EVENT RESULTS EVENT NOTEBOOK ROUND-BY-ROUND RESULTS

FRI. GALLERY (updated) SAT. GALLERY LIVE VIDEO

 

SATURDAY NOTEBOOK – EVERYTHING IS BIGGER IN TEXAS INCLUDING THE FINAL ROUND THRILLS

CLASH OF THE TITANS – Pro Extreme racer Jason Scruggs, who lists his occupation as a farmer, is accustomed to hard work.

Winning Saturday’s Pro Extreme title at the Texas Nationals created a whole new meaning for the term work.

Scruggs ran a 3.589 elapsed time at 217.25 to stop longtime friendly rival Frankie Taylor, who turned in a quicker 3.583, 212.06.

“The whole day seemed like it was a Clash of the Titans,” admitted Scruggs. “I had to run Brandon Snider and we were both .57s and then Frankie and I were .58s. It was a battle of two crafty, old school racers for sure.”

Yes, Scruggs won two races on holeshots where both he and his opponent scored identical elapsed times.

Blame it on the Rockingham loss where Scruggs dropped a tough race on a holeshot to Randall Reid. In all four rounds, Scruggs out-reacted his opponents. He had plenty of time to think about the loss.

“That hurt bad, but it might not have been as painful if the race was two weeks later. There were five weeks so I had to think about it for that long. Today I knew I was going to have to get up on the wheel and drive good if I wanted to win. That’s what you have to do to win out here.”

NO WAY I’M LOSING – The Pro Nitrous contingent are an interesting group. They’ll drive flame-throwing doorslammers and some will absolutely talk junk to their opponents.

With this said, there’s no way Jay Cox wanted to lose to Stevie “Fast” Jackson Saturday night at the Texas Motorplex.

Cox left on Jackson and led him all the way to the stripe in a race which could be considered mechanically ugly, winning 3.865 to 3.912.

“It was close all the way down,” Cox recalled. “We both pedaled all the way down and the lock-up pulled the motor down and anytime they do that, it tends to hurt the motor. I hate we tore up our engine, but we got the win so it doesn’t matter.”

Cox believes Jackson brings out the best in him as a racer.

“There’s nobody I enjoy racing more than Stevie, and I want to beat him,” said Cox. “He and I are a lot alike. We have orange cars, nitrous motors and love to talk junk. We are real good friends. We always get up for one another and I wish we could have made full pulls in the finals.

‘It was my first win for Charlie Buck and now I have a little boy. I had a lot of good things this weekend.”

Cox, who qualified No. 4, worked his way past Jeffrey Cummins, Keith Haney and Jim Laurita to reach the final round.

“We always play games up on the starting line,” Cox said of Jackson. “It’s part of the game, the trash talking and playing games. I look forward to that. Anytime someone wants to play games up on the line, it always gets me fired up. It’s boring when you go up there to just stage and go.”

PERFECTION – Three races, three wins … just another race in the perfect season for Pro Boost racer Kevin Rivenbark.

Rivenbark beat teammate John Strickland in an all-Galot Motorsports final round to maintain his undefeated season, and did so on a holeshot, taking out the No. 1 qualifier Strickland, 3.847 to 3.832.

“We started out the season winning and I cannot ask for a better car and crew,” said Rivenbark. ‘This season has been flawless, and we did have a slow start this weekend in qualifying. We had some issues here and there in qualifying that bit us. Once we got going, it all worked. I think we stand a good chance of winning the championship.”

There was a sense of disappointment when Rivenbark “only” qualified third.

“Any time you qualify in the top half of this field, you ought to feel proud. There good drivers in this class and at this point in time, we have found something they haven’t. They haven’t caught us yet, but they will.”

Rivenbark said he’s going to ride the wave of success as long as he can with the clear understanding that fortunes can change at any time.

“You can be hero to zero in quicker time than you go down the track. These cars are unpredictable.”

TWO IN A ROW IS A TREND – Sooner or later someone in the Pro Extreme Motorcycle division will catch on to Chuck Wilburn’s “rope-a-dope” trick.

For the second race in a row, Wilburn, who admitted he didn’t think he could win, won. In winning, Wilburn took out Chris garner-Jones on a holeshot, winning 4.132 to 4.105.

“I really didn’t expect to make it to the final again,” said Wilborn. “It was hot and humid, and the track was loose. We couldn’t get down the track in qualifying and couldn’t do that well. The main thing that helped us is when the sun went down.”

Wilburn recorded the quickest elapsed time in the quarter and semi-final rounds to reach the money run.

“We tried to step it up for the final, but once I put it in second gear, I knew he was going to come around me,” Wilborn explained. “He wasn’t able to because I had enough on the tree. I squeaked one out.”

