Nothing was going to erase the smile from Extreme 10.5 racer Chuck Ulsch’s face, not even losing a hard fought battle against Billy Glidden in the finals at the ADRL Gateway Drags in St. Louis on Saturday night.

That’s because win, lose or draw against Glidden, Ulsch knew his name would be forever etched in drag racing history as the first driver in his class to ever record a three-second elapsed time.

Ulsch posted a monumental 3.986 elapsed time at 197.88 miles per hour to not only beat class heavy-hitter Jeff Naiser but also advance to his second consecutive ADRL final round.

Semi-final in St. Louis, Ulsch Laid Down the Run …

Nothing was going to erase the smile from Extreme 10.5 racer Chuck Ulsch’s face, not even losing a hard fought battle against Billy Glidden in the finals at the ADRL Gateway Drags in St. Louis on Saturday night.

That’s because win, lose or draw against Glidden, Ulsch knew his name would be forever etched in drag racing history as the first driver in his class to ever record a three-second elapsed time.

Ulsch posted a monumental 3.986 elapsed time at 197.88 miles per hour to not only beat class heavy-hitter Jeff Naiser but also advance to his second consecutive ADRL final round.

“If I had to give one up for the other, I’d gladly hand over the win for that first three-second run,” Ulsch admitted. “That’s a mark in history right there.”

Ulsch had been awful close to the mark before the St. Louis semi-final run having run a 4.010 two weeks prior in Dinwiddie. During Saturday’s heat-drenched qualifying, Ulsch reeled off another 4.01 behind the wheel of Gil Mobley’s Camaro to qualify on top of the sixteen-car field.

Heat be damned, Ulsch knew that he had the car to run the three.

“We knew we were awful close to it,” Ulsch said. “All we needed to do was get the short times down a bit and we knew it would run out the back door. We believed later in the day that the track would come around to us [as it cooled down] and it did. I had a feeling when I left the starting line that it was going to run a three.”

The feeling wasn’t a totally confident one for Ulsch as he admitted a measure of surprise when the three-second run popped on the scoreboard.

“Getting that run down in the books was a lot of work off of our backs, we did a lot of work for that run,” Ulsch pointed out. “Todd Tutterow and the crew really worked hard to make this happen.”

For his efforts, Ulsch will receive a $3,000.00 "bounty" from Mickey Thompson Tires plus Flowmaster Muffler's $5,000.00 cash reward, a 3 second commemorative ring and a custom-designed leather jacket. He is the inaugural member of the Mickey Thompson Tires & Wheels ADRL Extreme 10.5 3-Second Club.

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