Back in early 2008, Denny Savage had a face-to-face meeting with Donald Long.

During their conversation, Long drove home the point that he wanted put on a race or races to “give back to the racers.”

Long and Savage began organizing the first event and the Outlaw Radial Tire Championship sanctioning body was formed. Long is the current mayor of Outlaw/Small Street Tire Racing. The ORTC’s founders are Donald and Amanda “Puddin” Long, his wife.

“We had our first ORTC race in October of 2008, and it paid $15,000 to win,” said Savage, who is the ORTC race coordinator and he has been involved with drag racing for nearly 50 years. “That was unheard of.”

Back in early 2008, Denny Savage had a face-to-face meeting with Donald Long.

During their conversation, Long drove home the point that he wanted put on a race or races to “give back to the racers.”

Long and Savage began organizing the first event and the Outlaw Radial Tire Championship sanctioning body was formed. Long is the current mayor of Outlaw/Small Street Tire Racing. The ORTC’s founders are Donald and Amanda “Puddin” Long, his wife.

“We had our first ORTC race in October of 2008, and it paid $15,000 to win,” said Savage, who is the ORTC race coordinator and he has been involved with drag racing for nearly 50 years. “That was unheard of.”

Flash-forward to the present and the ORTC has morphed into a huge success.

Look no further than the “Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia,” event this past Friday, Saturday and Sunday at South Georgia Motorsports Park in Valdosta, Ga.

“When we originally planned the event, we didn’t have a very accurate idea of what kind of car count we were going to get,” Savage said. “We basically had three heads up classes, we had Outlaw Radial vs. the World, Ultimate Radial tire and Extreme Radial tire. What we did when we planned the race, not knowing what our car count was going to be, we added in three index classes, 6.50, 7.50 and door car open comp. That usually results in about 100 cars and we didn’t want to have a lot of down time. What we didn’t expect is how many cars that showed up in the headliner class, Outlaw Radial vs. the World. I sold 91 tech cards for just that one class to race for $20,000.”

Originally, the Outlaw Radial vs. the World class was supposed to just have one 32-car field for eliminations. The high car count, however, led to improvising.

“We told all the racers that if there were 64 or more cars, then we would have a consolation race so everybody would get to race, and we did,” Savage said.

Over 100 cars showed up for the Test and Tune at the track on Thursday. There were also 110 cars combined entered in the Ultimate Radial Tire and Extreme Radial Tire classes.

“By the time we got this whole show started on Friday, we intended to have qualifying sessions at 11 a.m., 2 p.m., and 5 p.m., and we were also fighting severe cold weather,” Savage said. “Because of the cold weather, it took longer for track prep and by the time it got to 6:30 p.m., 7 o’clock Friday, and really got dark, we were only halfway through qualifying. So, what we did was cut the day short for safety reasons because the track surface was so cold.”

On Saturday, the ORTC event picked up where it left off and finally began eliminations later in the afternoon.

“By the time we had completed the first round in these three heads up programs, including the consolation 32-car field, it got to be Saturday night once again the conditions were getting unsafe (because of the weather). We had Sunday with the track as a rain day and we decided to call it a day (Saturday) because we didn’t want to get anybody hurt. We picked up the action Sunday and had everything finished just before it got dark.”

The ORTC “Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia,” event not only made history, but it also was recorded as the races were broadcast on pay-per view.

“This was a major hit,” Savage said. “According to the South Georgia Motorsports Park people, the spectator crowd we had there was the largest paid spectator crowd they have ever had at that facility.”

David Wolfe was the overall winner in the Outlaw Radial vs. the World class and he won $20,000 for his efforts. Wolfe clocked a weekend-best elapsed time of 4.447 seconds down the eighth-mile, the distance of ORTC races.

“Those numbers are unheard of,” Savage said.

The tremendous success of the event didn’t shock Savage.

“In a way we were surprised and in a way we weren’t,” Savage said. “We hooked up with Mark Walter [Dragstory.com] for the pay-per view, and he did a wonderful job. Over the winter, Donald (Long) decided that we were going to have one race to determine who is the baddest man on small tires and that’s what we did last weekend. This was the biggest ORTC event we have ever had and we just had a great time.”

Because of last weekend’s great response, Savage says plans to run the event in 2011 have already begun.

Savage says next year’s special ORTC event will be the Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia Part II, and it will be at the end of February or maybe a week later to get nicer weather. The race will once again be held at South Georgia Motorsports Park.

“The plan for next year is to move our Test and Tune up a day earlier because we had guys from California, Colorado, Illinois, Michigan, Texas, Arkansas, and from just all over the country bringing their cars to this year’s race,” Savage said. “If we don’t have the frigid weather, we will be able to get it (next year’s event) off in two days. The reason we try and do that is because everybody comes from so far to our events, and we try and leave them to have Sunday as a travel day.”

Next up for the ORTC is its three-race schedule for its points championship.

The events are April 30-May 1 in Valdosta, Ga., July 2-3 in Huntsville, Ala., and the last one determine the overall champion in the respective classes will be at South Georgia Motorsports Park Oct. 22-23.

“Our thing (at ORTC) is to give back to the racer,” Savage said. “We’re not in this to make money or make a living off of it. We give it back to the racers. We at ORTC also would like to send out a special thanks to our major sponsors, Mickey Thompson Tires, Proline Racing Engines and TRZ Motorsports without the support of these sponsors this would not be possible.”