Drag Illustrated Issue 139, December 2018 | Page 61

them,” he recalls. At age 32, however, something
just clicked. “I said to myself, ‘I’m gonna do this!’”
Helms owned a motorcycle that he traded for a
4-door English Ford, better known as an Anglia. It
wasn’t the ideal drag car in most circles, although
Helms did like the fact that his particular model
Anglia had a 4-inch longer wheelbase than its
2-door counterpart. He worked tirelessly on the
car until it was race ready. “It needed a lot of
work,” he admits.
The first pass Helms ever made was at Moores-
ville Dragway sometime around 1981, clocking
7.50 on the legendary eighth-mile strip. Sammy
was bitten by the racing bug immediately after
taking his first tree, and soon realized he wanted
to race every chance he got. “We’d race on Sat-
urday nights at Mooresville – which didn’t end
until like 3 or 4 in the morning – then we’d eat
breakfast somewhere and go straight to Shuffle-
town on Sunday,” Helms remembers.
After keeping that routine for a while, he then
began to branch out to other area tracks such as
Farmington, and also Greer and Spartanburg,
both in South Carolina. In pretty short order,
he had his boxy 4-door race car clocking 6.20s,
which made it one of the fastest bracket cars in
the area in those days. “I was racing three and
four nights a week and I’d often win low quali-
fier money, which was like $50, so it was really
adding up!” Helms says.
All the while, Helms also maintained a career
at the Charlotte Observer newspaper, where he
worked in quality control. “For over 40 years that’s
what I did for a living, and it’s how I had afforded
to waste money on drag racing,” he laughs.
After a while the local bracket scene wasn’t
satisfying his desires, so he started racing the
Anglia in IHRA competition, traveling the entire
national event circuit. The unique 4-door English
Ford became one of IHRA’s most photographed
cars of the 1980s, often winning Best Appear-
ing or Best Engineered awards. The car’s 331 ci
engine and Powerglide combination also made
it a very consistent entry, with Helms picking up
multiple wins.
Tragedy struck, however, at Shuffletown Drag-
way when Helms crashed the Anglia during a
day of performing transmission tests. “I rolled
it about eight or nine times and totally lost the
car. I stayed in the hospital for three days and
came out crazier than I was when I went in!” he
declares. Helms climbed right back in the saddle
and drove a friend’s race car at Shuffletown the
following Sunday.
By now, Helms was building race cars himself
and was also a dealer for Walt Weney’s S&W Race
Cars. “They were wanting to get an Econo Drag-
ster in this area, so S&W made me an offer and I
took it.” Immediately after the initial purchase of
the rear-engine dragster, Helms bought a second
car from S&W with the intentions of running
both IHRA and NHRA, which he did for quite
a few seasons.
One of the things Helms enjoyed most was
the fact that his family was by his side at every
event, but things began to change in the late
1980s. “The sanctioning bodies had to settle a
few lawsuits in those days and they really began
to tighten up on things you could do at the track.
For example, my son was about 7 years old at
the time and he was my starting line person,
and although he was very competent, he wasn’t
allowed to go to the starting line anymore. He
couldn’t tow the car or help me work on it in
the pits either,” Helms recalls.
Suddenly, with his support system disman-
tled, racing wasn’t nearly as fun as it once was.
“I raced for another year by myself, and then one
day while coming back from Norwalk I made the
decision that I was done with racing.” In 1988
Helms abruptly left the sport he dearly loved and
stayed gone for an astonishing 30 years. “I took
aspirin and Tylenol to get over the sickness, but
I never fully kicked the habit,” he laughs.
All it took was one trip to Mooresville for
Helms to get the racing itch once more, and
suddenly he was exploring his options to stage
a comeback. His first idea was to build a replica
of his old English Ford, which he indeed started,
but before he could finish, an Opel GT became
available and he got somewhat side-tracked. Then
came a pair of dragsters that he also thought
might come in handy, so he bought them both.
Amazingly, the car he currently drives serves
as a direct link to the past. “My friend George
Allison owned and raced this dragster back in the
1980s when I was doing this the first time, but I
thought after George passed away that his fam-
ily sold this stuff years ago. I contacted George’s
son, Daniel, and realized that it was the same
car.” Helms promptly bought the entire racing
operation, which included the pair of dragsters.
“George was a great IHRA racer and won a lot of
events with the car I’m driving now, so it feels
like I’m riding with a friend again.”
A lot had changed in the 30 years that Helms
was away, most notably how it felt to make a
full-throttle trip down the strip. “I put a real soft
tune-up in the dragster so that it would clock
something like 6.0s, which is what I was run-
ning when I left. It sure enough ran a 6.0 and it
scared the daylights out of me!” he laughs. Before
long though, he became comfortable in the car,
and now routinely competes in the 4.80-sec-
ond zone. He’s also continued his winning ways
since returning to competition and recently went
nine rounds to win an event at North Carolina’s
Shadyside Dragway. It had been 30 years since
Helms added a trophy to his collection, and it
sure felt great.
Upon his return, he soon realized that he also
loved the atmosphere of the PDRA series and en-
joys racing in either Top Dragster or the Bracket
Bash. He once again finds himself racing some-
where every single weekend, and he’s renewed a
lot of old friendships from decades past.
“I have a whole different outlook on drag racing
than I did 30 years ago. Back then I had to win or
it didn’t matter, but these days I go to the races
to have a good time, so if a win happens, hooray,
and if it doesn’t I’m still cooking, camping and
grilling out with my friends,” Helms smiles, “so
I’m a winner either way.”
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