Rick Santos

Any body know what's going on with Rick Santos these days? The S&S Automotive special!

There was a guy that beat all the odds! And did it repeatedly! I had a friend that lived down the street from him in Antioch, California. Rick used to do testing of new stuff out on the street in front of his house. Just a short hit and back out of it to see what the launch felt like. Most of his neighbors were cool with it, but a couple were always calling the cops.

 

One badddd man.

The Champ still lives in Brentwood, Ca. outside of Antioch. Rick and his family still operate S & S Automotive in San Leandro, Ca.

After his drag racing career, Rick, George and brother Jeff became active in the dirt track sprint cars, their small block Chevrolet powered cars dominate the classes that they race in.

S & S Automotive also built a engine dyno to provide a higher level of service to their customers.

They still do alot of the machine work and repair for many west coast Alcohol and Nitro racers.

I am proud to be friends with the Santos family. great people.

 

Santos Racing days

For those of you not enjoying our sport about 20 years ago, Santos won NHRA TAD Championships running a blown small block Chevy, against a mix of early A/FD's and blown cars running more than 100 inches more engine that he did. He did it with weight breaks and an engine that could whip butt on just about any combination being legally run in TAD in those days. Him and his family designed and built these engines. They were ass whoop set ups that competitiors feared and hated at the same time. I believe he had some significant input and backing from GM for some of that time.

And I didn't mention the fact that I, too, think that Rick and his entire family were and are great people. He worked hard and gave back, at the same time. Wish he were still a neighbor. If he would get back into it, he could do test hits at my place any time he wanted to! Hell, we'd do 'em together!

Jim-late of Texas, formerly of Antioch, Ca.

 

Santos Racing days

I don't think there was ever anything that was recognized by NHRA as illegal. There was always a bunch of cry babies that were looking for an out when they were getting taken to school by some guy with a small block, but no infractions. In those days there wasn't quite as much control on parts and pieces as you find now, but to my knowledge, Rick never broke any rules because NHRA was the same then as they are now about rules - You get over that line and we strip everything from you that you got while you were outside the rules. Ask Darrell Alderman, et al. And they didn't even break a 'Rule" rule. Just made us look bad.

Rick was an innovator, not a cheat!

 

That car Rick won with only weighed 1,600 lbs! That was his main advantage till NHRA banned it! I asked him later what he thought that car would run with the Norm Grimes' Combo he ran in the O'Bannon car! He said it would be scary!!!

 

Just to correct things a bit, Rick won all of his championships in Jack O'Bannon's BAE Hemi powered car, not the family owned bitchin' SBC powered TAD. True he did win national and divisional events in the S&S Auto car, the championship years were in the O'Bannon Oakwood Homes sponsored cars.

 

use your name.

"Ken", If thats your real name. Please take a moment to align your facts on this subject.

Rick Santos & family NEVER ran a C blower on the Small Block Chevy car.

The "Gizmo" situation happened 2 full years after they parked their car.

It is possible that Rick was driving a car that had one of Drazy's expermental blowers. I remember a run at Phoenix where the Oakwood homes car ran Around the low 5.30's at 220mph , which was very impressive.

"Ken", The person that posted this thread appears to have done so in an attempt to give Rick Santos and his family credit for what they had done with their own car. They are very good at what they do, no matter what they are involved with.

And for you to try and diminish that with a comment about cheating shows the type of person that you are. A cry baby.

If you feel the need to bring all this to light, make sure that you get ALL the names of ALL the players that were involved, and have the BALLS to use your REAL and FULL name. Happy Easter.

 

Thought it was more along the lines of "grey matter" and NHRA decided to disallow it, no different that what goes on in PM/PS/NFC/TF; heck every class. Guess that was their way of "chillin' the fuel" back in the day haha Still not fair to those who couldn't get the blower. Given their performance, it'd be nice if they'd allow the "C" nowadays.

Brandon Booher
NHRA TAD #35

 

Gizmo you suck for bringing up sh..t like that, like the thread states and like Hudson says, this thread is not about stuff like that. If you what to start your own thread, do it. Also, when you are willing to post something like that, be man enough to use your full name.

Dean Murdoch
www.speedzonemagazine.com

 

Rick, George and Jeff were some of the people I enjoyed racing with the most.

The SBC car was just plain cool.

With O'Bannon, Grimes and the rest of the crew, Rick was tough to beat. Having a chance to race against the best ment something. When you could run with them you knew you were on your game. We were fortunate to run with them, and they even gave us their cooler of beer after we beat them in the finals. To the victors go the spoils, they said.

Rick, George, Jeff, and the rest of the family are good people.

 

I can tell you from first hand experence rick's work is second to none i ended up with that championship winning car (from the obannon stable) that rick built himself. The workmanship is unbelivable and still to this day there is no dragster that compares to it.
With all the laps he done in it and all the laps dave done then we race it constantly and freight it back and forth across our country on bumpy railway lines and still the car never has cracked a weld i dont know how he welded it but man he knows how to bulid stuff that's for sure.

 

As Dean knows, there was excitement in the air when the Santo's family small block was at Mission. The crowd favourite back then!

I think on this forum you should only be able to use real names. I hate gossip too. I have met so many nice folks in the alcohol ranks over the years. More than helpful and just plain genuine. I can't wait to get to the track and it is nice hearing from folks in other divisions too.
Just my 2 cents worth.
Dale