So that afternoon, about 3 p.m. Pacific, they did it again. They didn’t merely back up their record or run within some specific percentile that would verify or legitimize their historic performance in the minds of some, they literally duplicated their previous numbers down to the thousandth and recorded their second-straight 5.644-second, 250-mph-plus quarter-mile pass. There wasn’t a shadow of a doubt about it.
“It’s an old drag racer’s trick,” says Camp, chuckling. “I just left the car alone. I made some slight adjustments for the air, sent it down the race track and she did it again. If that didn’t make it matter-of-fact, if that didn’t satisfy the critics, there’s nothing that will. Bottom line, and excuse my filthy mouth, but we f*&%#d that record up. We buried it. That’s what we did.”
To the uninitiated, it might seem like parlaying their barrier-breaking performance into a monumental victory at the $20,000-to-win Street Car Supernationals would be necessary for this next-generation “Wild Bunch” to call their four days in fabulous Las Vegas the makings of a drag racing fairy tale. However, nothing could be further from the truth. He might not admit it now, or even know it, but there was success at every juncture of this journey for Camp Stanley. From the time he turned the key and fired the diesel engine of his tow rig to the time he exited off I-15 onto Speedway Boulevard toward Las Vegas Motor Speedway; from the early shut-off 5.79 to the fateful pair of 5.64 passes, every bit of it, each individual piece, was all Camp wanted.
“John and I have raced together for years,” Camp begins, “and to do ITALICS> that <ITALICS with him is almost unbelievable. That kid, with his brother, used to pack my parachutes in the ‘Wild Bunch’ days. I’ve drug John all over creation doing this, even to Australia on a couple different occasions. He’s been there through this whole thing. To have him, Axel, Scotty and Jimmy Kline, who’ve been with us forever and ever and ever; it’s great. It was great to be able to share that experience with them, to do it together. It was the best weekend of racing of our lives—mine for sure—and I don’t know that we’ll ever top it.”
Since their days running in the National Street Car Association battling the big dogs of Pro Street to their current tour of duty in the American Drag Racing League’s shark-infested Pro Extreme category, Camp Stanley and his merry men have always embraced the journey, not letting the results dictate their demeanor, win, lose or draw.
“We’ve always been out there sloggin’ away,” says Camp. “Racing the big names, doing what we could, where we could, and no matter what happens. You break something, go out first round, whatever the case, we’re not fighting, getting mad or whatever. We do this because we love to do it.
“Could Jason Scruggs have done it? Alex Hossler?” he asks. “Yeah, they probably could have, but …” He pauses. “They didn’t. We did. A couple guys from Hagerstown, Maryland—Podunksville, Appalachia—we went out there and got it done. We’ve always kept coming back for more, and eventually it came to us.”
This story was originally published on April 26, 2014. 
