Lindsay Wheelock Proves It’s Easy To Break Into Drag Racing

Anyone looking closely when the Constant Aviation Factory Stock Showdown competitors are pulling up into the staging lanes at an NHRA race will see that Lindsay Wheelock isn’t alone in her Dodge Challenger Drag Pak.

For her six-year-old son and daughters, 9 and 4, rumbling toward the starting line and a grandstand full of fans isn’t all that much different than a quick zip through the McDonald’s drive-through at home at Lafayette, Ind. – except she shoos them out of the car when they get there, and they don’t get a Happy Meal.

“Everybody else is like, ‘Oh, I bet these kids think it’s so cool,’” Wheelock said. “Like, no, they have no idea. This is normal for them. They get to ride in a 2,000-horsepower vehicle, and they’re worried about when their next snack is, you know?”

And that’s what makes Wheelock, a third-year Factory Stock Showdown racer, so popular. She and husband Dustin and their children represent the core of the sport: grassroots drag racing, working on their own cars, and having serious fun, family-style. They’re ordinary, heart-of-America folks with an uncommon passion for drag racing – who are helping the sport grow.

“I feel like our family is very relatable,” Lindsay Wheelock said. “We are not the first family to come out here and do this – I get that. But I don’t know very many people that are willing to share that side of it. And I’m a very open and honest person. So, I love to overshare – that’s probably one of my biggest downfalls is I give too much information that people don’t necessarily want to know. Well, I think I’m trying to use that to my advantage, where it’s like, ‘Oh, yeah, Lindsay is willing to talk to us.’ I want to be approachable.

“My greatest feedback that’s come from all this, the No. 1 question I get asked is, ‘How do I get started?’ And that tells me that I’m inspiring them to do it…because they know I knew nothing, and they know nothing – yet. They want to try it. And they feel comfortable enough to come ask me that know that I’m going to give ’em advice.”

I’m living a dream that I didn’t even know I had. I tell people that all the time. How cool is that? I don’t know how many people can say they had a dream and didn’t even know it.

And that’s the beauty of Lindsay Wheelock. The 34-year-old full-time dental hygienist, homeschooler, and race-team manager isn’t kidding that she knew nothing when she started out behind the…