With voting completed for the 2007 All-America Auto Racing Team, five
drivers emerge as contenders for the Jerry Titus award. Led by Tony
Schumacher, the 2006 Titus winner, nominees include four-time Champ Car
World Series titlist Sébastien Bourdais, Indy Racing League champion
Dario Franchitti, back-to-back NASCAR champion Jimmie Johnson, and Ron
Hornaday Jr., who won his third NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series
championship.

Schumacher became a Titus nominee by gaining the most votes in the Drag
Racing category of the American Auto Racing Writers and Broadcasters
Association's All-America team, where he was named to the First Team
along with Tony Pedregon. Pro Stock rivals Jeg Coughlin Jr. and Greg
Anderson earned Second Team honors, while Honorable Mention accolades
went to IHRA champs Bruce Litton and Dale Creasy Jr. Top Alcohol Funny
Car legend Frank Manzo was named to the Second Team in the At-Large
category.

Philip Read beats Mike Dunn in exciting Aussie Final Round 

The
American Top Fuel duo of Mike Dunn and Cory McClenathan nearly pulled
off an American sweep during the recently completed International Top
Fuel Challenge at Western Sydney International Dragway in Australia.
Dunn lost a tough final round match against Philip Read.

Those 8,000 horsepower Top Fuel beasts lived up to their reputation and
anticipation during qualifying yesterday with the quickest Top Fuel field in
Australian Drag Racing history during the Interanational Top Fuel Challenge in Sydney, Australia.

Martin Stamatis top qualified with a
4.684 ahead of team mate Phil Read's 4.686.

American stars Mike Dunn and
Cory McClenathan also slotted into the top half of the field with their 4-second
efforts.

The unlucky racer was Amanda Shepherd, who drove a superb
pedal effort in the 5.2 range, yet was not quick enough to qualify for race day
today.

Torco's CompetitionPlus.com received a press release informing us that three time NHRA Sport Compact World Champion Brad
Personett has formed a partnership with his former teammate Ed Marx to race a
’53 Nostalgia Purple ProMod Corvette in the AMS Staff Leasing Pro Mod
series run at NHRA Powerade events in 2008. Personett is the 3-time NHRA World
Champion in the Pro Rear Wheel drive class driving the Titan Motorsports Scions.

Joshua Hernandez, the current NHRA AMS Pro Modified Champion and strong running ADRL competitor, will compete in
the 2008 season with sponsorship from the National Guard.

Hernandez will
drive next season as one-half of a two-car team. The driver for the second car
has not yet been announced.

"I'm honored to represent the
citizen-soldiers of the National Guard, and it's a responsibility that I take
very seriously," Hernandez said from the annual PRI show in Orlando. "I'm very
excited to have the opportunity to put a National Guard car into the winner's
circle in 2008."

The Flowmaster American Drag Racing League presented by the National Guard today
announced its 2008 national event schedule, which features nine events and
first-time visits to a number of facilities.

Among the highlights of the
schedule are the Hushpower Dragstock V event in Rockingham, N.C. (the ADRL's
biggest and oldest event),  the AlphaTrade ADRL World Finals in Ennis, Texas
(featuring the ADRL's Battle for the Belts championship eliminators), and the
ADRL's first visits to Oklahoma, Michigan, and Maryland.

Every
Friday, Torco's CompetitionPlus.com brings you our Feedback letters.
Read what our readers have to say about our feature articles and you
can even offer your opinions.

FEEDBACK FRIDAY - DECEMBER 7

Victor Cagnazzi Racing driver-in-waiting Shane Tucker, the Australian
Pro Stock star who has been signed to a developmental contract while
VCR searches for corporate funding for his car, just might become a
household name before he ever makes a pass in NHRA competition.

Tucker
recently spent a day at the track filming a commercial for Sweet Dreams
Mattress of Mooresville, N.C. The commercial shows a couple sleeping on
the starting line while Tucker executes a burnout and launch just a few
feet away.

NHRA Funny Car driver Ashley Force has
been named No. 10 in Yahoo!'s Top Trends in Search for 2007 in the
sports news category, it was announced recently by the global Internet
site that is among the most trafficked Web destinations worldwide.

Force finished 10^th behind a host of other major sports
newsmakers for the year, including NASCAR, tennis stars Maria Sharapova
and Serena Williams, the World Series winning Boston Red Sox, soccer
stars David Beckham, Christiano Ronaldo and Ronaldinho, the Chicago
Bears and the Super Bowl. Force was the only motorsports personality
named to the list.

Force, who earned the

Auto Club Road

to the Future award which recognizes NHRA's rookie of the year, became
the first female racer to advance to a final round in Funny Car in NHRA
history. She drove her Castrol GTX Ford Mustang to a 10^th
place finish in the NHRA POWERade Series points standings, the best
season finish for a female driver in Funny Car history. Force, 25, is
the daughter of 14-time NHRA Funny Car world champion John Force. They
star in “Driving Force,” a popular reality show that airs on the
A&E Network.

An extension of one of the more rapidly expanding teams in NHRA drag racing,
David Powers Motorsports will launch a modern show car program beginning in
2008.

 

The unique Top Fuel dragster show
car will have two separate one-piece carbon fiber bodies featuring both the
Caterpillar (Rod Fuller) and Matco Tools (Antron Brown) paint schemes. The David
Powers Motorsports show car project began following the 2007 NHRA season and
will be completed in time for its first appearance at Fabick CAT/Linn State
Technical College near St.
Louis in January. The show car will be housed at the
team’s new race facility in Brownsburg, Ind.