Drag Illustrated Issue 153, February 2020 | Page 47
DIALED IN
Turkey Beach Bash
Southeast bracket racers gobble up over $40,000
at inaugural Gulfport Dragway event By Van Abernethy
W
hen race promoter Gaylon
Rolison Jr. wanted to put together
a pre-Thanksgiving race at his lo-
cal Gulfport Dragway in Gulfport,
Mississippi, he knew that timing
was crucial since most folks clear their calendar
to be with family on Thanksgiving.
He figured that a gathering of bracket racers
competing for big purses would be a success in
November and penciled it in the week before
Thanksgiving, which turned out to be a huge
success, for the appropriately named inaugural
Turkey Beach Bash, a proposed one-off event
that Rolison says is already on the schedule for
February 2020
2020 due to the fantastic turnout.
For Rolison, the infrastructure was really al-
ready in place when you consider the steadfast
support from local racers who compete in the
King of the Coast series, which Rolison co-found-
ed in 2005 and now operates with his wife, Jen-
nifer, and their daughters, Morgan and Kendall.
For a brand-new event such as this to work,
Rolison says he knew his core racers from King
of the Coast would have to come out and support
it, and they didn’t disappoint. “We opened this
race for pre-entry on July 1st, and we were full
all the way up till this weekend. It sold out pretty
quickly,” says Rolison.
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