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 When people spot Wanda Exum climbing out of her drag racer, they sometimes stare.
"They usually think I'm just sitting behind the wheel of someone's race car or just steering it while it's being towed someplace," said Exum, one of the few women drivers found on drag racing tracks around the Carolinas.
"Even when they see me wearing the fire suit and a helmet, they still ask if I'm the driver. They just assume my husband is the driver. Not me. It's really comical."
Exum has excelled in the male-dominated International Hot Rod Association Top Dragster class.She's made about 20 appearances at Rockingham.
She's one of 800 drag racers there this weekend for the Holley Spring Nationals at Rockingham Dragway. Qualifying continues today. Finals will begin at 11:30 a.m. Sunday.
Of the competitors this weekend, 25 are female. Exum and Raleigh's Candace Marsh are the only African American females.
Exum's racing career has picked up speed since she graduated from Roy Hill's Drag Racing School in Rockingham in 1993.
The Greensboro resident has driven her green, 1995 S&W 150-inch Altered to speeds up to 190 mph on the eighth- and quarter-mile courses.
"Her car is very unique," said Steve Earwood, owner of Rockingham Dragway. "In fact, it's one of the most exciting cars out there. It's a front engine, short wheel base. That makes it fairly erratic and you have to be pretty talented to handle it on the track."
Exum, the mother of two grown children, works as a business administrator with a Greensboro company. Her love for fast cars can be traced to her childhood in Rocky Mount.
Uncles drove sports cars, but none raced professionally.
Exum didn't move from car enthusiast to driver until her husband and crew chief, Thurman, began to frequent race tracks. Their first date in the early 1970s was to a drag race at Maryland's Capitol Raceway.
Thurman Exum, a professor in motorsports technology at N.C. A&T, raced for a while.
"When he stopped racing, I took it up," she said.
The couple's sons have not been attracted to drag racing. They contend their parents' past-time is "too loud, too dirty, too hot," she said.
But every chance she gets, Exum talks with women, especially college students, about drag racing. One goal, she said, is to change the perception of drag racing as a dangerous, male-dominated sport.
"Safety is always a priority and I feel safe because I know that Thurman takes care to make sure that everything is in place before we get to the track," said Exum, who added she has not been involved in any major crashes.
In January, Exum received a Trailblazer Award from the Association for Minorities in Motor Sports, a 2,000-member organization based in Greensboro.
"She's the fastest African American female in the nation in drag racing," said Wayne Clapp, founder and executive director of the organization.
The organization also recognized the contributions of pioneering minority racers such as NASCAR's Wendell Scott, Bill Lester, Harold Mills and Willie T. Ribbs.
"I plan to keep racing until I can't get in -- or out of -- the car anymore," Exum said. "Not everyone can drive a race car or have the nerve to do so. I'd be remiss in not using that talent."
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