Strange Engineering has made a name for itself in all forms of drag racing like NHRA and NMRA with decades of manufacturing, design and engineering innovation.

Yet as successful as the company has been, Strange president Jeff Stange realizes how important the grassroots racer is to his company.

To that end, Strange is the title sponsor of the Fun in the Sun bracket race at Bradenton (Fla.) Motorsports Park Nov. 13-16.

“There’s a series called Gear Head Racing right now that’s just starting up and that series is going to put on more regional events throughout Sportsman racing, not just for bracket racing, but for Sportsman and whatever (type of racing) it is in regional areas,” Stange said. “So working with race tracks to put on events that we will help promote and be part of whether it is financially or time-wise to have racing that is fun and safe and kind of old-school type of racing on a regional level. Instead of following the national campaign we want to set up areas and work with race tracks to help put on events we can promote and get more people involved with racing in general.”

The Fun in the Sun event is a tribute to the late Scott Weney, a former IHRA Funny Car champion and S&W Race Cars owner. Weney passed away this past Nov. 19 he was 55.

“I knew Scott Weney and he actually passed away at that event (Fun in the Sun) last year,” Stange said. “Scott was around forever and I kind of grew up with him,” Stange said. “Scott and Scotty Richardson put together the first Fun in the Sun, which was last year, and when Scott passed away I was talking with Scotty (Richardson) regarding kind of what I wanted to do with racing at a local level, getting involved with tracks and eventually start putting on smaller events and we can get Strange involved and other manufacturers involved with it and put money back into the grassroots races and try and grow that. I like going to the race track and being in that kind of culture. When Scott (Weney) passed away Scotty Richardson and I started talking about and that’s why we decided we will just partner up for the Fun in the Sun and for other races to kind of grow.”

Richardson is running the Gear Head Racing Series and Stange said he will help him in any way he can.

“Fun in the Sun is going to be the first race in Gear Head Racing and then our plan is to grow that with multiple events and not just in Florida and not just in bracket racing,” Stange said. “We want to have this rewarding for the manufacturer and the racer - that’s our goal.”

Stange acknowledged he and his company started focusing more on grassroots a couple of years ago.

“Probably two or three years ago NHRA got very stagnate and very expensive,” Stange said. “We are still going to work with the NHRA racers, but I started traveling around looking at other forms or racing outside of NHRA. I can’t tell you how many races I went to, but quite a few and just from walking around I would go pit to pit basically at divisional races for NHRA or another local race for a track, and I started talking with people. I was kind of amazed of the quantity of people who were out there and they were not getting a lot of support and looking at the payouts in that form of racing. I thought for Strange, we were really missing the boat by putting way too much emphasis on organized racing if you will and not nearly enough on grassroots, weekend or regional racers, whatever you want to call it. Then I went to Yellow Bullet race last year I was blown away how big that was out there. I think as far as our drag racing market, this is our future, meaning working with local tracks and getting out there and servicing our customers and promoting our product.”

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