Billy Torrence sparked a bit of discussion at the Countdown opener last month at Reading when he accepted his Top Fuel winner’s trophy and referred to the manipulated points adjustment -which erases the actual tally of earned points and gives the Nos. 2-10-seeded drivers a huge break by bunching up the standings – as “the Loser Appreciation Program.” That’s because this year, the NHRA is allowing racers out of the top 10 to participate in the Countdown if he/she attended every regular-season event and made at least two qualifying passes at each.

Torrence and son Steve – and fellow Top Fuel racer Josh Hart – contend that the NHRA decision-makers have caved into the “Everybody gets a trophy for showing up” practice.

During the third qualifying session at the No Mercy 12 event in Valdosta, Limited Drag Radial racer D.J. McCain rode out a monster wheelstand, and barely avoided the driver in the other lane. Smith was uninjured in the crash.

There's no such thing as a sure bet in drag racing. However, based on Pro 275 racer Mo Hall's track record at South Georgia Motorsports Park, he's pretty darn close to this status. 

Hall, who entered this weekend's event undefeated at South Georgia Motorsports Park, continued his dominance by blasting out a 3.753 elapsed time at 197.88 miles per hour. Hall has two wins at SGMP with Lights Out 12 and Sweet 16 titles under his belt. Hall was second in Wednesday's provisional qualifying with a 3.810, 195.65.

His secret? Give the Gene Fulton-powered engine in his Corvette as much nitrous as it can take. 

Tony Stewart added another entrée to his racing platter Thursday, announcing he’s now a NHRA team owner, but quickly noted that without veteran team owner Don Schumacher and Top Fuel driver Leah Pruett, the team wouldn’t be a reality.

“She’s done so much work just to get us to this point of helping us understand the budget,” Stewart said about his fiancé during Thursday’s press conference at zMAX Dragway. “She’s had to lay out budgets for other teams in the past. Without Don and Leah, there’s no way this would have happened.”

Jack Wyatt, who for years has run his IHRA and NHRA Funny Car operation out of his Seymour, Iowa, race shop, has experienced broken motors before. But a couple of weeks ago, the veteran owner-driver was on his way to World Wide Technology Raceway at Madison, Ill., near St. Louis. But that time, the broken motor was on his tow vehicle.

“We were going to run St. Louis, and I broke the motor in my tow truck and we couldn't get there. So we've got another truck to use for here because they're still working on mine. This was a 12-hour drive, close to home,” Wyatt said.

Ronnie Swearingen, a highly respected tuner for countless top nitro Funny Car and Top Fuel teams, passed away Oct. 10 in Hemet, Calif. He was 63.

“He was a crew chief for (Top Fuel driver) Lori Johns, Tommy Johnson Jr., Freddie Neely, Al Segrini, Phil Castronovo and Billy Meyer, and he and Whit Bazemore go way, way back,” said Dennis Swearingen, Ronnie’s cousin, and fellow drag racer. “There is a long list of drivers, I could go on and on. He was one of those guys who got a lot of drivers their very first NHRA win.”

Radial vs. The World superstar Tim Slavens has a new hot rod, and at least for now, it's running slicks and Pro Modified. Slavens said in a Facebook post, "Don't worry we're not giving up on Radials, Just expanding our options!"

Leading Australia Top Fuel team Rapisarda Autosport International  will return to racing at Sydney Dragway’s test and tune meeting on November 5-6.

The team has not raced since winning the Santo Summer Thunder meeting on January 25, 2020. 

RAI usually fields up to four cars but will be confined to a single entry.