Dale Armstrong

Dale Armstrong (1941 – November 28, 2014) was a Canadian drag racer and crew chief. After winning 12 National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) and 12 International Hot Rod Association (IHRA) events in the 1970s, including the Pro Comp title in 1975, he became Kenny Bernstein's crew chief. The combination produced four consecutive national championships in Funny Car (1985 to 1988) and another in Top Fuel. Bernstein became the first driver to top the 300 miles per hour mark in an engine tuned by Armstrong. Armstrong has been inducted in numerous halls of fame. He died on November 28, 2014 at his home in Temecula, California at the age of 73. He had sarcoidosis.

Armstrong was born in Holden, Alberta in 1941. He bought his first car, a 1936 Ford Coupe, for five dollars at age 14. In 1957, he began drag racing the car on a dragstrip at an airport near Calgary. It took him five attempts to make a 60-mile-per-hour (97 km/h) pass; he took out non-essential pieces of the car such as the back seat to lighten the load. His reputation for repairing cars quickly grew and soon there were cars lined up for repairs behind his family's garage. He began drag racing in NHRA's Northwest division in a Chevrolet Z-11 in the B/Factory Experimental class in an front-ended machine that had 11-second passes at 115 miles per hour (185 km/h). Armstrong and a friend towed his dragster to Southern California for the February 1964 Winternationals. In January 1965, he moved to Southern California and began campaigning a Chevrolet II at local tracks since he could compete up to five nights per week. He converted the car into a Funny Car and began running the car in early 1966 using the nickname "The Canuck". The car appeared on the cover of Hot Rod Magazine in December 1966; the article in the magazine said "Even a diehard Chevy lover would have trouble telling just what had been the original vehicle". The supercharged engine achieved runs in the 8-second bracket with a top elapsed time (e.t.) of 8.89 seconds. In 1969 he drove a Chevrolet Camaro in the Super Stock class and he followed it up with making passes in Funny Cars "Travelin' Javelin" and Tom Strum's Swapper.

...
Wikipedia