Photo Courtesy Matt Ilas

Ron Capps loves a good adventure.

Capps exited his Southwestern Virginia hotel on a Thursday morning decked out in his best “farmer” attire. Matt Ilas, with ESPN, along to film the adventure was floored.

“The best part was, I landed on Wednesday night, ran down to a Wal-Mart looking for some overalls. I found these ugly brown farmer looking overalls and a wrangler shirt, which I pictured Matt wearing on his farm, and they actually looked good together. I came bee-bopping down the stairs and the ESPN guy about fell over backwards. I got dressed for the part. I was serious. When I first talked to Matt about it, I said I really wanted to spend a day on the farm. I wanted to get up at the crack of dawn; no bs.”

Any Mountain Motor competitors attending the Shakedown at E-town event now have a little more incentive to go fast. John T. Montecalvo, Inc is providing a Low Qualifier bonus in the amount of $1000. John Montecalvo, who is the reigning Mountain Motor Champion, stated that he wants to support this by racers, for racers organization.

The American Drag Racing League (ADRL) announced that its website, www.ADRL.us, has been named the title sponsor for the eighth annual ADRL.us Shakedown at E’Town, which takes place Oct. 1-3 at Old Bridge Township Raceway Park in Englishtown, NJ.

In addition to the ADRL.us title sponsorship, the ADRL’s in-house magazine, Adrenaline, will also sponsor the event’s Adrenaline Pro Extreme Eighth-Mile Challenge.

“When the situation presented itself last week that Al-Anabi would not be able to continue as the title sponsor of this great event as a result of their contact with the ADRL, it became a high priority for both myself and (Al-Anabi owner) KH Al-Thani to help (Shakedown founder and promoter) Dave (Hance) secure a title sponsor,” ADRL President and CEO Kenny Nowling said.

“It was never our intention to hurt the Shakedown event when the clause was put into the Al-Anabi contract, so I wanted to make sure that I did whatever I could do to help resolve the situation. Dave is not only a great friend, but also a competitor in the ADRL, so I wanted to help him in any way possible. As a promoter of national events, I know the value that comes with an event title sponsorship. Dave, his crew and everyone at Englishtown have done a great job building the awareness for this event.

Rodger Brogdon secured the final berth in the Countdown to 1 during the last event of regular season by knocking off the defending world champion Mike Edwards in the first round. Brogdon was pleased with making the playoffs but not in the manner in which it all came together at the last moment. He claimed the tenth and final seed.

Two races into the Countdown to 1, Brogdon intends to prove he belongs there. Headed into the third stop of the playoffs, he has moved up to ninth, just one round out of eighth place.

Brogdon raced his way to a quarter-final finish. The momentum for Brogdon can be attributed to a team which tested and triple-checked every component on the Attitude Apparel-sponsored Pontiac.

The American Drag Racing League (ADRL) and Gabe Reed Productions (GRP) are pleased to announce that rock legend Vince Neil of Motley Crue will perform a free concert during the LenMar Motorsports ADRL World Finals VI on Oct. 23.

The LenMar Motorsports ADRL World Finals and the prestigious Speedtech “Battle For The Belts” takes place on October 22-23 at the Texas Motorplex in Ennis, TX, and Neil will be performing a 75-minute set in front of the capacity crowd on that Saturday evening between the semifinal and final rounds of eliminations.

A veteran rocker of more than 30 years, Neil has been the boisterous front man for Motley Crue, one of the most well-known rock bands in history Neil’s latest solo effort, “Tattoos & Tequila,” has received rave reviews and his autobiography of the same title is a best seller.

Motley Crue has sold more than 80 million albums worldwide and Neil has been at the forefront of that extreme lifestyle while performing classic hits like, “Girls, Girls, Girls,” “Kickstart My Heart,” and “Dr. Feelgood.”

Not since Gary Scelzi pulled off an amazing Top Fuel run in 1997 has a rookie driver won both the Full Throttle world championship title and the Auto Club Road to the Future Award.

Pro Stock Motorcycle phenom LE Tonglet, winner of the first two playoff races in the Full Throttle Countdown to the Championship, has emerged with an opportunity to join Scelzi in the NHRA record book as a rookie world champ.

In the first two playoff events – at Indianapolis and last weekend at Charlotte, N.C. – Tonglet rode his NitroFish Suzuki to victory over three-time world champ Andrew Hines.

Tonglet, who started the Countdown in the 7th position, will try to keep his incredible Cinderella run going at the O’Reilly Super Start Batteries Fall Nationals presented by Castrol Syntec, Sept. 23-26 at the all-concrete Texas Motorplex, the sport’s first supertrack. Tony Schumacher (Top Fuel), Robert Hight (Funny Car), Greg Anderson (Pro Stock) and Hector Arana (Pro Stock Motorcycle) are the defending winners of the NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series event, which will be televised on ESPN2 HD.

It was a very, very long time in coming, but Al Ackerman, a Competition Eliminator driver, is finally having his NHRA breakout year.

Ackerman, who began his NHRA career in 1964, is having a dream season he never wants to wake up from.

“The season has been record-breaking to say the least,” said the 63-year-old Ackerman, who pilots a dragster. “It has been kind of unbelievable for us to accomplish what we have this year.”

Ackerman is atop the NHRA’s national Competition Eliminator point chase with a 706 total, thanks to winning at Norwalk, Ohio, Brainerd, Minn., and Indianapolis. He also was runner-up at Atlanta.

NHRA A/Fuel and IHRA Pro Fuel Dragster driver Johnny Ahten will appear as the in-studio co-host of Speed Scene Live, a Southern California internet-based TV and Radio motorsports show, along with host Scott “Lucky” Hudson, Tuesday night September 21st at 9pm EST / 6pm PST at http://www.speedsceneracing.com.

It wasn’t for lack of effort that prevented Scott Ray for making the final round call to race Melanie Troxel at the recently completed NHRA O’Reilly Auto Parts Nationals in Concord, NC.

Ray beat heavily favored Mike Janis with a run which turned his finely-tuned, Andy McCoy Race Cars into a barbeque pit for a few moments at the tail end of his semi-final victory. He was uninjured in the incident. The car wasn’t as fortunate.

"It was a big disappointment but we still had a great weekend" said Ray. "We got a break in the first round when the Jegs car had problems, then Von Smith and I had a pedal contest on the hot track in the second round. We had Mike Janis in the third round and knew he would be tough so dad had it really hopped up.