Labor Intense NMRA Weekend

WINNER
Defending Drag Radial champion Phil Clemmons gets up on the wheelie bars. He hooked his '93 Mustang GT on a set of BFGoodrich Drag Radials and ran 8.34 at 169.25 mph to win the event. Motivation comes from a Fox Lake-built, 347ci engine and a ProCharger F1R blower.

The car show 'n' shine portion of the Columbus event was packed with Fords of all generations. Of course, late-model Mustangs accounted for most of the entries. There were, however, some unique Ford classics mixed in there. too. Someone brought out an original '50s Ford that had run in NASCAR with a supercharged engine.

Up and away goes George Seeger in his Vortech-blown machine. The EFI-Renegade newcomer finished runner-up with his 8.80 performances.

WINNER
Chris Colitas nailed down a near perfect 0.009 reaction time in the final round. He then ran an 11.71 on an 11.69 index for the Modular Muscle victory.

WINNER
After taking a few races off, Mike Sodano was back at it again in Columbus. The Open Comp racer banged the gears to low-10-second runs and won the class.

WINNER
The Truck and Lightning category brings out Ford trucks of all generations. Randy Henry laid down the smack in the field with his F-100 and beat Johnny Lightning for the event victory.

Johnny Lightning had his chopped-top, tubbed-out Lightning on the property. His index for the weekend was a 9.95, and he made it all the way to the finals only to slow down just enough to get edged at the finish line by Randy Henry. Lightning reported that this truck would be twin turbocharged in 2006. After the season ends, it will be shipped to Pro Turbo Kits for the conversion.

WINNER
Shawn Johnson had an intimate meeting with the tech department on Friday. His Factory Stock car passed tech with flying colors and proceeded to outrun the competition. That has become a regular occurrence in the F/S category. This time he beat Jonathan Paulk in the finals--11.47 to Paulk's 11.66.

Jonathan Paulk launches his Factory Stock car on a set of BFGoodrich drag radials. The Calypso Green coupe ran a best of 11.66 at 115.54 mph in the finals.

We think Crazy Phil Hines might be the most hard-core person we know. One day before the Columbus event, he fell 11 feet off the top of a truck. He received 152 stitches that started at his forehead and went down to his upper lip. Hines insisted the doctor not use painkillers because he had to be ready to race that weekend. He wore an open-face helmet because of the swelling, and he ran his Super Street Outlaw car in competition. Hines said the pain went away when he cracked off a seven-second run in an '01 Mustang GT.