Houston Raceway Park hosted three double-up winners this weekend as Rickie Smith, Billy Glidden and John Montecalvo got the job done in Pro Nitrous, Extreme 10.5 and Extreme Pro Stock, respectively. Joining them in victory lane for the inaugural ADRL Texas Drags were Pro Extreme star Joshua Hernandez and Pro Extreme Motorcycle’s Ashley Owens, who both won in dominating fashion.

An emotional Smith said he savored last night’s win in the postponed-from-March UTI Dragpalooza VI event as much as any in his storied career as he felt it offered proof he remains relevant in the class. He apparently remains intimidating, too, as Johnny Pilcher went red against “Tricky Rickie” by 28-thousandths of a second while Smith duplicated his best-of-class 3.90 pass from the semis at 192.82 mph to take his third career ADRL win and his second in as many nights.

Matt Hagan raced to the No. 1 qualifying position in Funny Car Saturday at the Mopar Mile-High NHRA Nationals at Bandimere Speedway.

Antron Brown, Allen Johnson and Michael Phillips also will lead their respective categories into Sunday’s 11 a.m. eliminations as No. 1 qualifiers at the NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series event. The race is the final stop of the three-race Western Swing and the penultimate race in the regular season. NHRA's six-race championship playoffs -- the Countdown to 1 -- begin Labor Day weekend at the Mac  Tools U.S. Nationals in Indianapolis.

Hagan powered his special edition Team Mopar Dodge Charger to a 4.161-second run at 301.33 mph to overtake 14-time world champ and current series points leader John Force for the top qualifying position. It is Hagan’s second No. 1 of the season and fourth of his career.

On Friday night, Michael Phillips thought a 7.26 or 7.27 elapsed time was going to win the pole at the Mile-High Nationals, he was wrong.

Phillips set a new track record for the second day in a row at Bandimere Speedway, winning the pole with a 7.238-second time at 186.41 mph.

“When I saw Karen Stoffer go out there she went 27 and then Jimmy Underdahl went 28, I knew I was going to go at least 24 or 25,” Phillips said. “I hit all my shifts and I made a perfect pass on that 23.”

Confident his Friday night run, 3.961 seconds at 286.19 miles per hour, would fall to the cooler temperatures, Brown expected to either improve himself or watch the time fall to his closest competitors. He was willing to bet Kalitta, Dixon, Schumacher, McClenathan or any of the other top names would find the combination to knock him off the top spot in the final session of qualifying.

It didn't happen, which saved Brown from losing the farm.

Pro Extreme veteran Hugh Scott suffered a patented Hugh Scott accident today, crashing off the starting line of his lone qualifying attempt for the inaugural ADRL Texas Drags at Houston Raceway Park (HRP).

The Attitude Apparel team of Rodger Brogdon and Steve Kent have signed Pro Stock Motorcycle rider Craig Treble to the ‘Pistonator’ team for the balance of the 2010 season and the NHRA Countdown to 1 championship.

Treble, who started the 2010 season riding for Don Schumacher, found himself back on board his own bike after Schumacher shut down the Pro Stock bike team and put the operation up for sale. The talented rider from Indiana will run the final eight races of the season showcasing the Attitude Apparel motorsports clothing line that features the fan favorite ‘Pistonator’ has the company logo.

This is the third and final stop on NHRA’s much ballyhooed “West Coast Swing,” and it’s showing on the faces of mechanics, drivers and race officials.  It’s been a very long two weeks thus far, weeks fraught with emotional trauma (the untimely death of Mark Niver), controversy (the Pro Stock confrontation at Seattle) and a lot of highway miles.

Drag racing is an exhausting endeavor for the professionals because almost everyone is a Road Warrior, i.e., the crews service the cars and then, at the end of the day, have to climb into the transporter and hit the highway for the next race.  Someone – usually more than one and as many as a half dozen – do double duty, servicing the clutch between rounds and then driving the support rig or race transporter to the next event.  Compared to Sprint Cup teams, our guys often work longer and tougher weeks.  Yes, we know the NASCAR series is comprised of 36 races, but did you know that most of the teams employ dedicated truck drivers who only show up late on race day to handle getting the rig home while the rest of the guys climb aboard the team plane for a ride back to their base?  Oh, if only our teams had the funding to do things like that, what a difference it would make.

Three of the five pro class winners Friday night at Houston Raceway Park had previously visited only one ADRL winner’s celebration.

Frankie “Mad Man” Taylor earned the postponed-from-March UTI Dragpalooza VI Pro Extreme title for his second ADRL win, “Tricky Rickie” Smith picked up his second Pro Nitrous trophy and Pro Extreme Motorcycle rider Travis Davis also took the hardware home for the second time. Meanwhile, John Montecalvo increased his Extreme Pro Stock win total to three and Billy Glidden, the 2008 Extreme 10.5 champ, added his 10th race title, becoming the first ADRL competitor in any category to reach double digits in the win column.

There is very little John Force hasn’t achieved in his legendary career.

Friday night, he added another line to his “novel” of accomplishments.

Force, a 14-time world champion, won the provisional pole with a 4.191-second time at 296.76 mph at the Mile–High Nationals in Morrison, Colo. The mph being critical as Del Worsham had an identical 4.191-second effort, but only went 294.75 mph; handing Force the provisional pole.