It wasn't the first time that drag racers, the Navy, and HOT ROD had conspired on a story. Big Daddy, who controversially visited troops in Vietnam in 1971 (HRM, Apr. '72), posed for Navy posters on the deck of the USS Lexington in 1972. Next, in the Sept. '75 issue, Terry Cook wrote of Tom "The Mongoose" McEwen in his Duster Funny Car racing a Navy F-14 Tomcat at the Naval Air Test Center in Patuxent River, Maryland. Over the 258-foot distance of the aircraft's catapult launch, 'Goose lost with 1.97 seconds at 118.20 mph to the F-14's 1.76 seconds and 175.86 mph.
In Sept. '83, Garlits did another shoot aboard the USS John F. Kennedy with his exhibition turbine dragster, Swamp Rat XXVIII. He got more serious in the Apr. '87 mag with an actual race against a Navy F/A-18 Hornet at New Jersey's Lakehurst Naval Air Station. The race was 300 feet, covered in 2.29 seconds by the plane while Garlits was unable to hook up on the runway. A special 300-foot timer was set up at the Keystone Nationals to clock Garlits at 2.39 seconds. The Navy had won again.
