IHRA has announced that the River Cree Resort and Casino has signed on
as the title sponsor of the Rocky Mountain Nationals July 3-5 at Castrol Raceway in Edmonton, Alberta Canada.

Host to the biggest IHRA drag race in North America, the River Cree
Resort and Casino will only add to the already sterling tradition that
is the Rocky Mountain Nationals.

“This is a terrific partnership between River Cree, the IHRA and
Castrol Raceway. Race fans want excitement and they will find it at
both the Rocky Mountain Nationals and at the River Cree Resort and
Casino – it is a dynamic matchup between three successful brand names,”
said Michael Heeb, Vice-President and General Manager of River Cree
Resort and Casino. “We are proud to support such a great event,
especially one that is recognized as widely as the Rocky Mountain
Nationals.”

In addition to the River Cree Resort and Casino’s title sponsorship,
the Edmonton Marriott at River Cree Resort has been named the Official
Host Hotel of the Rocky Mountain Nationals. The Edmonton Marriott will
be offering special deals and packages in conjunction with the July
race.

Tim Lynch won for the second time in three weeks at Rockingham Dragway,
using a .030 of second starting line advantage to get his 2002 Ford
Mustang to the finish line .007 of a second ahead of Bill Futch’s
Camaro Sunday in the Outlaw 10.5 final of the 1320X championship.

The racing went into the wee hours on Saturday and the final rounds
were completed sometime after midnight, but the first NHRA Lucas Oil
Drag Racing Series event on the South Central division’s schedule is
complete. The race was not originally slated to finish until today but
with high winds forecasted in the area of the Texas Motorplex, NHRA and
track officials opted to get it done early.  In the end, Malcolm Wahle
of Claremore, Okla., got the win in Top Alcohol Dragster and defending
division Top Alcohol Funny Car champ Steve Harker picked up this year
where he left off 2008 – with a win. The Gainesville, Ga., resident is
also the defending event champion.

Wahle was the No. 2 qualifier with a 5.347-second pass and was in the
5.3-second neighborhood all weekend. His best run of the day came in
the semis when he faced off against Shayne Lawson, Broken Arrow, Okla. 
Wahle ran 5.330 seconds to Lawson’s 5.420-second effort. In the final
Wahle squared off against Dan Kracht, Gretna, Neb., and Wahle’s
5.358-second, 259.21 mph pass was more than enough to cover Kracht’s
5.568-second, 266.27 mph lap.

Miramar, Fla., resident Bill Evans collected the win in Top Alcohol
Dragster at the NHRA Lucas Oil Drag Racing Series event at South Georgia
Motorsports Park and Mark Billington of Norcross, Ga., won in Top
Alcohol Funny Car.  The race was the fourth of six in NHRA’s Southeast
division.

In the Top Alcohol Dragster final, Evans squared off
against No. 1 qualifier Artie Allen of Jacksonville, Fla. Allen
red-lighted and Evans ran 5.782 seconds at 254.57 mph to earn his first
win of the season.  He was runner-up at the division’s season opener in
Bradenton, Fla.

This was Billington’s third final round
appearance of the year and his first win.  Starting from the No. 6
qualifying spot this time he ended up in the final against top
qualifier Mickey Ferro of Stamford, Conn.  Billing made a 6.401-second,
237.88 mph run but it was enough to beat Ferro whose car went up in
smoke at the hit of the throttle.

Chris Rini knows a thing or two about survival.

The
survivor of U.S. Airways Flight 1549 that crashed in New York's Hudson
River earlier this year returned to the survival skills he's more
accustomed to by outlasting 27 entries to win Piedmont Dragway's
opening Big Dog event on Saturday evening.

Rini, of Carmel, N.Y., combined a string of four-teen elapsed times to win big for new engine builder Charlie Buck.

Winning
big for Rini meant winning from the No. 1 qualifying (4.14, 175)
position en route to beating Jason Harris in the final round.

The road to the winner's circle included wins over J.D. Goad, Darrin Hoyle and Ford runner Tracy Cockman.

Kurt Johnson's first-round loss to Pro Stock rival Jeg Coughlin Jr. at Sunday's
SummitRacing.com NHRA Nationals certainly had its share of
unpredictable drama, even though the eventual outcome was not what the
ACDelco driver would have liked. Especially on a weekend when the
black-and blue crew continued to make substantial gains on their Chevy
Cobalt with each pass down the race track.

