An 86-year-old Northern California race car driver proved you’re never too old to feel the need for speed after recently breaking two records by hitting more than 300 miles per hour.
Sacramento resident Gary Matranga and his team recently set records at Utah’s Bonneville Salt Flats this summer — and he’s not done yet.
In the gas division, the grandpa bested his own record by 17 miles per hour, hitting 308 mph.
But Matranga didn’t stop there, returning to race in the fuel division while taking on drivers whose engines were powered by nitromethane and alcohol.
He hit a whopping 310 mph to win, beating the eight-year-old record of 305 mph.
Matranga revealed that handling his modified 1966 Barracuda is no easy task.
“It’s a handful of work sometimes,” he told KCRA.
The Barracuda, with a twin-turbocharged Hemi engine, has more than 2,400 horsepower.
“About 2.5 miles, it kind of settles down with the air force and then at 300 mph it still moves around, the car moves around quite a bit,” the driver shared.
Matranga, who’s been obsessed with speed almost all his life, made it clear he isn’t ready to just sit on his titles.
He’s already making plans with his team to come back — and reach even crazier speeds.
“The idea is to go streamliner at 400 mph,” he said, referring to the specially designed Bonneville racer built with a bullet-shaped body.
Located in the Great Salt Lake basin in Utah, drivers from all over the world travel to the Bonneville Speedway to race on the 30,000 acres of hard white salt crust.
The race track, which has been a popular spot for motorsports since 1912, hosts three speed events every year.
“Bonneville’s terrain is an ideal speedway — it’s barren and flat, with winter rains creating a surface as hard as concrete in the warmer months,” according to Utah Office of Tourism website.
The Vice president of Utah Salt Flats Racing Association, Monte Widdison, called it the “the last bastion of high-end amateur racing in the world.”
