Darrell Gwynn Foundation - Official Charity of Barrett Jackson
03.31.09: NHRA Winner's Funny Car to be Auctioned at Palm Beach Barrett-Jackson Event
West Palm Beach, FL -- Drag racing champion Mike Ashley’s 2007 Custom Nitro Funny Car will be sold during Barrett-Jackson Palm Beach Collector Car Auction to benefit the Darrell Gwynn Foundation, a Florida-based nonprofit and an official charity of Barrett-Jackson. The Torco Racing Fuels Dodge Charger that Ashley drove to victory in the 2007 MAC Tools U.S. Nationals will be auctioned off April 10 during the “World’s Greatest Collector Car Event” in West Palm Beach. Proceeds will support the Foundation’s paralysis prevention, care and advocacy work.
The same car sold for $130,000 at the 2008 Barrett-Jackson’s auction in Scottsdale. The car was donated back to the Darrell Gwynn Foundation by a noted collector and contributor to the Foundation. The car is not set up to run, and is being sold as is. The lot number is 374.4. The car was designed by Chip Foose as tribute to the Eric Blake Faulkner Foundation which has helped families with stillborn children. Donnie and the late-Hollie Faulkner had been the proprietors of the traveling Oakley merchandising trailer that has covered the 23-race National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) series. Ashley raced the car once and won with it in the U.S. Nationals.
“We’re thrilled to auction off this car with such an incredible story,” Foundation president Darrell Gwynn said. “We know a lot of car collectors will want to own this car. It’s connected to tremendous causes.” Gwynn, a former NHRA star who is paralyzed from a 1990 racing accident, created the Foundation in 2002 to raise money for donating custom wheelchairs, providing long-term services for new spinal cord injury patients, funding paralysis research, and getting the public involved and educated about ways to avoid paralyzing injuries.
Ashley will join Gwynn on stage in auctioning off the car. In conjunction with the auction, the Foundation will present custom wheelchairs to a 20-year-old college student and an 18-year-old with cerebral palsy. The agency has donated more than 70 wheelchairs at racing, fishing, car auction and other events, as well as when needs arise throughout the year. “Donating wheelchairs before large crowds gives bidders a true sense of what our work is all about,” Gwynn said.
One of my all-time favorite photos, The Kid and Big Daddy ~ fla
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