A little "Did You Know" fact about the mater...

#16 07-22-2008, 05:24 PM

Heya Will,
My only claim to fame with the Nitrosims was having the FC MPH record from the online games when it finally faded. I never could outrun WB Hawaiibird (Partridge) and a few others, I tried like Hell but it never happened, lol.

That online racing is just like the real deal, "speed cost money, how fast you wanna go?" When gamers start running radiators on there PC to cool them down from overclocking they were stretching beyond what I could afford, lol.

But, it was a lot of fun and many late hours at night.

#17 07-22-2008, 05:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kris Hill

Kelly took me by the hand in '05 and led me from the dead as a doornail DSR board (which I think no longer exists) and brought me here.

Ah yes! That board turned into a total fiasco! It was a shame too cuz it was pretty DPR driver interactive.

#18 07-22-2008, 05:35 PM

Since I'm convinced that this site is now the de facto "message board of drag racing", I think it's necessary to clarify some of the points Will made.

Being online didn't always involve the Internet. Before we had web browsers and HTML, there were things called bulletin boards. They had forums just like we have today but everything was text only.

Mike Hollander was the founder of RIS over at CompuServe. At that time, the Racing forum was by far the most active anywhere online. Some of the staffers went so far as to post reports from races they attended. The report showed up on Monday usually, but if we were really lucky the reporter would post each evening if they could find some sort of connection.

And it was always a labor of love - though Hollander received money from CIS for the traffic his forum generated, none of it went to the reporters other than a shirt or two.

Larry Sullivan was the guy who helped me come up to speed, and come to think of it was the first person to gently tell me that typing in all caps wasn't nearly as cool as I thought it was.

I was already racing in PS at the time, and remember volunteering to help Jerry Reynolds at Memphis sometime in the late 1980s. Jerry was another one of the pioneers. It was at that race I met the new guy, a local who was interested in helping cover races. The new guy was Ed Dykes, and no one who ever met Fast Eddie will ever forget him.

Though at one time I was a staffer on CompuServe, I finally gave it up after being frustrated one too many times by Mike Hollander. We had lengthy arguments about this new thing on the horizon - something called the internet. He didn't seem to think it would amount to much and that people would always pay a monthly fee to places like CompuServe.

While RIS was "keeping the faith", others like Jerrod DID have the foresight. NitroMater filled the void and no one had to pay a monthly fee.

I think RIS may even still exist, but when Ed and Larry Sullivan decided to break away to do this newfangled internet thing, the company they set up was FastNews Network.

It was pretty much a perfect organization, those two. Larry was the computer geek and blazed many trails in software design in drag racing. I wish more people recognized what he's done for all of us.

Ed was a salesman by trade, and he and I would have hours-long conversations as he was trying to stay awake driving home from his latest sales call. I can verify he was about as far from a tech-head as you can get, but with his personality and brains he got the job done.

When we first started covering races, the Media Relations manager of NHRA called us "just fans with laptops" to our collective faces. But Larry and Ed hung in there and slowly gained the respect they so richly deserved by being professional, complete, and interesting.

So, here's my congratulations to all the visionairies who took the knocks, wise cracks, and financial hit back in those dark days when most people didn't understand what the net was, and proudly bragged they didn't even know how to push the power button on a computer.

If it wasn't for them, where would all of us drag racing junkies be?

#19 07-22-2008, 05:37 PM

Will, great piece of history that made me misty eyed. There are many lurkers here that were part of that history and had hours of fun and made friends from around the world. The common thread was our love of the sport of drag racing. "Man those were the days"
Just a few I can remember: Jeff Brady, Kevin Smith, George Reilly, Bill Servino, teams LETR, TT, WB, AR, MAM and the king of sim racing WBHawaiiBird Bernie Partridge Jr.

Thanks to NitroMater for this space.

Keep'm Lit!
RO

#20 07-22-2008, 05:41 PM

Hey, Rick....you know I luv ya dude, but there's no such thing as a 'Texas Yankee'!

#21 07-22-2008, 06:06 PM

Heh, another Snake racing dot com forum refugee here. Circa 2003.

A kid named Max posted over there, he was into hockey and corresponded with Larry Dixon. One day Max mentioned "the 'mater". So I swung by here.
Snake's board eventually shut down, and this became the default place.

Great post Will, thanx for the history lesson.

I really enjoy hanging out here, met a bunch of fantastic people thru this site.
I hope to meet many more that I see everyday on here.
We've shared good times, and we've shared sad times, we dish out good-natured ribbing, we bicker and argue, we show support, we have laughs, sometimes things get kinda crazy here, but overall it's a great place.

Thanks Jerrod and all who made this place.

