NMRA Bradenton 2009 - Sunday Coverage

[mark@stangtv]

We all lost an hour of sleep last night and when you stay up until 1 AM doing updates, every hour counts. Oh well, it is Sunday and time for eliminations! Everyone was rolling the cars out of their trailors, as we will start with Pure Street and Drag Radial before 12 PM opening ceremonies, since they are the two largest classes.

[Tom@StangTV]

Nothing like a good old school, heads-up, shootout involving some really quick street cars and that’s exactly what Muscle Mustangs & Fast Ford’s Spring Break Shootout is. Presented by Pro50.com, the shootout has had a few changes sense its last event last year. This year MM & FF teamed up the NMRA to host this event and such there is a new format for the competitors to deal with.


True Street cars must be able to complete a 30 mile cruse before competition to validate their street ability.

The format this year is simple. According to musclemustangfastfords.com, the Spring Break Shootout is a heads-up quick 16 format race that is open to the quickest 16 cars from the NMRA True Street class and run on a 4/10 pro tree. But remember, in True Street, cars make three back-to-back passes and take the average of those times to decide a winner - the same will go for deciding the 16 cars for this shootout. From there the racers will be run following a sportman ladder to decide a winner.



To the winner goes $800, a Ford Racing Boss Block, a choice of any Pro 5.0 Shifter, and of course the 6 ft trophy complete with bragging rights. The finials for this shootout will be run on Sunday, March 8th but we will find out who the lucky 16 are by the end of the day. They will be running this shootout around 12:30 - 1:00 local time. Stay tuned for more updates from Bradenton!

[Tom@StangTV]

Eliminations are now under way here in Bradenton. Because of the rather lage Pure Street and Drag radial classes racing started early for these classes. Check out some of the highlights from the first round of Pure Street and Drag Radial Eliminations.



Drew Lyons took on Steve Gifford in the first round. Drew took off first from the line but Steve caught him at the 60’ and never looked back - ending his run with a 10.465 at 103.350 to Drew’s 10.820 at 123.54.



Mark Anderson had the quickest pass of the round, he took on David Hill with Mark in the left lane and David in the right. David took off first and it looked like he was going to take the win until the around the 330’ line when Mark caught and passed him finishing with a 10.334 at 130.52.

The other competitors that made it through the round were:
Shawn Hansen was taken out by Eric Burkhart with a 10.490 at 129.36
Alan Hill red light handing the win to Brandon Alsept and his 10.427 at 126.58
Finally, Jimmy Wilson’s 10.398 at 128.82 was good enough to take out Shawn Johnson

Drag Radial



Drag Radial racing has been great so far, and there has only been one round. Sonny Biggs meet with Chris Bussell right off the bat. In the end Sonny Biggs took out Chris Bussell in a great race with Sonny’s 8.388 at 173.98 to Chris’ 8.577 at 160.94



The close action continued when Adam Jude took on Orson Johnson in the first round. Orson took off quick, but Adam gave him a run for his money as both car finished neck and neck. Adam ran a 8.633 to Orson’s 8.636 with Orson taking the win in the end after factoring in the reaction times of Adam’s .148 to Orson’s .105.

Here are the results from the rest of the first round of Drag Radial today:
Matt Bell advances over Bob Kurgan with an 8.348 at 171.10
Pete Johnson looses to Sean Lyon’s 8.169 at 177.27
Enzo Pecchini knocks out Bill Wolf with a 8.287 at 173.61
Last but not least, Jason Lee had the by-run and let out as the car shot toward the center line. He costed to a 11.991 at 70.84 mph.

[mark@stangtv]

Bob Kurgan went out in the first round of Drag Radial due to an abnormally large wheel stand. Being that Kurgan doubles in the NMCA Xtreme Street class, they wasted no time swapping parts over for the race in two weeks. A different rear gear to accommodate the taller tires, different blower, and additional weight makes up the majority of the changes.

[Tom@StangTV]

The Spring Break Shootout is underway and here are the results from the first three rounds of eliminations. Well have coverage of the finials later today.



Randy Seward had a great run; he took on Jason Roberts in the second set of cars to go down the track. He posted a 9.348 147.15 to Jason’s 10.580 at 129.49 to advance to the next round of cars.



Blair Brannock put a run down that proves he isn’t here to mess around. While he was a little behind out of the box he ran his 5.0 to an 8.992 at 156.68 to knock out Joel Cura who ran a 9.531 at 146.38 - the fastest run of the round.



Chris Segura was taken out of the competition after running a 10.497 at 135.39 by Jason Bornn who ran a 9.390 151.84. Both car left the line almost at the same time, but by the 60’ Jason had already started to pull away.



