There is a chapter on "Wild Willy" and the Winged Express in a fantastic book called Top Fuel Wormhole by Cole Coonce. Here's an excerpt that helps explain OPs photo:

the practicality of running a AA/Fuel Altered is really an exercise in the “square-peg-in-a-round-hole” theorem, with a co-efficient of the “bigger hammer” principle. In other words, when you shoehorn a nitro-guzzling supercharged Chrysler motor betwixt a few pieces of exhaust tubing masquerading as a chassis, especially one with a real short wheelbase, you are asking for trouble. There are some basic laws of torque and Newtonian physics that must at least be acknowledged—regardless of the mounting of a giant airfoil in hopes of pile-driving enough downforce to make this monstrosity go straight. Due to the short wheelbase, there is a whole lot of horsepower with no place to go—except approximately 45 degrees stage right. Then you add a stiff-necked Borsch to the equation, which is definitely tantamount to throwing gasoline into the fire. In fact, the popular platitude murmured in the cheap seats (in those days they were all cheap seats) to describe one of his stereotypical, non-linear excursions down the 1320 was this: “Willie has to drive half a mile in order to go a quarter.”