#22 07-22-2008, 06:25 PM

So y'all really do have 'Mater meetings? I'm always too nervous (or too late) for those things. I had a bad experience meeting up with fans from band message board while I was living in Vegas and I've been gun shy ever since. And no way do I want to shatter the fragile illusion that I'm a decent person and a decent journalist.

#23 07-22-2008, 07:29 PM

Great history lesson, Will!

I think I first heard of the mater back in 2004 when I was searching for something and it came up as a search result. Mostly did a bunch of lurking in the shadows until about a year ago and actually met a buncha maters at Vegas2 last fall.

#24 07-22-2008, 08:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paul Rogers Jr

Hey Will, I actually found the Mater by one of the banner ads being run on (I think it was NitroSim.com). I think it was some time around 2000.

I think that I ran in one or two offline races and then raced in the online with Team Low ET.

I have been here ever since and have referred many people here.

Hey Paul...I too raced for team low et. What was your handle? Mine was DixonfanLETR.

#25 07-22-2008, 08:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kris Hill

So y'all really do have 'Mater meetings? I'm always too nervous (or too late) for those things. I had a bad experience meeting up with fans from band message board while I was living in Vegas and I've been gun shy ever since. And no way do I want to shatter the fragile illusion that I'm a decent person and a decent journalist.

Kris! OMG....some of the best (and most interesting) people in the world I've met from this board and/or Mater Meetings! You gotta go girlie!

#26 07-22-2008, 08:15 PM

I came on board to the old "Mater" just to catch the next post of Rodge, I mean Pat McGill, I mean Takamychet, I mean Dan Lynch or whatever his name was? Those were the days! Moving on to the new Mater was like finally getting a handle on that unknown bad rash?

#27 07-22-2008, 08:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bobby Miller

I came on board to the old "Mater" just to catch the next post of Rodge, I mean Pat McGill, I mean Takamychet, I mean Dan Lynch or whatever his name was? Those were the days! Moving on to the new Mater was like finally getting a handle on that unknown bad rash?

LMAO Bobby! You nailed the 'essence'.

#28 07-22-2008, 08:25 PM

Thanks Will - good recap
I think it was early years - I was not (and still not ) a game player. But I was involved with CIFCA and the owner/driverof the F/C was Bill Merbach. Bill used to race Drag Boats and then worked on Hartmans F/C. (I think Richard was one of the signers on Bill's NHRA Lic) I heard about NitroMater at one of the monthly meetings. At the time I actually had a internet computer at my desk at work. I got hooked immediately. In the old days, sharing thoughts and opinions with Jim Jennard, Don S., Virgil Hartman, The Millers and many many others every day, was the absolute coolest thing. (A virus took my 'Corporate' internet priveledges away a few years back so now my time on here is very limited) Of course like almost everyone, right away I fell in deep 'like' with Kelly!

The Mater became my daily 'fix' for Drag Racing. It has gone through a few Seasons of change - but it is still a GREAT site. I appreciate each friendship/relationship that has been obtained here.

Thanks Ya'll

<quote> Will (Side note, ...I used to swear I'd never spend that much money on shades, then you borrow a friends Oakleys....and you're hooked for life).

Not to derail this Thread - Chad was driving the Semi for Jim Maher (CIFCA FC) to a Race at Vegas and I went along ....he loaned me a pair of "O's" and I can never go back now.

And the world get smaller Jerrod is now a neighbor if mine! (Damn J'Rod - you've got some amazing things in your garage!!

)

Thanks all you Pioneers!!

#29 07-22-2008, 08:46 PM

The GoRacing.com drag racing section is where I got my start, and Jerrod and Will I think were over there too. Jerrod sent me an e-mail to come check out his new website. Man a lot has changed since then. I think Jeannie Allsage was the first person to ever post, and I was second.

Here is a screenshot from 2003 thanks to archive.org

#30 07-22-2008, 09:34 PM

Wow, talk about bringing back memories....

The RIS site was THE best place for race coverage other than calling the Castrol Hot Line and listening to Mac give his reports. I remember many a chat session with Mike, Ed and a host of characters that populated the sight with frequency.
You're right Dan, Larry Sullivan doesn't get near the credit he deserves for the work he did with Ed Dykes and today with Rick Green and the rest of the FNN crew.
Speaking of Ed Dykes, he was quite a character and I still remember the emptiness felt when we heard about him crashing his small plane in the fog on the way home from the IHRA banquet. Tremendous loss. Most folks don't know that the media center @ Heartland Park is named in Ed's honor.
The Mater, heck, I've been on here so long I don't remeber when I signed up!
Just know that I appreciate the site that Jerrod has nurtured along, along with Will's site's as well.
The Mater and insidecompracing.com are checked frequently every day.

Thanks for the trip down memory lane Will, it's amazing how far we've come, and tantalizing to think of where we might be going......

Unk