Former NHRA Announcer Dave McClelland Dies at 85

• McClelland took an unlikely route to his place in drag-racing history.

• Among his many honors was induction into Motorsports Hall of Fame of America in 2016.

• NHRA became his home for more than half of its 71-year history.

Former SEMA president and CEO Chris Kersting said, “Every once in a while, we get to be a part of the magic that happens when exactly the right person is performing in a particular role.”

He was referring to Dave McClelland, the legendary velvet-voiced NHRA broadcaster for three decades, who died Sunday of natural causes at age 85.

Kersting was right. It wasn’t just McClelland’s honey-smooth voice and classic delivery that made the often-honored announcer so much a part of the NHRA’s 70-plus-year drag-racing story. It was his commitment to his craft, his genuine love for the sport’s people as much as for its quick and fast race cars, and his approachability and enthusiasm.

To borrow a line from the late Indianapolis Star motorsports writer George Moore (who said it about USAC plane-crash victim Frankie Del Roy), McClelland was a one-off: “They built only one. And [Sunday] they closed up the shop.”

Bill Moore, writing in January 2009 for Speed Style Magazine, said, “Dave McClelland has stood out from the herd all these years in a world of blinding speed and spectacular automobiles, hot rods, cruisers, and dragsters. He’s a classy kind of guy you’d want to call friend . . . and over the years he has been friend to a vast range of men and women, including the real movers and shakers in the culture of cars and the sport of speed. And, in rubbing shoulders with great men and women, he not only helped elevate them, but he has elevated himself through hard work that generally meant holding down two jobs throughout his working life.”

For that, he has been honored on what he would have called “a humbling” number of occasions. Perhaps at the pinnacle is his 2016 induction to the Motorsports Hall of Fame of America. He received the Car Craft Magazine Ollie Award and was named to the Car Craft All-Star Drag Racing Team for lifelong contributions to drag racing. SEMA enshrined him in its Hall of Fame, fitting because he had emceed the organization’s awards banquet from 1976 to 2015.

The Don Garlits Museum’s International Drag Racing Hall of Fame presented McClelland with the Founders Award. And in a surprise move in 2009, during a dinner ceremony he was emceeing, the American Auto Racing Writers and Broadcasters Association named him the recipient of the Pioneer Award for longtime dedication and achievement that has made a difference in motorsports. The Pioneer is one of AARWBA's oldest and most prestigious awards, and this was the first time it was presented to someone in the media.