way to the right but his left front tire was turned all the way to the left. Not a good look and certainly not a good way to drive. It didn't take a master mechanic to see that the tie rod was broken and that isn't something a couple of sixteen-year- olds can fix in the dark in the middle of the night. It is not something you can hide from your dad, either. Oh, we tried. We found that backing up kind of made the tires line back up but the minute you went forward they took off in different directions again. I tried to push on the right front tire while he crept forward, hoping to get off the road at least. We made limited progress that way. And the ditch that ran along the road didn't help any. The right front tire kept trying to slide down into it. So he would panic and stab the brakes and next to nothing got accomplished. The neighborhood around Greenfield Drive was semi-rural in them days; the houses were not too close together and there was next to no street lighting. I became concerned about the time and the possibility of some other racer flying up Greenfield coming upon the scene too fast to stop.

After a bit, a curious neighbor came out, and with some adult supervision, we got the car off the road onto the shoulder...precariously close to the ditch. The neighbor called the dad, who had to borrow someone else's car to come to the rescue. I saw that my work there was done, so I wished him well and took my leave...I still had to face my dad, the Chief, which required me concocting a story believable enough to keep from getting myself grounded...or killed.

It was pretty late, or early, depending on your perspective, when I got home. I crept quietly into the house but it was a great creep wasted...both folks had been celebrating Saturday night in their own preferred manner and were dead to the world when I came in.

So...it was getting on for three AM when my empty head hit the pillow. As I was about to the drift off, reliving the excitement of the race, still pumped full of adrenaline, seeing images in my mind of the two cars careening down the freeway side by side, screaming engines pushed to the limit, the speed with which the end of the freeway with its reflecting arrows seemed to rear up before us, when another image crowded into my brain. I had a shot of the undercarriage of the Pontiac as the tie rod started slipping, stressing, then breaking. Then a jumble of scenarios filled my mind: the tie rod breaking two minutes sooner, while we were side by side at over 90 mph. Or while we were pushing those cars to the limit making the curve. What the result might have been if it had broken as he was passing me going the other way on Greenfield. Oh, the possibilities were endless and scary. And not very sleep-inducing.

Monday at school, I saw my friend in the hallway and asked how things went with his dad. His dad said, "No problem, could have happened to anyone, anytime...don't sweat it, son..quick tow and a day in the shop and she'll be good as new...just lucky no one got hurt, huh?" Then my buddy looked at me and asked if I had thought about what might have happened if....

Wouldn't it be a great story if the two boys had learned their lesson and never endangered themselves or anyone else by racing and speeding and sliding around corners and spinning their wheels and all that? Yeah...but it happened in San Diego County...the southernmost of Southern California, where cars and hot- rodding and drag racing are not just a part of life, they are the rites of passage for all teenage boys. Besides...it's only a great story if there are witnesses...and no one but us saw anything. But it did cause me to slow down for a week or so.