How do you put a proper cap on top of the three days of awesome old-school racing that the 2021 Holley Hot Rod Nationals bring to Beech Bend Raceway at Bowling Green? How do you exceed the treasures hidden in the swap meet, or the gleaming show vehicles that are out in the show fields? After three days of everything from Nostalgia Super Stock machines to the wild Geezer Gassers, what's left? That can be summed up in one word: Cacklefest. The proper end to the festivities involves a final blowout that involves liberal use of nitromethane.

If you haven't had the experience of a Cacklefest or nitromethane cars in general, allow us to explain it to you as best as we can. These are the cars that your grandparents warned your parents about. This is a fuel so wicked that for a few years in the later 1950s, certain tracks refused to allow nitromethane-powered machines to run at their facilities while names like Emery Cook and Don Garlits were posting run times that fell somewhere between "surprising" and "shocking". Nitromethane-powered machines stand out above all of the racers by the physical experience...the exhaust note is sharp and cackling, the scent grabs the nose and won't let go, your eyes will water as the exhaust fumes are a mild irritant at close range. When these machines race, the initial "hit" that you feel when the cars dig in and start accelerating is harder than a gasoline-powered machine.

For Cacklefest, the celebration starts with a parade of the winners of the PPG Show 'n Shine event right at the sun starts to make it's final move down towards the trees at the far end of Beech Bend. After each winner gets their moment in the sunset, the parade of every nitromethane-powered machine starts, with the cars that will be push-started paraded down to the far end of the track. The remainder of the vehicles will be parked up against the walls of the track and as soon as it's dark enough, the engines are lit off. Push-started vehicles will idle their way up into place against the wall as the photographers swarm over the machines, doing their best to capture the flames jetting out from the header pipes.The teams will run the engines as long as they feel safe, before things start to get too hot, then once every last machine shuts off, that's when the end of the 2021 Holley Hot Rod Reunion has been reached, with the air hanging rich with nitromethane fumes.