Suddenly the rider who didn’t’ think he could win a race is in the thick of a championship battle.

“Chasing a championship is somewhere we’ve never done before. We have only one engine and as long as it stays together, we will be at the next race. We will be going for three in Michigan.”

WHO WOULD HAVE THUNK IT? - The law of averages suggest a person would be more likely to sustain worse injuries in an airplane crash than in a race car equipped with the best safety equipment available.

PDRA Pro Nitrous racer Chris Rini will quickly tell you he beat the odds.

Seven years ago, after emerging from the highly-publicized US Airlines crash into New York's Hudson River, Rini wasn't as fortunate when he lost control of his ATI-sponsored Camaro and impacted the retaining wall in Bradenton, Fla.

Rini was knocked unconscious upon impact but when he woke up, he learned the extent of his injuries included seven bruised ribs, a sore knee and myriad other bumps and bruises.

A determined Rini returned to action during the PDRA Texas Nationals in a new Camaro built by Jerry Bickel Race Cars.

“It feels great to be back out here," said Rini. "The first couple hits in the car it was kind of like new to me again, kind of getting my bearings there. The new car contained more safety equipment, and I had a new helmet since the other one got damaged in the crash. The experience was just different, but it feels good.”

Rini couldn't say what caused the accident as his car inexplicably made an abrupt left turn.

"I was knocked unconscious for quite a while," Rini explained. "I don’t even remember the actual run. The last thing I remember was starting it up and starting the burnout. That was my last memory of the whole run.”

"It just feels weird saying an airplane crash was easier."

RELATED LINK - http://www.competitionplus.com/drag-racing/news/8941-chris-rini-my-first-crash

THE SPORTSMAN REPORT – For the second event in a row, the Top Sportsman division, now dedicated to fallen defending champion Ronnie Davis, came down to two 1963 Corvettes. Texan Monte Weaver denied Dan Ferguson his second consecutive victory with a winning +.019, 4.329 coupled with an .009 light. Ferguson lost despite a +.005, 4.015.

Chase Murray ran nearly dead-on, as his +.002, 4.142 was more than enough to claim the Top Dragster division over Dillon Bontrager, who fell off of his pace with a losing +.084, 4.142.

Ty Casey (Pro Junior Dragster) and Trent Augustyn (Top Junior Dragster) rounded out the Junior Dragster winners.

FRIDAY NOTEBOOK – WHAT A DIFFERENCE A YEAR CAN MAKE

NOT THE SAME LIZZY - What a difference a year can make. 

The last time Lizzy Musi raced at the Texas Motorplex, the experience was as ugly as it could get. On a qualifying pass alongside fellow Pro Nitrous racer Ron Muenks, she lost control of her Dart and made an abrupt turn left into his path. The two cars collided ending her weekend. 

Musi crashed the car once more, and this prompted her father, Pat Musi, and Rickie Smith, two accomplished doorslammer drag racers to begin a closer investigation. They both determined the car was the issue and not her.

Friday night, in her first run since the dreadful day last March at the Texas Motorplex, Musi sent a message that was no longer going to be the butt end of criticism from keyboard crew chiefs who determined she couldn't drive. 

Musi, ironically with Muenks in the opposite lane, drove her way to the top of the qualifying leaderboard during first day Pro Nitrous qualifying at the PDRA Texas Nationals. Her 3.772 elapsed time vaulted her to the top of the list, nearly a half-tenth quicker than No. 2 Tommy Franklin. 

The run had held for two sessions before she blistered her opening run with a 3.726, 204.98. And even though Franklin stepped up, his 3.760 placed him in a distant second just ahead of Stevie "Fast" Jackson's 3.773. 

The scary part of the scenario for the girl who was the laughing stock of the class a year ago, with Smith making chassis and tuning calls via the telephone and Musi implementing them, is that no one is laughing anymore.

“I think it had a little more steam in it," Musi said. "I think it would have gone a little bit more. I can’t believe 204.98, we were so close! We were just edging on trying to get that 205 (laughs). I think it probably would have put a little more oomph to it, but hey, the motor is in good shape, we’re running fast consistently, I love it. We didn’t even have to work on these things as much, so that’s good.” 

Musi admits she tried to push last year's crash experience to the back of her mind, and for the most part was successful in blocking it out. However, there were those lingering memories the first time she rolled up to run. 

"I was thinking about it before I got here and I’m like, "Oh, here we go," Musi admitted.”It was dreading a little bit, but once I got in the car, it didn’t even come across my mind."

Then she looked over, and there was Muenks. 

