Sisterhood of Muscle Vee Dolofan

Vee Dolofan is the embodiment of a high-performance mom on the go. She and her husband run a real estate property management business in the Las Vegas area in addition to raising their six children, yet she still finds the time to go drag racing with her Dodge Challenger SRT® Super Stock – including an appearance in the popular Street Outlaws television series.

I’m a jack of all trades: wife, mother, momager, office manager, director of marketing/advertising, consultant, investor, designated driver (haha!) and the best part of it all is drag racer! Life is great!

Mother of Six

Every parent who is reading this knows how much work it is to raise one child, let alone six, but it should be noted that all of the children are into some form of athletics. Youth sports schedules are often grueling and once again, the Dolofan family is juggling four of those schedules at once – and Vee is using her own experiences in the drag racing world to inspire her kids.

My other children are all active athletes and I am so proud of them for their hard work and determination. My eldest son plays college football in Illinois on a football scholarship, my daughter is an active competitor in gymnastics as a Junior Olympian and my youngest son, who is the energizer bunny and literally the kid who never stops, is working towards being in boys gymnastics. However, he is heavily into working out and is infatuated with body building. It’s crazy to say for a kid who is only seven years old but has had a six pack since he was five years old. I mean the kid has crazy genetics when you look at him! So, I am excited for him to start getting into a sport … I think this is just only the beginning to something possibly amazing for him and all of my other children and their future.

To me, there is no way to tell how far an athlete can go but I always remind them that you can do anything you put your mind towards to and make sure you give it your all. I think that’s why it’s so important for me to share with them my love for drag racing. Drag racing is a male-dominated sport and I want to show them it’s not. We need to face fear in the eyes and say that we, as women, can do it too. If I can put my focus into something I am passionate about, so can my children. It doesn’t matter what sports you choose. You can choose to be great at everything. Why limit yourself? Do it all (with the exception you are doing the right thing) and I am hopeful that someday my kids can have the same confidence to do the same.”

Getting into Drag Racing

We asked Dolofan how she got into racing and as is often the case, she got involved by watching her husband race for a while before getting on the track herself. However, she has always been into muscle cars and the car scene in general.

My husband is the culprit as far as drag racing goes. We both have a love for the car scene and I was heavily in love with muscle cars since I was a little girl. I could remember the majority of the muscle cars I saw by just looking at them … but as far as racing goes, it was my husband who I used to go to the track with and always watch him racing. One day, he asked me if I wanted to do it so that I didn’t have to sit there and watch and at the time, I drove a Ford Mustang GT. I took it out to our local race track on amateur night called Midnight Mayhem. Since then, I never looked back.”

While Vee Dolofan may not have looked back after cutting her teeth at the track, she began looking forward to a faster vehicle. In 2017, she purchased her first Dodge – a Maximum Steel Challenger SRT Hellcat.

At the time, I had no clue what I was getting into because you could not test drive Hellcats at all. I drove it straight home from the showroom floor and you could definitely tell this car was going to be a beast out on the streets. There weren’t many people driving Hellcats at the time, so I had to do a lot of researching online and picking people’s brain who did own Hellcats to familiarize myself with this platform. It’s been the best decision yet and I have not looked back since driving it home from the dealership back in 2017.

After spending a few years with that SRT Hellcat, getting a feel for the power and the chassis, she decided to move up to an even quicker Dodge, selling her first Challenger to make room in the garage for her SRT Super Stock. She purchased this second Challenger specifically to go drag racing, so while it can be driven on the street, she does not use it as a daily driver. She races often in the Las Vegas area and has traveled as far as Texas, where she competed in TX2K – one of the best-known drag racing events for street cars in the country.

Vee Dolofan’s most unique racing experience came when she was invited to participate in a special version of the popular television show Street Outlaws. She provided some insight on how she got on the show and what it was like to participate in the filming.