 Tree malfunctions cost almost 90 minutes of Friday’s qualifying in Las
Vegas. A rubber malfunction in the first round of Pro Stock almost cost
Kurt Johnson a disqualification.

KJ was pre-staged and then his side of the tree went dark.

"To be honest, I thought I had completely lost my mind," Johnson said.
"I rolled in, lit the top bulb, and Jeggie was pre-staged, and he went
in. I rolled through there, and before I knew it, my top bulb was out.
There were no lights on whatsoever. It's like, did I miss the second
bulb coming on and roll right through? I gave it a bump, enough for it
to come on. I took a bite out of it, and probably rolled six or eight
inches, and nothing came on, so I stopped, because you're being timed
on the seven-second rule to be red-lighted. I said to myself, 'All
right, we'll take another bite at,' and then the top bulb went out."

Cory McClenathan faced teammate Tony Schumacher in a rematch of last
weekend’s Houston Top Fuel final during the second round of the NHRA
SummitRacing.com Nationals. However,
the excitement wasn’t on the starting line – it was back in the staging
lanes determining which lane the drivers would run.

Schumacher had the lane choice and Cory Mac’s former tuner , who is now
wrenching for his opponent took the left lane, apparently
second-guessed him and went to the right, only to return to his
original selection.

"In the back of the staging lanes we were told we were going to have
the right hand lane," explained McClenathan. "Then we were swapped over
to the left and I thought this might play in our favor. And, obviously,
at the last second Mike said, 'OK, we want the left-hand lane back,'
after what they saw in front of them (Brandon Bernstein beating Larry
Dixon out of the left lane).

"Lane choice is the crew chiefs' prerogative. We kind of had it tuned
up for the right lane to begin with, so I wasn't too concerned about
the lane changes. You can't let that mess with your head. You just go
up there and do your job as a driver.”

Robert Hight had a streak of good fortune end with this weekend's visit to The Strip at Las Vegas. Since 2005, Hight
has been able to win at least one race in the first five races of the
season. That stat tumbled to the ground with a semi-final loss to
eventual winner Ron Capps. Even with the streak ended, Hight was upbeat
about the future.

“Today was a lot better than the last two races," Hight said. "I am
upbeat about our Auto Club of Southern California Mustang because it is
definitely tunable. We just need a few more runs and I think we are
there. Yesterday in qualifying we made two good runs. We stepped up. We
have all the old stuff back on it. We have a new chassis. It is working
well,” said the former JFR crewman. “I am definitely excited about
that. We are going to test here tomorrow and use one of our four days.
We’ll see if we can’t get it to where we want it. This is a great race
track and they do a good job. I’m looking forward to testing.”

Rookie Top Fuel pilot Shawn Langdon followed the first low qualifying effort of his brief professional career with a final-four finish during the NHRA SummitRacing.com Nationals in Las Vegas.

"To get that close to our first final makes you want it even more,"
said Langdon, who had a monstrous .049 to .091-second reaction time
advantage over Schumacher at the starting line. "I knew we left strong
and the car was trucking down there. I didn't see him at all until it
unloaded there at the end and he got past me.

"My confidence in this car and this crew is sky-high right now. I think
it's just a matter of time before we win one together. To come out in
just our fifth race together, get the pole, and come so close to
reaching the final says a lot about our potential."

Matt Hagan is failing miserably in only one aspect this year. He is failing to run like a rookie.

Hagan continues to lead the pack of NHRA Rookie-of-the-Year contenders with his solid performances
in each of the five national NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series so
far. He's consistently moved up the ladder; initially by winning his
first round in the second event, then landing in the semifinals in the
third. Sunday during the NHRA SummitRacing.com Nationals, he stepped it up even further and reached his first final
round of his short career, ending the day as runner-up to his Don
Schumacher Racing teammate Ron Capps.

His solid run launched him into second in the Funny Car point standings, and he's now 106 points behind Capps.

Hagan's charge through the field in the Shelor.com Dodge included a
dismissal of Bob Bode (4.144/291.45), his DSR teammate Jack Beckman
(4.215/298.73) and Cruz Pedregon (4.200/302.41) before facing Capps
with lane choice in his arsenal.