Uncle Robin Lawrence Has A Thing For Breaking Nine-Second Barriers, But This One Came On His New Car's First Spin
If you spend any time listening to Dr. Meyer giving the NMRA play-by-play from the tower, you would think Uncle Robin Lawrence was driving an 800hp walker. The Doc has a penchant for creative exaggeration and often jokes that Uncle Robin is the oldest man in Ford drag racing. At 47, Robin isn't even close to being the oldest, but he's certainly older than many of the 20- and 30-something whippersnappers he competes against. We only hope we're as dedicated and enthusiastic about anything at 47 as Robin is about racing Mustangs.
In 1996, we first met Robin at the annual Super Ford 5.0 Shootout. This was the only 5.0 Shootout held in Canada, and Robin showed up with his turbocharged '94 Mustang and no sponsor stickers-how times have changed. A lot of things have changed since then, but one thing is oddly similar-that turbo car ran mid-nines. We met up with Robin years later as he was campaigning his Fox coupe in NMRA Factory Stock. He had earned a reputation for testing, testing, and more testing to extract every last bit of power from his combination. Since he knew us, he decided to share some of his secrets in the pages of this magazine.
We had featured his Factory Stock ride, and when he made the move to Real Street, we kept telling him he'd have to build a new car to score another feature in the magazine-it's rare we feature the same car twice unless it has changed owners and radically changed combinations. With that thought stuck in the back of his head, Robin soldiered on in Real Street, becoming the first car to run a nine-second pass, thus ruining our little street class for good-just kidding. It did forever raise the competitive bar in a class populated with experienced racers.
Ever looking for ways to keep his sponsors happy so he can afford to continue racing, what could Robin do-besides actually winning a race-to stand out from the pack? Oh, yeah, a new car. Not just any new car, however. Robin got the wild idea to build an '05 Mustang. At first, the plan was to acquire a body-in-white from Ford Racing Performance Parts and scratch-build a cutting-edge Real Street machine. "Basically when I saw the '05 at Michigan with Dr. Jamie Meyer driving it, it was the first look I had at the car. I thought, That car doesn't look bad going down the track," Robin explains. "When I saw mention of the bodies-in-white on the Internet, I submitted an application. When it was approved, I told Don West I really couldn't afford the car, and he handed me a check for the cost of the body-in-white."
You know what they say about best-laid plans. Being on the cutting edge isn't always easy, and the downside to grabbing a body-in-white so early in the game was that no crash parts were available at dealers-no interior, no glass, nothing. Time for Plan B. Robin decided that starting with a real car would be the best route, so he pooled his sponsor money and purchased a spanking-new '05 V-6 from his pal and fellow racer Bruce Hemminger.
After driving the car around to visit some sponsors, Robin knew what came next. At the time, it was unthinkable, but Robin had to tear apart a perfectly good Mustang. Before the check for the first payment was even written, Robin had the car apart in his garage. He struck a deal with Mustang Parts Specialties to purchase all the V-6 drivetrain gear he would be using. That helped offset the cost of building the new car, but it also meant he had a $20,000 doorstop in the garage.