James Pratt

Photographer, Writer, Storyteller, IT networking professional

You are here: Home / Blog / Soul in the Valley drag races

Soul in the Valley drag races

by Leave a Comment

I love taking sunset photos at Thunder Valley Raceway in Noble, Oklahoma. The sun sets right off the end of the track in the summer. If you wait until after sundown and use a bit of flash for fill, the pictures turn out amazing.

My best friend Tommy Bolton organizes several motorcycle drag races each year. This time he organized “Soul in the Valley” at Thunder Valley Raceway in Noble, Oklahoma. I love photographing sunset races there, since the sun sets right off the end of the track, giving me the opportunity to take some beautiful pictures that show the epic scene of “Saturday Night at the Drag Strip”.

This year Tommy invited both motorcycle and automobile drag racers to the event. It was a hot night in early August so was dripping sweat all evening. I wanted to capture the feel and excitement of drag racing, and what better way than to do this at night. This could have been any drag strip Saturday night in America.

Tommy invited 4-wheeled vehicles as well as motorcycles to the races. I love the ingenuity of creativeness of the Saturday night racers in how they build their vehicles. This truck is a prime example of cool.
I took photos of both the pre-staged racers, as in this photo, as well as when the light turns green.
I framed up my photo and then would watch for the green light to snap the shutter. I thought the green light went well with this picture.
The racing action started before sunset, so I tried doing this silhouette of the racing action before the sun went down to show a sense of “place” in the photo.
Before the sun went down I caught some of the racers doing burnouts as they warmed their tires before the launch. I thought this modified Beetle was pretty darn cool. And it was FAST! They don’t stick a wheelie bar and parachute on the back of slow cars.
This is the view before sunset. A cool shot, but not nearly as dramatic as after the sun goes down.
I also wanted to grab some pictures from the pits. Here I got a picture of Tommy Bolton (orange shirt) talking to his crew while they were tuning one of the race bikes.
It is always fun to try out different positions to get a different look at the scene. For this shot, I stepped back a bit and got the “crew chief” – in this case, a fellow racer – as we watched his friend launch down the track. I wanted to be sure and get the starting lights and the crew chief in the picture together.
Burnouts are always fun to photograph. This is a cool “donk” that also runs like a scaled donkey – pun intended.
Racers will race anything, including pickup trucks. This was a sleeper. It looks like a stock Chevy S-10, but underneath are huge slicks and a built motor. It was fast.
They raced both “bar” and “no-bar” bikes – referring to wheelie bars. This is a “no-bar” bike from the Tombo Racing stable.
Pulling up to the starting line.
Pre-staging – one orange light. It means the bike is entering “the box”.
Two orange lights means the racer is “staged” and ready for the green light. Both racers have to be staged with two orange lights each before the starter lets them go.
Once both racers are staged, they get the green light. See how the wheelie bar bit into the pavement at the launch and left marks?
Notice the wheelie bar marks on the pavement for the first part of the run.
Most racers have someone to help them get ready at the start.
When the light turns green, it is all on the racer.

Subjects

4x5 film 4x5x365 agriculture Amazon Web Services bicycle Bill Dragoo BMW Brass Ball Bobbers combine Darwin Motorcycles dirt bike drag racing Edmond El Reno film Fortinet Guthrie Ilford Delta 100 Ilford Delta Pro 100 Ilford HP5 Jeep John Deere Kawasaki Kay Pratt Kodak TMAX-100 Lexington Micha Young motorcycle New Mexico Nikon Norman Conquest Oklahoma Oklahoma City Oklahoma Living Oklahoma Living Magazine Oklahoma Today Ride Oklahoma South Canadian River Thunder Valley Raceway Tombo Racing Tommy Bolton Toyo 45A Toyo VX-125 wheat harvest Wrangler

About James Pratt

I am an Oklahoma based writer, commercial photographer, editorial photographer and adventurer based in Oklahoma City. I love telling stories about people. A motorcycle is my preferred means of travel, and I have over 5,000 hours piloting small airplanes. My editorial photography has been published in hundreds of magazines and my commercial photography has been used by dozens of companies worldwide.

Leave a Reply

Location

My Workouts this Week

Subjects

4x5 film 4x5x365 agriculture Amazon Web Services bicycle Bill Dragoo BMW Brass Ball Bobbers combine Darwin Motorcycles dirt bike drag racing Edmond El Reno film Fortinet Guthrie Ilford Delta 100 Ilford Delta Pro 100 Ilford HP5 Jeep John Deere Kawasaki Kay Pratt Kodak TMAX-100 Lexington Micha Young motorcycle New Mexico Nikon Norman Conquest Oklahoma Oklahoma City Oklahoma Living Oklahoma Living Magazine Oklahoma Today Ride Oklahoma South Canadian River Thunder Valley Raceway Tombo Racing Tommy Bolton Toyo 45A Toyo VX-125 wheat harvest Wrangler
%d bloggers like this: