Hard to crank...

[K5Danny]

Forgive me if this topic is covered elsewhere. My 72 Blazer is a monster to get started after it has been sitting a few days. It has a 350 with the Q'jet carb. Someone wire tied the choke to one position, so I'm not sure if I should investigate that or not. I usually pump the gas 3-4 times and turn it over with about half throttle. If it doesn't hit, I'll repeat. Usually after about 3-4 minutes of this it will finally crank. The starter solenoid or ignition switch is going bad too, so usually during this time, the starter won't even work for a few minutes. I'll fix that problem this weekend, but I'd like to know how to remedy the situation of getting it cranked.

Thanks in advance!