Scott Kalitta Memorial Service

July 1, 2008

Last Thursday evening, at the end of the opening day of the 2^nd Annual Summit Racing Equipment NHRA Nationals, a memorial service was held to celebrate the life of Scott Kalitta. With few exceptions, the entire community of NHRA Professional Drag Racing was in attendance. The overwhelming outpouring of supportive emotion for the Kalitta family and team members was almost surprising in its intensity. Some members of the NHRA family that one wouldn’t ordinarily expect a great deal of emotion from were genuinely affected. It would have been impossible to have been in that crowd last Thursday and not felt the interconnection that ties the racers together as a closely as any nuclear family ever was, and the sense of loss was palpable.

The ceremony took place in the Ernsthausen Performing Arts Center, and was open to the public. As it turned out, the public largely consisted of professional drag racing team members and their families. The auditorium, although large enough to accommodate significant gatherings, was standing room only. It’s not uncommon to see racers from any venue shake hands and slap one another on the back in congratulations on a win, or a as compensation for a loss, but the atmosphere last Thursday went far beyond the expected norm. Drag racers have always been common folks that share a love for their sport and for one another as people. Tragic incidents that leave a vacuum in the ranks such as the loss of Scott Kalitta seem to effect the drag racing community more intensely than it does in other forms of racing. That interconnectivity is what separates them from the rest of the racing world and ties them together more closely. Time, and our sport will move on, but that vacuum will never be entirely filled.