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It’s the first race of the NMRA season here in Bradenton for 2012. With a strong showing in True Street and the Cobra Jet Showdown, this weekend will be the place to be for Mustang racers. Keep it tuned to StangTV all weekend for the coverage from Bradenton!
Special thanks to our event coverage sponsor SCT Performance, check them out at www.sctflash.com.
Friday Morning Pit Notes
Mike Washington is making a semi-full return back to Factory Stock in 2011, who looks to run five races this year. It was this race 10 years ago were he received his first NMRA Factory Stock win and went on to finish fourth that year.
In 2003, he almost beat Charlie Booze to the punch in the “perfect season” category, getting all the way down to the last round of the last race of the year in Bowling Green still undefeated. In that matchup against Jamie Holten, Washington’s clutch pedal caught on the overtravel stop designed to keep it from going all the way to the floorboard and wouldn’t come back up, costing him the race and the no-hitter for the season.
Though the 2003 championship was his by a mile, 2004 wasn’t nearly as easy, and Washington finished second in points. After taking 2005 off, Washington returned to FS in 2006 but subsequently moved up to Real Street.
His refreshed Factory Stock Mustang features a new 312ci motor built by RGR, along with a myriad of other suspension updates.
One class we are excited about this weekend is Coyote Stock. As long as you purchase a sealed 2011 5.0 engine from Ford Racing, you can put it into any Ford chassis you want and come run heads up racing. It's a great class for budget-minded enthusiasts that still want the ability to run high 10 second times with. Though there is currently only one Coyote Stock car on the the property...
Steve Matusek is back with his beautifully-panted BOSS 302 Mustang. While many think it was simply just a new paint job, Matusek has also done many updates to the car over the winter - including new turbos and refined suspension.
Quite possibly the highest car count for the weekend in the pro pits is the Cobra Jet Showdown class, with about a dozen cars on hand. The class will qualify on Friday, and run on a Sportsman ladder with a .500 full tree for Saturday eliminations. The class will feature a $2,500 purse and the overall winner of the Showdown will receive $1,000.
One man that has put up some impressive off season numbers is Chris Tuten with a 7.o2 @ 2o4 mph in testing. Tuten ended up second in the championship last year with a 7.03 run at the Bowling Green finals. It will be harder this year though with the temperatures looking to be in the mid 80s. One thing Tuten is definitely looking forward to is a better Bradenton - at last year's race he was plagued by a broken engine.
Factory Stock champion Carlos Sobrino is back with a new scheme on his Mustang, though we can't quite figure out what's going on...
Test and Tune Notes and First Round of Cobra Jet Showdown
All the cars were running faster than their dial-ins for the first round of Cobra Jet Showdown, but it was Anthony Bongiovanni with the fastest Cobra Jet of the round with a 8.920 @ 149.17. Steve Matusek of Aermotive is playing double duties in the CJ class along with testing his Pro Mod, running a 9.852, -.448 under his dial in. On Wednesday while testing ahead of this weekend’s race, Tasca got the job done, reportedly cranking out a killer 7.96 at 174 MPH from his “Winner White” 2010 Cobra Jet to become the first Cobra Jet into the sevens.
Steve Matusek has been struggling to get his Mustang down the track and hasn't had a successful launch yet.
The heat is hurting the all motor cars in Hot Street. Robbie Blankenship was off pace with his test and tune pass of a 8.54 @ 151.
Jim Brown had some issues with his Pro Outlaw 10.5 Mustang as the car stumbled while trying to do a burnout. The team pushed the car back into the staging area where they had the nose off. Minutes later Brown returned to make a run but had to lift mid track.
Kenjo Kelly was on a solid pass in his Super Street Outlaw Mustang but had a puff of smoke a the eighth mile and had to shut it off, costing to a 8.07 @ 124 mph.
Qualifying Round 1 Notes
Pro Outlaw 10.5
SCT Performance stepped up in a big way by announcing their sponsorship of the Pro Outlaw 10.5 class in 2012. SCT is also sponsoring about 8 cars in a variety of different classes, and as you can probably tell, Mike Murillo was one of the many that received a new wrap. Murillo's qualifying pass was aborted, giving the current number one qualifying spot to Tim Essick with a 6.903 @ 201 mph.
Super Street Outlaw
Chris Tuten set low ET of the round with a clean 7.165 @ 200.75 pass. John Urist has been leaving abnormally soft during his passes today and ended up in the number two spot with a 7.241 @ 201.88 mph. Both Phil Hines and Kenjo Kelley had to pedal on their runs.
Renegade
Since Pure and Real Street were both eliminated from the NMRA heads up schedule, some had to choose to go different directions. Tim Matherly stepped up from Real Street to Renegade, though could not get the car to run properly. Brian Mitchell managed to hold down the number one spot with a 8.533 @ 151.36. Alton Clements would go into wheel spin at the 60 foot clock and would abort his run.
Drag Radial
Jason Lee ran a very respectable pass in the heat with a 7.583 @ 184.57, and he even had to pedal a wheelie when the Mustang came up at about 100 feet out.
Hot Street
It was a lonely pair of ROUSH-powered naturally aspirated cars in Hot Street during the first round. Robbie Blankenship would nudge out Don Bowles for the number one spot with a 8.557 to a 8.625
Coyote Stock
It was a battle of the Joe's during the first round of Coyote Stock as Joe Charles raced Joe Guertin. As you may have noticed, Charles is driving the Tim Matherly's championship-winning Real Street Mustang in the new class. Charles would take the number one spot with a 11.197 to Guertin's 12.492
Factory Stock
Mike Washington took the top spot in Factory Stock with a nice wheels up launch and a 11.206 @ 117.89 run. Defending champ Carlos Sobrino would be DQed after leaking fluid was found after his burn out. John Leslie Jr. came in with a close second spot 11.467 run, and Louis Sylvester's 11.532.
Qualifying Round 1 Sheets
Up Coming Feature…
Within the next few weeks we will have a full feature on Charlie Cooper's supercharged 5.0-powered F-150, that runs mid 11s with only a few bolt ons! Stay tuned...
