For 25 years, John Montecalvo had been waiting for this moment.

His moment finally arrived on Oct. 23 at Rockingham (N.C.) Dragway when he was crowned the IHRA’s Pro Stock world champion.

“I can’t even describe what it’s like to be a world champion,” the 58-year-old Montecalvo said. “I wish everybody who runs Pro Stock could win one and I have a lot of friends who have finished second and they just never get over that. It’s always, what if this or what if that or could we have changed this or changed that? This is the first year we do not have those doubts, there’s no second-guessing. We won the championship and it feels like there has been a tremendous weight taken off of all us. This is not just me, it’s a team effort here and we were all under a lot of pressure.”

For 25 years, John Montecalvo had been waiting for this moment.

His moment finally arrived on Oct. 23 at Rockingham (N.C.) Dragway when he was crowned the IHRA’s Pro Stock world champion.

“I can’t even describe what it’s like to be a world champion,” Montecalvo said. “I wish everybody who runs Pro Stock could win one and I have a lot of friends who have finished second and they just never get over that. It’s always, what if this or what if that or could we have changed this or changed that? This is the first year we do not have those doubts, there’s no second-guessing. We won the championship and it feels like there has been a tremendous weight taken off of all us. This is not just me, it’s a team effort here and we were all under a lot of pressure.”

The world title was especially sweet for the veteran Montecalvo because he was close to winning a coveted championship numerous times in his 15-plus year career in the Pro Stock ranks.

“We were third I think four or five times, and every time we were third we could’ve won a championship, we were that close,” Montecalvo said. “Something would bite us at the end, whether it was a mechanical issue or I had a redlight, there was always some kind of an issue that would get us at the end. Luck just didn’t fall our way in the past, but it did this season.”

Montecalvo’s speaks the truth.

His title run came with plenty of nervous moments at Rockingham, which was the final event of the season.

Montecalvo qualified first with a 6.358-second elapsed time in his 820-cubic inch Chevy Cobalt with a Sonny Leonard motor, and then he had a bye run in the first round of competition.

The Long Island, N.Y., resident could’ve clinched the championship by beating Ned Katuran in the second round, but Montecalvo had engine trouble and lost the race. Montecalvo’s setback opened the door for Frank Gugliotta. If Gugliotta defeated Bob Bertsch in round three, he would overtake Montecalvo for the world title, but that didn’t happen as Bertsch beat Gugliotta on a holeshot, sealing the crown for Montecalvo.

“Rockingham didn’t go the way we wanted it to,” Montecalvo said. “We were planning on going there, qualifying No. 1, winning the event and winning the championship. We got two of three, so I can’t complain.”

After Montecalvo reached the pinnacle, he had thoughts of calling it quits.

“Actually, retirement was a consideration, but that lasted about five minutes,” said Montecalvo, who runs his John T. Montecalvo Inc. business in Long Island which manufactures asphalt. “We’re looking forward to coming back out next year swinging, but with a different attitude. The pressure is off and we’re just going to go out and have fun and I think it’s going to make us a better team. I think I’m going to drive better and I think we’re going to perform better all the way around.”

Presently, Montecalvo is going to spend some time enjoying what his team accomplished before switching gears to 2010.

“My plans immediately are to take a break,” Montecalvo said. “A lot of guys are testing and we will start testing after the first of the year. Right now our plan (in 2010) is to run IHRA and ADRL, just like we did this past season. I’m also thinking somewhere along the line, probably midseason, you might see us in an NHRA car. If I run in NHRA, that would definitely be with a different car. We would keep the combination we have in our car right now to run the Mountain Motor stuff in IHRA. We’re going to have a Sonny Leonard motor, a Rick Jones car and the combination is going to be the same all the way around, there’s no way I would ever change that combination. We will build a new car to run in NHRA, and if we run in NHRA it will positively be in Pro Stock. I would want to probably pick and chose the NHRA events I would go to, and if we have competitive horsepower maybe run the whole circuit.”

The state of the IHRA has been chaotic recently, but Montecalvo is upbeat about his class.

“I’m happy that we’re forming this new Mountain Motor Pro Stock Association, and I think it’s going open a lot of doors for us,” Montecalvo said. “Obviously, the track owners in IHRA wanted us back and they see some value in Mountain Motor Pro Stock. I know we have quite a following at the IHRA tracks that we gone to and we have quite a following on the ADRL circuit also. So, I think it was a win-win for everybody. Our goal this year was that we were trying to stay in contention for two championships, and we did that all year long. The problem was that at the end of the year, there was a conflict in schedule. We could’ve potentially won both championships if they didn’t have IHRA and ADRL races scheduled on the same weekends. Our goal for 2010 will be to try and repeat in IHRA and try to win the ADRL championship also.”

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