Ever wondered what goes on behind the scenes at a National Hot Rod Association drag racing event? The folks over at 1320 Video on YouTube got some excellent behind-the-scenes access to help viewers understand what goes on in the world of professional, top-level drag racing, and it’s a great video for both longtime fans and the curious newcomer.

Basically, 1320 hit up the NHRA Finals for the first time in 2021, which took place at Auto Club Raceway in Pomona, California. As you can imagine, it was a big event, which meant that there was tons of racing to watch and tons of cool stories to learn.

The full video is below:

Here, you’ll get a tour of everything — what it’s like to be a fan or a media member, how a race production is made, and how each category breaks down. You also get to hear a fun story about how the scoreboards at Pomona are way shorter than usual because the track is on an airfield and a plane once crashed into the board.

I love motorsport logistics. It’s like watching a really cool traveling circus roll into town for a few days, where everything is set up and torn down in record time, and with some racing in between — so seeing the Jumbotron with its own trailer and the portable studios that the NHRA brings to events is much of what made this video so fascinating to me.

And then, yeah, there’s the fun bit: the actual race cars (which includes a drag-raceable PT Cruiser). Despite making plans to go time and again for the past three years, I’ve yet to attend a proper NHRA drag event. After chatting with our lovely managing editor Lalita Chemello today — and finally sitting down to watch this 1320 video in full — I’ve finally made it my mission to get to the drag strip in 2022. COVID permitting, of course.