Dennis Morse got sent home by Chris Escobar who had to chase down Dennis only for a second before passing him right after the 60’ line. Look for Chris to be a contender in the end of this; he posted a 9.169 at 154.05.

Here are the other drivers that advanced along with their et and mph:
Scott Boda: 10.015 at 146.10
Justin Burcham: 9.689 at 133.78
Ron Smrekar: 10.670 at 129.42
Orestes Gonzalez: 10.261 at 136.21

With half the cars now packing their tools up, the remaining racers really started to turn things up.



Right off the bat Blair Brannock threw down another quick run with a 9.161 at 155.60 to take out Ron Smrekar who ran a 10.901 at 126.10.



Scott Boda will have to try again next year as Chris Escobar laid down the fastest time of the round with a 8.893 at 155.11 to Scott’s 9.163 at 147.13



Justin Burcham was knocked out by Jason Bornn who ran a 9.214 at 155.06 to Justin’s 12.068 at 79.76.

Round three was a quick one, with only four cars left things are coming down to the wire in Bradenton.



Randy Seward left Blair Brannock sleeping at the starting line and never looked back. Even though Blair Brannock ran a faster et at 8.951 at 156.68 compared to Randy’s 9.236 at 149.95; but because Blair’s reaction time was .638 slower than Randy’s, it was enough to take the win.

Chris Escobar put down another fast run against Jason Bornn. Jason ran a 9.126 at 153.29 but it wasn’t fast enough to beat Chris’ 8.945 at 155.33 as the finals will be Chris Escobar taking on Randy Seward.

Check back later today for the finials!

[mark@stangtv]

Dwyne James had a bad fire as he passed through the eighth-mile marker and down through the end of the track, Keith Neal went through for the win with a 7.453 @ 197.71 mph. The fire is believed to be oil or transmission fluid that sparked it. AJ Powell lifted half track on suspicion of engine troubles and gave the win to Ruben Tetsoshvili with a 8.090 @ 186.37 mph. Mike Murillo made a solid pass, though slower than normal with a 7.224 @ 198.76 mph.



John MacDonald’s Super Street Outlaw car rode out a nice wheelie, brought it back down and managed to barely nudge out the win on a hole shot 8.318 @ 181.01 mph, to Billy Driscoll’s 8.312 @ 157.12 mph.

Don Burton won with a 8.001 @ 180.32 over Perry Santini’s 8.845 @ 176.02 and John Urist won over Chris Tuten on a 7.649 @ 180.32 to a 7.751 @ 186.21



Alton Clements Renegade car won over a slowing Chris Little with a 8.877 @ 153.87 mph. Chris Beary SN95 shot left once he launched it off the line, but it didn’t matter anyway due to his red light. Brian Mitchell got the win with a 8.782 @ 128.84 mph.



Ben Mens runs like a true, naturally aspirated combination with a clean 8.821 @ 152.25 mph to Max Gross’ 9.003 @ 150.00. Don Bowles had a hiccup off the line that led to aiding Tim Eichhorn’s win with a 8.886 @ 146.34 mph.



Tim Matherly ran the fastest pass of the Real Street crowd with a 9.718 @ 129.10 mph over a 10.579 @ 122.68 by Michael Washington.

[mark@stangtv]

Dwyne James’ fire was worse then what we thought at the line. The fire actually came into the drivers’ compartment and melted everything from the window net to the steering wheel. The transmission explosion blew a hole in the tunnel that lead to the fire spreading through the car. Dwyne was driven to the hospital as he also sustained burns. We hope he has a full recovery.



The other half of the Hellion camp sat defending champ John Urist. The crew was doing a tune up on the valvetrain and would be ready for the up coming Pro 10.5 semi finals.



Chris Little has had a tough weekend. The elimination round one was a loss for the crew due to a hurt motor. They were in the middle of determining the problem of the failure and was hoping the cause was a blown head gasket.



I went by AJ Powell’s pit to see what the problem was with his new Pro 10.5 S197. He felt that one cylinder was completely gone. AJ had no intentions of tearing down his car in the pits and was going to leave it to when he got home.



Mike Murillo and crew were working feverishly to remove the rear window to gain access to their intercooler that had an apparent hole in it, causing a boost leak from the previous run. The crew planned to repair the one in there and not replace it.



Jonathan Musil’s luck ran out when his crankshaft broke right as he launched his car off the line when he took on Paul Alfeo in the first Real Street elimination. "The crankshaft was five years old and needed to be replaced anyways," said the team. Jonathan says he has another engine he was building for this car anyways and they will be back in time for New Jersey.