"Yeah, that was crazy huh?" Musi said. "I knew I had to treat it like another pass. The last year was tough, but once I started making runs up and down the race track it built my confidence back." 

And even though her dad is a multi-time champion, Smith knew how to counsel the second generation Musi to the point where she had her confidence back. 

"I’ve been through quite a lot, but I’ve had a lot of people support me along the way and guide me," Musi explained. "Ricky has been giving me a lot of tips, and he’s helped me out a ton; I can’t thank him enough, as well as my dad. I have the two best teachers out here, so I can’t thank them enough for helping me get my head on straight and doing what I need to do.”   

Running to No. 1 is what Musi needed to do, even if she did leave a little on the table for Saturday's final session. 

TODD TUTTER-LOW - A new tire combo and no testing make Todd Tutterow an extremely happy drag racer. The rest of the Pro Extreme field, not so much. 

Tutterow used the two to his advantage as he led all three Pro Extreme sessions on Friday, concluding the day with a 3.599 elapsed time at 212.93 miles per hour. Brandon Snider was second quickest with a 3.623 while Rockingham winner Randall Reid was third with an identical 3.623. 

“The track’s good," Tutterow said. "This is my style of racing. No testing before the race, go straight into qualifying, every man for himself."

Tutterow is clearly not a fan of having pre-race testing at the same event the race is scheduled for. 

“I just don’t like testing at the race track," Tutterow said. "It costs a lot of money. I mean, we’re already here, but that’s just another day we’d be gone from home. I’m just a racer that doesn’t like the testing part.”

The good for the Pro Extreme teams is that Tutterow didn't have more time to refine his new 34.5-inch slicks designed by Goodyear primarily for the Pro Extreme cars. 

“It was good and smooth," Tutterow said of his first run on the new slicks. "First time we’d run Goodyears at PDRA, and it seemed like it was really good, so we got a few new tricks in the bag and everything worked good. We did do some testing at home.”

"We have been working on some hot day tune ups; that seemed to work for us too. And then we got a little luck. I’d rather have luck than skill any day, right?”

PULLING HIS WEIGHT - John Strickland might be new to drag racing but knows the key to being successful is nothing new at all -- teamwork. 

Strickland, a member of the Galot Motorsports team, at least provisionally upheld the team's stranglehold on Pro Boost qualifying. The Harrells, North Carolina-based tractor pulling standout is quickly gaining similar status in straight line racing by nailing the provisional No. 1 at the PDRA Texas Nationals with a 3.840 elapsed time, a clear half-tenth of a second quicker than No. 2 Rick Fleck. 

Teammate Kevin Rivenbark, No. 1 qualifier at the first two events this season, was third with a 3.939.

“Well, all I can say about that is I got some really good guys that are getting me down the track," said Strickland. "I’m just sitting in there pointing and holding the wheel.” 

Strickland is racing in his first full season with the PDRA after having to run a limited schedule last season with drag racing secondary to his tractor pulling competition. 

"I missed part of the PDRA last year because I was running Grand National and chasing the points there," Strickland explained. "This year luckily they don’t conflict, so I’ll get to do both.”

It's just as well for Strickland who says the world of tractor pulling and drag racing are completely different but do have similarities. 

"The driving part of the tractor is like any other; the starting line, the holeshot is key, even the tractor pulling and getting a good start to get down the track," Strickland said. "Same thing with drag cars, but you have to do all of it with tractor by feel. You just feel it in what you need to do, when you really need to get after it, when you really need to get off the clutch and you need to get it going as fast as you can, so it just takes time.”

Strickland isn't ready to declare tractor pulling has made him a better drag racer. 

"I’m still not a good drag racer," Strickland said. "I just have some real good guys that make me look good.”

Tractor pulling isn't a high-speed sport, which makes the top end of a Pro Boost car intimidating even though he's been driving for a while now. 

"The first few times I did it I was halftrack before I could even figure out where I was. It was completely different; it’s one of the biggest rushes I have ever done," admitted Strickland. "I couldn’t imagine anybody on drugs having any more of a rush that what this gives you.”

THE SPORTSMAN REPORT - Headlining the sportsman divisions, John Bradford made the long tow from Phoenix, Az., worthwhile by leading three sessions of Top Dragster qualifying with a 3.880, 187.60 to edge the California-based dragster of Bob Button. Larry Eidson is on the bump spot with a 4.108. 

Coming from the other end of the country, Montpelier, Vermont's John Benoit raced to the top of the Top Sportsman division with a 3.920, 191.27. Dan Ferguson was second quickest with 4.016. Brian Heath is on the bubble with a 4.716.

Kendal Little (Pro Junior Dragster) and Mia Schultz (Top Junior Dragster) paced the Junior Dragster divisions.