Hungry to Race

© RumBum.com

Shawn Gann winds down after a day on the track.

On Thursday night, Shawn Gann's tummy's had to be growling louder than his Buell revving at the start line. With no breakfast, at the crack of 7:00 a.m. the Rum Bum race team hopped over to Concord, NC for the NHRA Carolinas Nationals. By the time they hit the zMax Dragway on Thursday afternoon for final prep before the next big race, Gann still hadn't eaten so much as a Saltine. And he didn't plan to until after his first qualifying round following day.

Though a fortnight ago, Gann hosted a tasty cake-filled celebration upon making the Top 10 of the NHRA Full Throttle Series - meaning that at #9, he's still steady in the running to win the whole shebang - he's back to the diet grindstone to make weight. Yes, a la high school wrestling champ spitting in a cup during math class, in Gann's profession the lighter the better. So the 5'7", 170lbs-ish racer forces a fast for over 24hrs.

"I feel like the fat girl in 7th grade," Gann confesses. Carrying an athletically fit frame already, the racer does everything he can imagine to lighten his load - well, everything other than pull an all-out Ghandi. The healthy foodie ordered a lighter racing suit, halved the amount of paint on his bike frame, and purchased a relatively featherweight carbon fiber helmet. But that last 5lbs is up to him.

While Gann is trying to get his mind off the rumble from his abdomen, Bailey Whitaker has a different hunger; he's gearing up to test out his newly built engine at the nationals courtesy of the Rum Bum Crew Chief, Gann's father, Blake, and the rest of the Race Team. According to the chief, the Rum Bum team is set to strike hard this weekend - with or without Gann's three squares a day. His skill and adrenaline can handle the reins just fine.