My name came about when the racing community heard that Street Outlaws were going to be in town for filming with the women/wives of Street Outlaws. Several of my racing buddies contacted me and told me they were going to get my name to the producers. I was a bit hesitant at first because my initial thought was, ‘I don’t street race,’ but after a lot of people kept asking me to do it … I got the courage to say ‘Why not? I just want to go race.’ Then, I got the call that I was going to be on the first episode of Gone Girl with three days’ notice. It wasn’t enough time for me to learn, to prep, to get my tuner out to Las Vegas and retune my car for the streets, absolutely nothing. So, I said ‘Heck! Race what you brung’ and I went ALL in cold turkey and went out to just have a good time. I knew my car was fast enough, but traction was going to be my biggest challenge racing on the streets.

On the day of filming, the street temperatures dropped quick and it was so windy that trying to prep the streets became impossible. There was dirt and dust all over the streets on top of it being ridiculously cold. I was out there freezing in winter/ski clothes that I luckily borrowed from a friend who had them in his truck that night. My hands and feet turned numb while we were out there filming for 12 hours. It wasn’t the greatest feeling already battling weather conditions, no prep and my car not possibly being able to hook on this street! Yup, I had it coming to me. Though, I wasn’t here to have an excuse … I was going to race and I was going to do what I do best, control the madness of my Hellcat racing out in the streets!

I ended up being paired with Lizzy Musi that night and it is quite a story for me! Lizzy showed up on big tires vs. my small tire and that was my first initial thought going in was ‘whatever to the rules … I’m going to race her anyways.’ Even though I felt like this was ‘entertainment’, I can’t say enough good things about the racers and the whole entire production crew. They were amazing people! I also don’t get to race many females in this sport since it is a male-dominated sport, so I was all in for it. I felt like what the viewers saw on TV was different to my perception of how the race really went down. When Lizzy and I both raced, our cars left strong off the line, but our tires let loose immediately. All I remember was that Lizzy’s car swerved really close into hitting mine and I let off and quickly veered to the right so we wouldn’t collide. It could have been real disastrous had I not made that judgment to get out of it. Lizzy gained control when I got out of it and she was able to get back on it. I tried to do the same once I got control, but my rear end spun horribly and I got out of it quickly. It wasn’t worth me trying to catch up, Lizzy was already gone. When we both got back to the starting line, the ladies of Street Outlaws were telling me good race, you can drive! Though we live to race another day … and, guess what, they were right … Lizzy and I got out of our cars and we hugged each other tight and started laughing. Yeah, that was pretty nerve-racking. Holy smokes! That has got to be the craziest race I have ever had! My car would have given it to her but it wasn’t my time. I want a rematch someday because I know that my small tire Mopar® could beat her big tire Camaro. Regardless, it was fun and I’d do it again someday – if they let me.”

Her 2021 Dodge Challenger SRT Super Stock is stock, shy of the 17-inch Mickey Thompson drag radial tires, and her best time to date is 10.44, but keep in mind that she does the vast majority of her racing at Las Vegas Motor Speedway with high elevation and big density altitude numbers. However, she has plans to add more power to run quicker times.

“I have always had a love of American muscle since I was a little girl and that has never changed. I have lots of goals going forward and my first would be to start modifying my Super Stock so that I can start competing again. At the same time, I want to concentrate on the NHRA Bracket Series in hopes that I can continue to fine tune my driver skills. I am on a mission to get more PBs and get back to winning races again!”

To assist in her efforts of winning more races, Vee Dolofan attended Frank Hawley’s Drag Racing School and got her racing license in a 7.50 Super Gas car, along with picking up some tips and tricks of the trade. In addition to her quarter-mile drag racing program, Dolofan and her husband also participate in half-mile racing and she hopes to compete in the Texas Mile in the future. Her ultimate goal there is to break the record for a street-legal Mopar vehicle, with her current best speed being 174 miles per hour in the half-mile.

Regardless of the length of track, everywhere Vee Dolofan goes racing, she shows others than you can have a career, raise kids and still find time to exercise your need for speed.

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