Mercedes Benz 230 SL, Loring Timing Association, and The Problem of Nostalgia

Stopped at Affordable Performance, Sean McKay's car shop on the Naskeag Road (across from the cemetery, next to the Beth Eden chapel.) One of the first machines I saw was this spritely Benz. I'll post later on the beater 1995 GMC that Sean is psyching-up to run at Loring Timing Association's 2.5 ex-airfield strip this weekend, way up in The County.  Zooming old airstrips: boys, this is going back to gearhead roots of the mid-late 1940s, when abandoned airfields (and California dry lakes) were the early venues of our kind of racing. Speaking of roots, have a look at the current issue of Hot Rod for a profile of the last 50 years of making things go faster. On the other hand: back in the May 2013 issue HR ran a sharp piece by David Freiburger on the problem of nostalgia ("Nostalgia: Getting Old?"). The problem may be bigger than billet.