Larry Morgan will, indeed, run a
one-off Rod Shop tribute car during this coming weekend’s Mac Tools U.S.
Nationals, so ignore that item in our Rumors section.  Morgan made his decision
after hearing about the Sox & Martin tribute car that’s being fielded by Bob
Panella, and is also being done in honor of the Rod Shop’s 35th Anniversary.

Former Rod Shop owner Gil Kirk, who’s been out of active drag
racing for a number of years while expanding his business interests in Columbus,
Ohio, not only approved of Morgan’s move, but strongly supports it.  “I remember
well our drag racing efforts, and Larry was an integral part of that,” he said
when we reached him at Morgan’s shop in Newark, Ohio.  “I’m basically here to
help them get the color stripes on the car correctly from a Cliff Getty design,
and I’ve already screwed things up.”

IHRA officials postponed Sunday
final eliminations of the Skull Shine World Nationals presented by ACDelco at
Norwalk Raceway Park. Tim Stevens won the Alcohol Funny Car class, however, the
remaining professional final rounds will be contested Monday at 10 a.m. Gates
will open at 8 a.m. and sportsman eliminations begin at 9 a.m. Sunday tickets
will be honored Monday.

The International Hot Rod Association has been building momentum ever since its
first national event on the 2006 eMax Drag Racing Series schedule, the Amalie
Oil Texas Nationals, which set attendance marks for San Antonio Raceway. The
amount of spectators who have enjoyed IHRA events in person has consistently
climbed all season, while television ratings for the IHRA program on SPEED
Channel are at all-time highs.

That momentum is continuing at the Skull Shine World Nationals
held at Norwalk Raceway Park this weekend. By Thursday morning, sportsman
registration had already surpassed the total car count from all classes at last
year's event. When professional participants are finalized the 2006 Skull Shine
car count could far surpass any IHRA national event in track history.

“This continues to be a banner season for sportsman participants
in IHRA racing,” IHRA vice president of race operations Skooter Peaco said.
“This is just another example of the growth of our racing series at all
levels.”

Tony Schumacher clocked the
quickest Top Fuel run and
posted the first 330 mph run Wednesday to close
testing for the Mac
Tools U.S. Nationals, the world's most prestigious drag
race.

John Force, Dave Howard and Andrew Hines were quickest in
their
respective categories as teams continued to prepare for the
historic
event at O'Reilly Raceway Park at Indianapolis, Aug. 30-Sept. 4,
which
will be televised on ESPN2 HD with more than 10 hours of
coverage.

For the past four seasons,
Sanair International Raceway has offered an alternative to Indy during Labor Day
Weekend. On September 3, all  NHRA/IHRA and ASRA Racers who want to race can
do so with a $60 entry. There will be lots of prizes as well as
individual Stock and Super Stock Eliminators paying a $1,000 to win and $500
runner-up in both eliminators well as a "King of the Hill" race with $500 to
win.

Effective immediately, NHRA will place a limit on the number of cars an owner
group can field in the professional categories.  One owner group can field no
more than four teams in each of the four professional categories that represent
NHRA POWERade Drag Racing.

We believe this move is in the best interest of the sport in terms
of preserving competition, reducing potential threats to racing competition,
improving fan interest in the sport, reducing barriers to entry into the sport
of drag racing, and reducing barriers to competition. 

Team JEGS driver Jeg Coughlin Jr., will race a pair of sportsman entries during
the Mac Tools U.S. Nationals at O’Reilly Raceway Park Aug. 30-Sept. 4. Coughlin
will be racing in Super Stock during NHRA’s largest and most prominent event,
and he will also be making a long-awaited return to Competition Eliminator. The
three-time NHRA world champion will assume his now familiar role as the guest
driver of Michael Ogburn’s West Coast Hemis Super Stock Barracuda and he
recently finalized a deal to drive a new Chevy Cobalt in Comp for Oklahoma-based
team owner Richard Freeman. 

“I plan to stay very busy while I'm at Indy,
but I'm really looking forward to it,” said Coughlin. “The West Coast Hemis
Barracuda is one of my favorite cars to drive and I'm also excited about getting
a chance to race in Comp Eliminator again.” Behind the wheel of Ogburn’s Harry
Holton-tuned Barracuda, Coughlin will once again be a top contender for the
$10,000 top prize in the popular Mopar Performance Hemi Challenge on Friday,
Sept. 1. Coughlin won the Hemi Challenge at Indy in 2004 and recorded a
runner-up finish last year. 

(8-23-2006) - The Kalitta Toyota body made
another aborted attempt today before shutting off after severe tire shake. The
fuel system gremlin may be corrected now, but the aborted run was unable to
provide the needed high speed aerodynamic data needed from the body design.

Torco’s Competitionplus.com stands
by the story we first broke in mid-July about the possible sanction change of
Norwalk Raceway Park from IHRA to NHRA.  Rumors have been wildly circulating
through the drag racing world for the last couple of weeks, so we’ll reiterate
our previous statement in an effort to stop some of the really wild
speculation:  Shortly after this weekend’s IHRA World Nationals NHRA and NRP
officials will jointly turn the rumors into reality.  Numerous changes are
planned for the much admired Ohio facility, some of which will make the track
unrecognizable to long-time visitors and competitors when they arrive for the
track’s first POWERade Series national event some time next summer.