If you’re a true car guy or gal, you want to truly drive your car. You want to take it on roads that allow you to get in touch with its capabilities – and your own. You want to experience the freedom of mobility, preferably at high-ish speeds, and with twists and turns, hills and valleys, curves and corners – all that good stuff that necessitates you becoming more intimately acquainted with the wheel, the pedals and the ’stick.

First published in the March 2026 issue of Street Machine

Sick Smokies was a drag-and-drive event that delivered these kinds of epic drives day after day for a whole week – not to mention six days of drag racing on the side. Scenic routes and good times were par for the course, as 270 street cars, including close to 50 gassers, carved a path through America’s Great Smoky Mountains.

THE RACE TRACKS

The seven-day trip took competitors to five provincial eighth-mile drag strips, most of which had not seen this kind of action in decades, if ever. The event began at Rocket City Dragway in Huntsville, Alabama, followed by three days spent racing through Tennessee: Music City Dragway near Nashville, Fitzgerald Motorsports Park at Crossville, and Knoxville Dragway. From there, it was down over the border into Georgia for a day at Brainerd Motorsports Park, followed by a drive-only day that went all over the map, from Tennessee into North Carolina, and back across to Alabama for the final day at Rocket City.

THE ROUTES

One of the major enticements for entrants was the chance to drive the legendary Tail of the Dragon. A bucket-list road for drivers and riders of all persuasions, with its touted 318 turns in 11 miles (17.7km) through the side of a mountain, the Dragon is definitely a one-of-a-kind thrill ride. But there were some equally amazing routes taken during Sick Smokies, all for different reasons. Cruising through downtown Nashville after dark was pure neon-lit insanity, while the curvaceous Foothills Parkway threw in some hairpin turns to keep drivers honest. It was easy to get distracted with so much incredible scenery flying by: mountains, valleys, waterways, cotton fields, fireworks warehouses, moonshine distilleries – there was a lot to see out the window.

The timing was ideal to catch the autumn trees bursting with colour, and nowhere were they more luminescent than along the 69km Cherohala Skyway. It was like Mother Nature had taken a heroic dose of psychedelic drugs. Imagine a mountain that looks like a bouquet of flowers. Now imagine seeing 50 of them all connected together, bouquet mountains stretching on forever. It was definitely a trip, man.

The drive through Ruby Falls near Chattanooga was another twisty one that took competitors up over the thin ridge of Lookout Mountain. It barely levels off at any point, just winds all the way up – like some mammoth, rocky, tree-covered drill bit. When you finally make it to the top, you’re relieved that it’s over, and you want to do it again immediately.

THE RACING

As if there wasn’t enough colour along the routes, the organisers, Sick, decided to add even more colour at the tracks by encouraging old-school gassers to participate. They gave priority pre-entry to gassers, and about 50 showed up, some of which had never even been driven on the street before.

The gassers all raced together each day in one big session packed with half-track burnouts, dry hops and wheelies. They put on a great show, and added an extra level of entertainment for the big crowds that came out to watch. The only major downside to it all was when madman Reggie Moore accidentally dry-hopped his ‘Organ Grinder’ Model A rat rod right into the Christmas Tree at Music City, causing irreparable damage to the timing system! Since not every car had made a run at that point, all times from Day Two were declared null and void. It was a bummer for some, a blessing for others, but the day still ended on a high note, with many entrants sticking around for some heads-up arm-drop races. Former Miss Ohio runner-up Ashley Canfield took up flagging duties in a fun, friendly session to help soften the disappointment of losing the day.

ROADKILL REUNION

Sick Smokies doubled as a reunion for several of the star cars from the axed TV series Roadkill, which starred David Freiburger and Mike Finnegan.

In addition to Finnegan’s ‘Blasphemi’ ’57 gasser and the ‘Rotsun’ ’71 Datsun 240Z that he loaned to Jimmy Dale for the week, there was also the ‘Bis Bomb’ ’67 Chevy Biscayne, campaigned by its custodian Robert Williams, who drove it across from California. All three cars made it to the end.

“We’re talking about 13 years of my life here, so it’s pretty freakin’ cool,” said Finnegan. “Just to know these cars are safe is huge for me. I bought the Rotsun after Roadkill ended so it didn’t disappear, and now Robert owns the Bis Bomb, so I know it’s not going to disappear. The idea that these cars are still running, still driving, makes my heart happy.”

THE WRAP-UP

The battle for the overall win ended up being not much of a battle at all, with Nick Cryer setting the pace from start to finish in his radical-looking ’33 Ford three-window coupe. He saved his best for last, running a 4.54@159mph on Day Seven to finish with an average of 4.63@155mph. By comparison, second place went to Lamar Swindoll Jr in his ’72 Camaro, with a 5.098@140mph, while third was Jarrod Aspegren in his ’64 Nova, with a 5.099@145mph. Ford to the front, with GM power!

Sick Smokies was touted as a one-off event, but as invariably happens, everybody had such a killer time that there’s already a strong push to do it again at some point. It won’t be next year, because Sick already has a stacked card of drag-and-drive events planned, but 2027 is a definite possibility. Plenty of time to get your junk together.

HIGHLIGHTS:

1. Not only did Zach Blausey drive his completely impractical, 14/71-blown 1923 T-bucket more than 1600km from his Cleveland, Ohio home and back, but he also slept in a hammock attached to the car throughout, and put on nightly flamethrowing displays at checkpoints through the T’s headers. “It was built in 33 days for LS Fest on a bar bet,” he said. “It’s named ‘Twisted T’ because I bent the frame doing a wheelie. I drive it about 10,000 miles a year, and it never gets trailered unless I blow it up!”

