Ed Renck, a former NHRA drag racer, bettered his own world record at the Salt Flats recently.

On Sept. 17, at the 2017 World of Speed event at the Bonneville Salt Flats, Renck improved on his record in the C Gas Roadster Class with a speed of 236.99 mph.

“It was definitely great to better my record,” said Renck, 75. “I was a little disappointed because I was going 236.6 between the four and five-mile mark and the tires started slipping. I got it back up to speed and bettered my record, but I was hoping to go 240 mph but I couldn’t because the tires were slipping. But, this is still a cool deal to improve on my record.”

Adorned with a fresh new scheme from paint master Jeff Hoskins, Carl Stevens Jr. will soon hit the Pro Extreme wars with this masterpiece from Jerry Bickel Race Cars. Here's you sneak peek. 

When the original Super Chevy Show returns this week to Rockingham Dragway, it’ll feature immaculately-restored Chevys of every shape, size and description in the car show corral, Chevy parts and memorabilia for sale or trade in the GM-centric swap meet area, and high performance Chevys, both past and present, competing on the high-traction concrete-and-asphalt quarter mile drag strip.

Nevertheless, outside of the jet-powered dragsters of Terry Rosberg (“American Thunder”) and Joe Zaccaro (“Southern Lightning”), nothing has generated more pre-race buzz than an old school match race featuring the “bad boy Bel Airs” of Kip Kauffman and Scott Cozzali.

Jim Oberhofer, Vice President of Operations, Kalitta Motorsports, has been nominated as a representative for the Real Men Wear Pink Campaign of Detroit that is put on by the American Cancer Society, an organization that has been committed to fighting cancer since 1913 through raising public awareness about this deadly disease.

The Real Men Wear Pink campaign was founded with the goal of getting men more involved in the fight against breast cancer – the second leading cause of cancer deaths in women behind lung cancer. Through their social media networks, all of the Real Men involved in the campaign will be tasked with the goal of fundraising a minimum of $2,500 for the American Cancer Society to go towards research, prevention, and other methods of support for those who are battling breast cancer.  

Veteran nitro Funny Car driver Jeff Arend will be back in the cockpit for the final two races of the 2017 season – Las Vegas (Oct. 25-28) and Pomona, Calif. (Nov. 8-11).

Arend will be behind the wheel of the Funny Car owned by Peter and Helen Russo.

“This is definitely exciting for me to get to drive for them again,” Arend said. “They are great people to be around and they are very dedicated to the sport. Racing with the Russo’s reminds you why you liked racing. I probably will do 10 times more work with this team than I did with the other teams I’ve been with. I help with the crew guys and I usually do the clutch in the car myself and I’m tuning with Mike Smith. To me, it is really fun and if it runs good it is a pretty good accomplishment. I’m pretty sure there’s a 3 (second-run) in that car.”

NHRA Top Fuel Dragster racer Shawn Langdon will throw out the first pitch at the St. Louis Cardinals vs. Chicago Cubs game at Busch Stadium in St. Louis on Wednesday evening.

The game is scheduled to start at 6:15 p.m. CDT. Langdon, driver of Kalitta Racing's Global Electronic Technology dragster, then will be joined by the world's biggest names in professional drag racing this weekend at Gateway Motorsports Park in Madison, Illinois, for the AAA Insurance NHRA Midwest Nationals.

Ashley Sanford, impressive in her Top Fuel debut at Indianapolis earlier this month, will substitute for Wayne Newby in the Rapisarda Autosport International entry this weekend at the AAA Insurance NHRA Midwest Nationals.
 
Newby qualified 10th and exited in the first round against Leah Pritchett at last year’s race at Gateway Motorsports Park at Madison, Ill., near St. Louis.

One of the few subjects that intrigue Bob Tasca besides NHRA nitro Funny Car racing is the Ford Motor Company and its product initiatives.  The relatively new executives at Dearborn, Mich., headquarters have signaled their interest in autonomous technology – that is, driverless cars.   

Tasca assures that it isn’t a Buck Rogers-ish notion.

​Fifteen years later, Clay Millican still might be overshadowed by Dougzilla.

But he doesn’t seem to mind.

In fact, he’s rather amused by the 2002 incident here at Maple Grove Raceway that transformed happy-go-lucky Doug Herbert into an angry hulk. Following a stubborn staging duel, Herbert stepped from his car and ended a heated discussion with Peter Lehman, Millican’s car owner at the time, by shoving Lehman. It all played out before a TV audience and a houseful of fans who are hopeless suckers for such kind of scrums.