Tony Pontieri recorded his first win of the season in a wild weekend of excitement and upsets as the AMS Pro Mod Challenge presented by Tindle Enterprises, Inc. ran the last race in its ten race season at the ACDelco Las Vegas NHRA Nationals.
 
The final between two stalwarts in the series, Pontieri and Steve Engel,  was decided by less than seven inches -- .0017 seconds - with Pontieri's '57 Chevy Bel Air edging Engle's '63 Corvette for the win and the AMS Eagle.
 
"I've gotten close so many times, just to be denied, most of the time it seemed by Josh Hernandez," Pontieri said. "When he went out first round, I said to myself 'I've got a chance!' - and sure enough, we did it!

Tony Pontieri recorded his first win of the season in a wild weekend of excitement and upsets as the AMS Pro Mod Challenge presented by Tindle Enterprises, Inc. ran the last race in its ten race season at the ACDelco Las Vegas NHRA Nationals.
 
The final between two stalwarts in the series, Pontieri and Steve Engel,  was decided by less than seven inches -- .0017 seconds - with Pontieri's '57 Chevy Bel Air edging Engle's '63 Corvette for the win and the AMS Eagle.
 
"I've gotten close so many times, just to be denied, most of the time it seemed by Josh Hernandez," Pontieri said. "When he went out first round, I said to myself 'I've got a chance!' - and sure enough, we did it!
 
"That final against Steve was a heck of a race - I honestly didn't know who won, I was just praying the light would come on in my lane," he said.
 
Pontieri's path to the finals included defeating Glen Kerunsky on a holeshot, 6.145/232.27 to 6.131/230.88, Kirk Kuhns and Jay Payne. Engle worked his way through Mike Knowles, Danny Rowe on a huge holeshot - 6.135/238.60 to Rowe's 6.070/236.92, and Harold Laird who redlighted in the semifinals against Engle.
 
No. 2 qualifier and newly crowned 2007 World Champion Josh Hernandez continued his battle with red-light starts, fouling out in his first round match with Kirk Kuhns and wasting the day's quickest and fastest lap of 6.047/238.68. Also suffering an upset in round one was Canadian restaurateur Raymond Commisso. His loss could have cost him the runner-up position in the BAE World Championship, but Jay Payne's semifinal loss to Pontieri assured Commisso of the No. 2 spot and relegated Payne to third place for the season.
 
Despite losing in the first round to the nitrous-powered '01 Viper of Billy Harper, series presenting sponsor Tim Tindle walked away with the $25,000 cash grand prize and from ProCare Rx CEO and Chairman Roger Burgess for defeating 2006 World Champion Jay Payne in the final round of the $50,000 ProCare Rx Pro Mod Clash.
 
After rattling off consistent 6.0-second runs in the first two rounds of ProCare Rx Clash eliminations, Tindle took the stripe ahead of Jay Payne in the final with a tire-shaking, back and forth wild ride down the quarter-mile. Tindle also earned the No. 1 qualifying spot on the strength of his first-round Clash time of 6.023 seconds.
 
"I can't even explain how winning this feels," Tindle said as he hoisted the $25,000 cash over his head and shouted. "We've worked so hard all year, and Chuck [Ford, Tindle's tuner] found the sweet spot on this Mustang. I'm overwhelmed."
 
Roger Burgess said, "I know Tim has put a lot into this series, and it makes me really happy to hand him this cash and award him this trophy for all of his hard work."
 
In addition to the cash prize, Tindle also received a two-and-a-half foot tall statue of a knight in armor riding a war-horse, made of silver and gold overlaid on exotic wood.
 
"We stay out here working with massive amounts of horsepower, I thought it was really fitting to have the trophy for our Clash be a knight on a horse - kind of like what the original horsepower was all about. The statue is a numbered piece in a lot of only 100, so it's definitely a collector's item as well as a trophy," Burgess said.