2. The number plate on Robert Freund’s Tesla Model S says it all: ITS NO EV. Yep, the car has been enhanced with internal combustion technology in the form of a twin-turbo BBC. The S ran high fives or low sixes at every track, until Day Five, when it ran into a deer on the road. The damage proved fatal for the Tesla’s Sick Smokies campaign – and also for the deer.

3. One tough new contender to emerge at Sick Smokies was the twin-turbo LS-powered ’64 Nova of Jarrod Aspegren. Jarrod raced the new build to a 4sec timeslip on the final day and took third place overall with an average of 5.09@145mph. Jarrod’s son Connor also raced the car – albeit heavily detuned – in the Junior Street class for kids aged 13-16, finishing second in class with an average of 10.05@71mph.

4. Mike Finnegan got his supercharged Hemi-powered ’55 Chev, ‘Blasphemi’, running its best eighth-mile times ever. Quickest among all the gassers, Finnegan claimed the A/Gas class win and finished an impressive fifth overall, with an average of 5.51@128mph.

“After 13 years of relentless wrenching on it, breaking things and replacing things, that car finally works, so it needs a break,” said Mike, who will now turn his focus to a ’61 Coupe DeVille for future drag-and-drive shenanigans.

5. Kansas City’s Troy Henderson and his dad Larry debuted a sweet ’63 Nova gasser they’d spent five years building. Starting with a rough-and-ready 60s race car from Oklahoma, Troy handled the chassis and ’cage work before it went to Larry’s for everything else, including the gorgeous paintjob. “We kept the frame rails; pretty much everything else is brand new,” said Troy, who was happy to finish his first event with a conservative eighth-mile average of 6.56@103mph.

6. It was good to see Rob Tansey and his wild ‘Gatekeeper’ gasser still in fine tyre-frying form at Sick Smokies. The 8/71-blown LS-powered ’58 Corvette lost a rear wheel during the Day Six drive when the studs wiggled free of the hub, but Rob fixed it using nuts and bolts from a nearby Tractor Supply Co store as substitutes. They finished the event with an average of 6.47@102mph.

7. Mike Finnegan loaned his ex-Roadkill car, the ‘Rotsun’, to Lil’ Gangstas racer Tom ‘Jimmy Dale’ Gunner, although it’s hard to say whether Mike did him a favour or condemned him to a week of pure hell. The turbo SBF-powered Datsun 240Z popped and banged its way to a best of 7.66@90mph on Day Four before it started burning through head gaskets with regularity. Assisted by various helpers, Jimmy Dale battled on to finish with an 8.14@84mph average.

8. The Stick-Shift class win went to Canadian legend Rich Guido. His go-anywhere ’65 GTO (above) blew a front tyre at the finish line on Day Two and spat the tailshaft out mid-track on Day Seven, but he was able to finish with an average of 5.67@130mph, just 0.05sec ahead of Kyle Buntley’s ’88 Mustang (below).

Kyle had an even tougher time, swapping out the turbo 5.3L in his Fox-body on Day One before struggling to keep head gaskets in it the rest of the way.

9. Drag-and-drive veterans Jay and Tonya Grabiak repped true gasser spirit, with Tonya playing back-up girl for Jay in the family ’55 and, for added style points, wearing a different retro outfit every day! The couple won the Spirit of the Smokies award, a one-off green helmet made just for this event.

“When Sick put out that they wanted long smoky burnouts and back-up girls, I was like, ‘Don’t tempt me with a good time,’” Jay laughed.

10. Manhattan, Illinois’s Nick Cryer claimed his first overall victory, justifying his decision to switch from his beloved wheelstanding Divco milk truck to this far more serious ’33 Ford replica coupe.

The twin-turbo LS-powered hot rod posted a new PB each day, including a scorching 4.54@159mph best, for an average of 4.63@155mph. “We debuted the car in May and we’ve just been learning all summer long, so this is absolutely awesome,” said Nick.

11. Jack Weatherford’s ’55 Chevy, ‘The Beast’, is partly a tribute to Two-Lane Blacktop, but the spooky theme added on top was the work of the Disney props department to promote the 30th anniversary of The Nightmare Before Christmas in 2023. “To all us old-timers, Two-Lane Blacktop is kinda the heart and soul of drag-and-drive,” said Jack, who made sure he recreated the Blacktop scene where the car hurtles past North Carolina’s Cheoah Dam.

12. One of the schmickest new rides at Sick Smokies was Will Owens’s ’68 Barracuda. Powered by a turbo 6.4L Gen III Hemi making north of 1400hp, the car took four years to build and was fired up less than two weeks out from the event. “It was a bucket-list thing for my dad Brennan and I to do a drag-and-drive together,” said Will, a Tennessee local. “We’re gonna see what the weakest link is, and then come out swinging at our next event.”

13. Richard Sparks’s ’63 AMC Rambler Classic 770 Cross Country gasser oozes cool. “I’ve had the car three years, but I only built it into a gasser last year after the tranny went out just 19 days before I took it on Hot Rod Power Tour. The straight axle is out of a ’61 Ford Econoline, and it’s got a 350 Chevy small-block. It’s not real powerful yet; that’s gonna come later.”

14. Sick The Mag boss Tom Bailey had his rare-AF ’69 Ford Torino Talladega at Sick Smokies. Purchased in 2015 as a roller, it’s now rocking a twin-turbo Coyote and six-speed. “This driveline was going to go into my grandma’s old 1970 Cougar, but the Cougar’s still not done, because everything I wanted to do with it, I did with this car,” Tom said. The ’Dega handled the driving legs beautifully, but it was a slug on the track compared to what Tom’s used to, running a 7.86@100mph best.