For the first three weeks in July, Pro Modified driver Ed Hoover was riding the high of his life.

With two straight wins at national events in Edmonton and Grand Bend, Hoover rocketed to the top of the Pro Mod point standings ahead of defending champion Kenny Lang and looked poised to pull away in the chase of his first career championship.

Then July came to an end.

The Northern Nationals started innocently enough, with Hoover wrapping up one of the most successful months of his career third on the qualifying charts entering Sunday’s final eliminations, but with a new month came a few new challenges for Hoover and his team.

For the first three weeks in July, Pro Modified driver Ed Hoover was riding the high of his life.

With two straight wins at national events in Edmonton and Grand Bend, Hoover rocketed to the top of the Pro Mod point standings ahead of defending champion Kenny Lang and looked poised to pull away in the chase of his first career championship.

Then July came to an end.

The Northern Nationals started innocently enough, with Hoover wrapping up one of the most successful months of his career third on the qualifying charts entering Sunday’s final eliminations, but with a new month came a few new challenges for Hoover and his team.

Hoover began the new month with a win over Harold Martin in the opening round, but his win streak of nine straight round wins dating back to the Sooner Nationals in June abruptly came to an end at the hands of Ike Maier.

“I headed toward the wall for some unknown reason. I say I was lined up wrong and my crew said I wasn’t. Either way it drove over to the wall and I had to slap the gas and just got beat,” Hoover said.

In the meantime rival Kenny Lang picked up his second win of the year and was able to erase any hint of a lead Hoover once had in jumping ahead by 56 points over Hoover.

“He went on and won the race and that took me right out of the lead and put him in a really good position,” Hoover said. “I have to try to either beat him early or win them all.”

Now Hoover travels to New England Dragway looking to get back on track and put himself back in championship contention with just three races remaining on the schedule.

“We have to capitalize on the next three races. We really need to win the last three races,” Hoover said. “As impossible as that sounds to win three in a row in Pro Mod, that is what we need to do, especially with the way Lang and his crew are performing.

“He doesn’t seem to have any bad luck like Ed Hoover does.”

While Hoover was clearly disappointed to see all of his hard work disappear in just one race, if there is only one thing you can count on it is that Hoover will be right in the thick of the title hunt the rest of the season.

“We will try our best to fight for it. We have 12 rounds of racing left giving us a short time to do a whole lot,” Hoover said. “The car is competitive enough to win races and I just have to try to do my best to get it done.” 

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