Auto Club Dragway at Fontana will become a battleground for the
nation’s best amateur drag racers when the third annual JEGS NHRA
Pacific SPORTSnationals takes center stage this weekend. Several
hundred racers are expected to attend the event, which showcases racers
in the NHRA Lucas Oil Drag Racing Series. The racers who attend the
SPORTSnationals will be competing for a share of more than $65,000 in
cash and an additional $400,000 in posted contingency awards. Several
high profile contestants are also hoping to earn valuable points that
could ultimately lead to an NHRA national or divisional championship.
 
The field in Competition Eliminator figures to be loaded with such
talent as four drivers currently ranked in the top ten are expected to
attend including current points leader Dan Fletcher of Churchville,
N.Y. Driving for the Fontana based Braun Racing team, Fletcher has won
five events this year in his 170-mph Chevy Cobalt. Other top contenders
include Jim Cowan of Dewey, Ariz., who is currently ranked third; Doug
Lambeck of Corona Del Mar, Calif., who sits fourth, and former national
champion Dean Carter of Glendale, Ariz., who is seventh.

With only three races remaining in the NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series, both Tony Schumacher and Tim Wilkerson have slowly
pulled away from the Top Fuel and Funny Car classes after both picked
up wins at last week’s O’Reilly NHRA Mid-South Nationals in Memphis.
Both drivers entered the Countdown to 1 playoffs in Charlotte leading
their respective categories and though Schumacher’s 53rd career win at
the event, followed by a runner-up finish in Dallas and win in Memphis
helped build upon his lead in the Top Fuel category, Wilkerson’s first
round loss in Charlotte bumped him from first to fifth in the Funny Car
standings. Two races and two wins later (Dallas, Memphis), Wilkerson
has regained the top spot with a 72 point lead over second place Jack
Beckman heading into Richmond.

JEGS TAPS RIPES AT GRAND MARSHAL/HONORARY STARTER FOR PACIFIC SPORTSNATIONALS

Marv
Ripes, founder of A-1 Automatic Transmissions, has been selected for
the dual role of Grand Marshal and Honorary Starter for the NHRA Jegs
Pacific SPORTSnationals.
          
Ripes founded A-1 in 1959 as a 24-year-old racer and is credited with
many innovations in racing transmission technology.  All these years
later, with a new partner on board, Marv is looking to the future of
A-1 Automatic Transmissions.  He continues to be involved in the
company and together with Adam Bowdish is ushering in a new era for A-1.

Direct hit from Hurricane Ike adversely affects Top Fuel racer Mitch King

For
as long as Mitch King has been drag racing, he’s been bringing his
fellow racers candy, most notably taffy, to the drag races as a
goodwill gesture. That practice has been temporarily halted as King was
one of those displaced by Hurricane Ike.

King, who operates La King’s Confectionary in Galveston, Texas, rode
out the devastating storm in the third floor of his three-story store.

“We got a lot of water,” King said. “We lost everything on the first
floor at the candy factory and everything on the first floor of my
house. There was six feet of ocean water at the candy story and seven
feet at my home. Both buildings are still standing and we are all
okay.”

It’s the fall and veteran nitro tuner Lee Beard has been in the game long enough to know it is silly season time.

Will he be here? Will he be there?

Beard has heard it all over the years.

“I’m still here wearing this Matco Tools uniform; that rumor mill can
stir up a lot of stuff,” Beard said. “I don’t know where a lot of this
stuff comes from but it’s that time of the year.”

Look out Top Fuel, former model turned drag racer Malinda Bertozzi has
a Top Alcohol Dragster license with a hankering to upgrade to Top Fuel.

Bertozzi earned her A/Fuel Dragster license recently at Doug Foley’s Drag Racing School.

The boys weren’t paying nice with Angie McBride on Sunday.

McBride has been a strong player of late, most recently scoring a semi-final finish at the NHRA Fallnationals in Dallas, Texas.

Those kinds of performances will make the competition take notice.

Building quality and performance since 1938, this year marks
Edelbrock's 70th Anniversary. Edelbrock started its humble beginnings
when the late Vic Edelbrock Sr., a talented young auto technician who
owned a repair shop in Los Angeles, purchased a 1932 Ford Roadster as
the family's daily driver and personal project car. This car inspired
Vic Sr. to design, engineer and produce Edelbrock's first performance
product - the Slingshot intake manifold for the flathead Ford engine.
With much success in the dry lake racing with the Southern California
Timing Association, Edelbrock's reputation and demand grew into more
products and the release of the first Edelbrock catalog in 1946.
Flash-forward 70 years and Edelbrock has grown from a small grass roots
business to the performance aftermarket's premier manufacturers of
performance parts and accessories.

Mike Kloeber’s dismissal from Bob Tasca’s Funny Car team left him on the sidelines for much of the
2008 season. A call following the NHRA Fallnationals in Dallas, Texas,
put Kloeber back in the ranks of the gainfully employed.

Kloeber’s resume isn’t exactly chopped liver considering that he tuned
Clay Millican to six IHRA Top Fuel world championships and among other
accolades as the first-ever 300-mph Funny Car run while working with
Jim Epler.

“I had been calling all the big teams to try and find myself a home
with a good team with a lot of funding and good parts,” Kloeber said.
“Kenny’s been one of the guys that I have been talking to off and on
all year long. Kenny’s been trying to stick with the guys he’s started
with and that kind of stuff. Kenny was trying to do what he thought was
best for his team so even though we talked a lot he didn’t elect to
hire me and finally after Dallas he gave me a call. I got on a plane
and came straight to Memphis.”

If hindsight measures 20/20 then Mike Edwards’ foresight measures a little better.

Edwards and team owner Roger Stull made the gamble to invest in an
in-house engine program following the 2007 NHRA U.S. Nationals in
Indianapolis. The result has been two national event wins in 2008.

Prior to this season Edwards hadn’t won a race since 2006.

“I can’t express how good this has been,” Edwards said clutching his
15th career Pro Stock trophy in Memphis. “It’s phenomenal. I mean our program last
year, I think we had six or seven DNQs. We have none so far this year
and we’ve won two races so we’re in the Countdown. That just doesn’t
happen in Pro Stock. You just don’t turn your season around from one
year to another, I got the same guys I always have so it’s not like our
guys or anything. It’s just our engine program just stepped us up to
the next level and they got us better and better.”