Despite their popularity in street cars since the 1940’s, it’s not all that common to see convertibles transformed into legitimate drag racing vehicles. Sure, there are hordes of open top roadsters in Super Gas, but we’re talking real, honest to God convertibles here. And drag racing needs more of them, because they’re different and they’re certainly cool.
Case in point is Tim Rigby’s awesome 1962 Corvette Convertible, which, to our knowledge, was the only convertible competing at the recent Radial Revolution at the South Georgia Motorsports Park and perhaps the only small tire, heads-up car of its kind. Some may know Rigby, who hails from Tehachapi, Calif., as the point man behind the West Coast Hot Rod Association.
Rigby’s beautiful and unquestionably unique Corvette is powered by a 418 cubic inch small block Chevrolet sporting a set of 265cc, 23-degree ported AIRWOLF cylinder heads from Dr. J’s Performance, and is nitrous-fed through an Induction Solutions two-stage fogger system. The bullet also features 14:1 custom nitrous pistons from CP, a .900 lift solid roller camshaft, a ported Edelbrock Super Victor intake, and a Dominator carburetor at the helm.
Rigby towed all the way to Georgia from the West Coast to compete in the popular X275 category, and while he came up just three spots shy of making the 32-car qualified field, he laid down an awesome 5.092 at 139.49 MPH on his very first pass on 275 Drag Radials at 2,920 pounds that had announcer Al Tucci and the crowd going wild.