You can tell at first sight this little green 1976 Datsun 620 truck lived a good life. For 45 years this tin can showed the years unashamedly. Little would you know this beat up Datsun truck means a whole lot for a whole lot of people.
In 1976 Stephanie Thompson’s dad Ralph Long bought it new at the dealership and brought it to their just moved-in rural-suburban Chino, California home. It was green and outfitted with KC Lights, roll bar, white wagon wheel rims, mud flaps and a white racing stripe! This is the hay-day of mini-truckin’. When not riding all around Southern California with her dad, she’d be hanging out with him on the tailgate. In elementary school, her dad would pick her up by calling her out through the CB/PA system he installed. In High School her dad outfitted the hand-me-down truck with a fresh coat of British Racing Green, a new scratchy burlap seat cover, and fuzzy dice. The truck was worn out – taking forever to get out of its own way and just as long to a stop. But she had something to drive for two years of college and a year towing her baby around. She moved on to a more appropriate ride for a small family and then the truck sat after her dad Ralph passed away from Pancreatic Cancer.
Family friends, Steve and Pamela Marquardt asked about the truck in the driveway full of cobwebs and dust. Stephanie said they were going to junk it and they bought it instead. They towed it out and by the end of the day Steve had it running and driving around the block! He drove it around in stock condition for three years.
Birth of Datzilla!
Then almost all of a sudden Steve thought about building the truck up as a dragster. A local at Irwindale Drag Strip Steve started building out perfect for the eigth mile track. A Nitrous breathing Chevy V-6 mill would fit real nice. A 9″ rear end with Currie axles would plant the rubber well.
Irwindale is one of the last remaining dragstrips open in Southern California, the birthplace of drag racing for God’s Sake! The 1/8th mile track has Thursday night “Run-What-Ya-Brung” racing. Before the truck got too powerful Amber would ride shotgun with her dad down the track to learn and feel comfortable in the truck.
Steve saw that the truck would be a great way to help Amber get over a pretty heavy time in her own life.
I find it very interesting that the truck has been passed down from father to daughter TWICE! First with Stephanie and her dad Ralph and then Steve handing it down to Amber. Although Amber won’t be driving it to school. However, it has schooled an opponent or two on the strip.
The track, the garage, a road trip are all really great escapes for when life is just smashing you at every turn. When Steve invited Amber to sit shotgun down the track – that’s all it took to bring that bright smile out of a young lady.
During that one lap as passenger, Steve telling her everything he is doing and thinking. At the very next round, he swapped seats with her. It took a few runs, to get the timing down and it was ALL FUN!
Drag Racing For A Cause
What started as a rush of adrenaline in the dry lake beds of Southern California has become the fastlane to educating the public of higher causes. This father/daughter team are a big example of that. Their time in the pits and working with sponsors are to bring awareness of Pancreatic Cancer.
Amber’s stepmom; Pamela Acosta Marquardt, lost her mother to Pancreatic Cancer after a 6-month battle. Pamela produced “An Evening With The Stars” gala, the very first pancreatic cancer black-tie celebrity fundraiser at the Beverly Hills Hotel, which funded the first early detection laboratory in The John’s Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. Three months later she founded the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network or PanCAN, the leading organization in the fight against pancreatic cancer – a place that patients and families have to turn to for information, resources and hope. Then Amber’s grandfather, Martin, passed only 13 days after his own diagnosis of pancreatic cancer.
Steve and Amber would get together in the garage and add more and more power adders to the truck and when they added nitrous on the Datsun it went 6.84.
IN AMBERS WORDS: “So when I am sitting waiting to be called to go up next, I am nervous I have a ton of butterflies in my stomach with knots. I get into the water box and do my burn out which is an amazing feeling, even though I still have those nervous butterflies. Then I pull forward and stage the first light while I am having so many mixed thoughts and emotions, like, make sure to get a good light, make sure you beat the person next to you. Then I stage the 2nd light and I am ready to rock and roll while still full with nervous butterflies. Then I take off and everything goes away and I am totally in my happy place. As I am going through the finish line I am smiling and so ecstatic whether I win or lose, ’cause I am just having SO MUCH FUN!! Then I come around and get my time slip it’s a good feeling especially when you beat your own times. Then I roll past the stands where all the spectators DO NOT expect to see a girl in the truck and that’s a cool feeling as well. Girls can do whatever they put their mind too. Don’t ever quit or give up!!!”
Then Tragedy Strikes!
It was an early Sunday morning. Steve was test driving Datzilla around the block, after Amber noticed a popping sound at the races the night before. All of a sudden her mom came in her room asking where her dad was because she had just been notified that his phone had dialed 911. The girls are freakin’ out and then Amber gets a call from her dad to come around the block with a couple of fire extinguishers, the truck is on fire!
She gets to the truck and the extinguishers did nothing, the truck happened to burn in front of a fellow racer’s house and their extinguishers did nothing until the Fire Dept. came and put it out in minutes. She was relieved that Steve didn’t get hurt too bad, he had 3rd degree burns on his left arm. None the lest this was a devastating day for Amber.
She posted a photo and video of the fire on Facebook and her friend Nichole George started a Go-Fund-Me site. Then someone tagged it and a great group of racers, led by Monti Fitzgerald and Jon McGovern, in Sacramento, some 400 miles away, started a campaign and James Bodine donated the S10, Chris Alston Chassisworks donated the roll cage that James installed. Disruptive Rides in Milpitas, CA donated the paint and body. Quick Performance built the rear end wtih a Dice Converter from Jeff Paradise. Jeff Walson of Champion Transmission rebuilt the gear box. The LS 6.0 was also donated. She is incredibly grateful to the race community that helped this Father/Daughter race team. She can’t wait to get out on the track and spread the love!
