With Evan Knoll out of
racing while recovering from the affects of a head injury, a special email has
been established so race fans can extend their well-wishes during this recovery
period. These emails will be delivered to Evan’s family as well as posted on
Torco’s CompetitionPlus.com.

"Hot" Rod Fuller is well aware what happens in sports to competitors who come up short in their quest for a championship.

The Las Vegas resident, who finished a disappointing second in the
chase for the NHRA POWERade Series Top Fuel title in 2007, doesn't plan
to join a list that in recent years includes the 2001 New York Giants,
the
2006 Detroit Tigers, the 2006 Chicago Bears and NHRA competitor Doug
Kalitta. The Giants, Tigers and Bears, one year after making their
sport's respective championship games, failed to qualify for the
playoffs the following season. Kalitta, who after finishing just 14
points short of winning the Top Fuel championship in 2006, struggled
through a disappointing and frustrating season in 2007 in which he
finished 10th in points and didn't qualify for NHRA's Countdown to the
Championship.

Fuller is determined to avoid being another member of that statistic.

The NHRA’s Vice President of Racing Operations Graham Light said he
felt compelled to notify the Las Vegas Motor Speedway management of his
safety concerns. He felt the need to express his concerns regarding
tires and the effect over-prepping the track can have on them at the
forthcoming Nitro Blast Off event scheduled, January 18 – 20, 2008.

So concerned was Light that he first notified LVMS management in
December. Reportedly when LVMS brass didn’t immediately respond in the
way Light had hoped, the NHRA executive conveyed those concerns with
P.R.O. President Kenny Bernstein. Bernstein said he then shared them
with the members of his organization at the request of Light.

That course of action then prompted LVMS General Manager Chris Powell
to issue a statement on Tuesday evening saying the event will carry on
as planned.

For the next three weeks, Torco’s CompetitionPlus.com will conduct its inaugural War Stories Showdown presented by Mach Series Accelerator. The veterans of yarn spinning are paired for what promises to be a series destined to produce the finest behind-the-scenes stories.

If Peggy Llewellyn never takes another competitive run in the NHRA Pro Stock Motorcycle class, she does so with no regrets.

That's how rewarding the 2007 season was to the Texas native, who after
a six-year hiatus returned to the sport in grand fashion, scoring her
first career victory and finishing fourth in the final POWERade Series
standings.

Team owner Karl Klement released the PSM rider from her contract after
the season, but that disappointment did little to detract from
Llewellyn's dream season.

The Winternationals kicks off later this week, and for a
lucky 100,000 or so it’ll satisfy the craving for loud noises and the smell of
nitro they’ve had since the last round of the Finals back in November.  Sadly, for most of the country, mired in
hip-deep snow and sub-freezing temperatures, winter will continue to drag on
seemingly indefinitely.

We would love to take you away from all that, but while
that’s something beyond our control, what we can do is take you to a place,
through these pages, where the sun always shines, where the people are
friendly, and where drag racing is taking place right now.

The need for speed is planet-wide.  For all we know it really could be universal,
but until someone comes down here and challenges Tony Schumacher to a
two-out-of-three, let’s just stick to what we can prove, and that’s that the
love of drag racing knows no boundaries. 

For the next three weeks, Torco’s CompetitionPlus.com will conduct
its inaugural War Stories Showdown presented by Mach Series
Accelerator. The veterans of yarn spinning are paired for what promises
to be a series destined to produce the finest behind-the-scenes
stories.

Tim
Grose, a former nitro Funny Car driver, has been an interested
spectator to the recent controversy of the Funny Car chassis and
subsequent crashes, but points out that while his was bad for that era
in drag racing, he’s seen a lot worse today.

“I was fortunate to walk away. I still don’t think mine compares to some of those I’ve seen today.”

While he’d prefer that his name be associated more as a competitor who
generated the most with the least, he’s still haunted by the reminders
of a grisly crash that some rank as one of the worst in the class.

He had, as some would say, it all, which included a beautiful wife
and a dream job - driving a NHRA POWERade Series Funny Car for drag
racing icon Don "The Snake Prudhomme.

Yes, life couldn't of been much better for Johnson ...then the phone rang.

It was Prudhomme, and the news wasn't good. The NHRA legend, whom
Johnson had driven for since 2001, informed his nitro coupe pilot that
due to lack of sponsorship he was trimming his two-car operation to
just the the Top Fuel dragster driven by charter member Larry Dixon.

Prudhomme said Johnson would still be under contract, but without a
car to drive, he certainly felt like a man without a country when the
decision was made in late October.

Some years back, when Torco’s CompetitionPlus.com was in its third year of existence and popular graphics designer Rod Burke of Burke Designs was looking to build a name for his budding business, we decided to pair together on a pretty neat project that would (A) build his name in the industry by showcasing his talents and (B) satisfy our desire to step into a realm previously only occupied by the legendary Super Stock & Drag Illustrated magazine. The legendary magazine made a habit of creating renditions of futuristic race vehicles.

Let’s revisit this wonderland of fantasy (and not real) and step into the realm of doorslammer Heaven.

The year is 2001 and the first season of the Pro Modified exhibitions with the NHRA. At the time, no one really knew what to expect of the program. That’s why we painted this picture of eight dream-induced, ultimate door slammer combinations.