Bart Tobner has decided to change everything he can with parts from his truck. He will be taking on Brian Mitchell so he is going to need to bring his A-Game.

[mark@stangtv]

Jason Lee became the first official 7 second NMRA Drag Radial record holder during round two of eliminations. The blast sent him to a 7.987 @ 174.55 mph with a little bit of walking around on track. Matt Bell lost, but still posted a solid pass of a 8.238 @ 170.97 mph.



Sean Lyon has been running like a bracket car all weekend. Each of his runs has been within thousandths of each other. Sean took the second round win with a 8.166 @ 176.19 mph to a slower 9.868 @ 140.75 mph by Orson Johnson.

Enzo Pecchini had a hell of a ride during his eliminations run. The run was going good until the Fox Body got loose, spinning the car in the middle of the track. Luckily, he did not hit anything and the crowd was cheering. Sonny Biggs would move on to the semis with a 10.713 @ 159.12 mph.

[mark@stangtv]

Jimmy Wilson took the win over Steve Gifford with a 10.208 @ 130.64 to a loosing 10.420 @ 128.17 mph. Eric Burkhart won with a 10.473 @ 129.03 mph over Brandon Alsept’s 10.506 @ 126.12. Mark Anderson had a bye run into the semis.

[mark@stangtv]

Turbonetics Pro Outlaw 10.5



Ruben Testsoshvili lined up next to Dan Millen for the first semi-final run of the of the Turbonetics Pro Outlaw 10.5 class. But the race was soon over, before Ruben took the green light, Dan jumped the start and took the red, DQing him from the round.



The red lights continued in the second set of the Outlaw cars. Mike Murillo red lit first followed by Keith Neal too. But because Mike left .015 seconds before the green, compared to Keith jumping the gun by .013, the win was handed to Keith.

Super Street Outlaw



The semi-finials for the Super Street Outlaw class was an amazingly close race. Don Burton faced John MacDonald, with both cars cutting good lights and they never were more than a tenth apart from each other the whole length of the track. In the end, it was the 7.669 pass of Don Burton at 191that beat out the 7.699 @ 184.99 of John MacDonald.

Following that race John Urist lined up and took the light for a bye run but never went down the track. He shut the car down and the team pushed the car back off the line.

DiabloSport EFI Renegade



Next up were the DiabloSport EFI Renegade cars of Alton Clements and Chris Van Gilder. It was another great race as both cars cut almost identical lights - Alton’s R/T was .044 and Chris’ was .045. The two cars raced down the track with Chris coming out on top with a 8.642 @ 160.17 mph over Alton’s 8.865 @ 142.83.

Brian Mitchell beat out Bart Tobner with a dominating run of 8.530 @ 160.77 over Bart’s 8.958 @ 156.11. Brian left before Bart and just pulled away the entire time, never looking back.

Edelbrock Hot Street



The Edelbrock Hot Street cars lined up next. Robbie Blankenship eliminated Tim Eichhorn with a pass of 8.774 @ 150.27 over Robert’s 8.896 @ 151.92. At first, it looked like Tim would take the race but that soon changed as the two cars were nose to nose at the 1/8th mile, and Robbie then took over the lead.

Ben Mens took a by-run following that and set up the finials where he would meet Robert Blankenship, making for an all Roush final.

BF Goodrich Drag Radial



BF Goodrich Drag Radial semis were up next. Sonny Biggs took off first against Jason Lee, but Jason has been on par all weekend and this race was no different. Jason caught Sonny by the 60’ and ran away from him. Jason finished with an 8.104 @ 173.87 over Sonny’s 8.241 @ 177.33.

Sean Lyon had a by-run into the Drag Radial finals.

5.0 Mustang Real Street



5.0 Mustang Real Street semi-finals started off with Jim Breese meeting up with Tim Matherly for a battle of team mates. While Jim was able to sneak off the line first, Tim ran a good race and was able to best Jim with a 9.681 @140.23 over Jim’s 9.714 @ 139.66.

Dave Ginter’s 9.960 @ 134.77 was able to knock out Paul Alfeo with his run of 9.76 at 138.58. Dave took off well from the start and keep the lead the entire time to advance into the finals.

Eibach Springs Pure Street



The Eibach Springs Pure Street cars were up next and Eric Burkhart and Mark Anderson were the first of their class to take to the track. Both cars cut good lights but in the end it was Mark Anderson with a 10.245 @ 128.93 that was able to beat out Eric Burkhart and his run of a 10.444 @ 129.51 to advance.

Jimmy Wilson had a bye-run to set up the finals.