A while back, we told you the story of Pancho González, a professional tennis superstar who spent his free time drag racing. When he wasn’t on a tennis court or racetrack, Pancho was making friends all over the SoCal hotrodding scene, and he maintained close relationships with legends like Louis Senter, Nick Arias, and Ed Iskenderian.
While writing that story, we learned that Pancho’s eldest son, Richard Gonzales and Pancho’s nephew, Greg Gonzales were in the process of painstakingly recreating one of the dragsters campaigned by Pancho and his younger brother Ralph Gonzales during the late 1950s in NHRA competition.
Racing under the team name “The Gonzales Brothers”, the original dragster won several Top Eliminator trophies at the local Southern California Dragstrips and qualified Second at the 1958 NHRA U.S. Nationals.
In its prime, the dragster could cut a 9.68 second/157.54 mph elapsed time.
Fun Fact: Thanks to his successful tennis career, González is often regarded as the first professional athlete to compete in drag racing. In fact, Greg likes to quip that “Pancho played tennis so he could afford to race!”
With the original dragster lost to the sands of time, Richard and Greg wanted to recreate it as accurately as possible—right down to the 4-71 GMC Blower on its 390 cubic inch Cadillac A/Fuel engine. Thankfully, they had pictures and some rough build specs to work with.
They got on their phone and enlisted plenty of experts on the project—veteran drag racers and builders with more years of experience than we care to count. Pretty soon project leader Wayne “The Peregrine” King (who sadly passed away in 2023), master fabricator Jim Hume, and famed engine builder Hugh Reynolds were on the job.
The project spanned years and incorporated a dizzying mix of skill sets, from the chassis design to the actual fabrication work required to make it all fit together.
The engine was a sizeable project in itself—first to source a workable 390 Cadillac block, and then the immense effort to turn it into a nitro-fueled and supercharged drag race powerplant.
Thankfully, Hugh Reynolds is a very, very detail-oriented guy and documented the entire build. Check out his story on that 390 Caddy motor here.
…And yeah, in case you were wondering, though it currently runs on alcohol, Hugh explains that the engine is totally ready for Nitromethane too.
We’ve stayed in touch with Greg Gonzales over the past few years, and eagerly awaited any news of the dragster’s progress.
Around a year ago, we learned that the engine was in the chassis and the dragster could move under its own power.
Yeah…you’ve got to hear this angry 390 Caddy for yourself:
Now, Greg is pleased to report that it’s done and making the rounds in the Nostalgia Drag Racing Circuit.
Indeed, the dragster’s already shown up to the Bakersfield Hot Rod Reunion and at local club events in and around the West Coast. And after reading our earlier article on Pancho, John Borcher from Goodguys invited the dragster down to the recent 2025 Spring Nationals in Scottsdale, Arizona too, where it got a ton of attention.
Greg tells us the dragster always draws a crowd of folks eager to learn about its history and get the story behind its famous owner, Pancho González—in fact, walk around the dragster and you’ll see his own signature Spalding tennis balls stuffed in the velocity stacks as a nod to its provenance.
In the future, Greg says he hopes to bring the dragster to the upcoming Nitro Revival at the California Hot Rod Reunion that’s taking place at Pancho’s old stomping grounds—the famed Famoso Dragstrip, just outside of Bakersfield, California.
And there are also talks about a potential film opportunity as well.
Hat tip to Greg Gonzales for his continual updates on the project, along with Tyler Meza for providing these incredible photos.
Check out the pics below and you’ll see the impressive amount of detail work that went into this incredibly accurate dragster recreation. And if you’d like to learn more about the Pancho González story, give this podcast episode a listen:
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