Multi-car teams have always been the way to go in the highly competitive world of motorsports.

From oval racing to drag racing and everything in between, multi-car
teams have always had an advantage on the field thanks to information
and part sharing and that is exactly the impact that team owner Mitch
King had hoped for when he started up a multi-car team a few years ago.

Beginning with a two car operation three seasons ago, King has had a
ton of success in a very short amount of time. Over the past two
seasons King and company have recorded seven wins and a Top fuel World
Championship coming in 2008.

For the first three weeks in July, Pro Modified driver Ed Hoover was riding the high of his life.

With two straight wins at national events in Edmonton and Grand Bend,
Hoover rocketed to the top of the Pro Mod point standings ahead of
defending champion Kenny Lang and looked poised to pull away in the
chase of his first career championship.

Then July came to an end.

The Northern Nationals started innocently enough, with Hoover wrapping
up one of the most successful months of his career third on the
qualifying charts entering Sunday’s final eliminations, but with a new
month came a few new challenges for Hoover and his team.

Tony Pedregon, 2003 Funny Car Champion, got mad Monday afternoon. Then he tried to get even.

He had just gotten his head handed to him by Ashley Force Hood in the same semifinal round of the U.S. Nationals his brother, Cruz, had been replaced in the Countdown to 1 by Robert Hight. Tony knew he was beaten fair and square. What he was angry about was how Robert Hight, running against his boss, John Force, had won the most important round of a very tough season.

So Tony decided to get even. He stood up in front of the ESPN2 cameras and called out John Force. He accused Force of cheating and taking a dive, of manipulation, all the while forgetting that people in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.

Four points never meant so much to a driver.

For Fredericksburg, Va.-based Robert Patrick, those points determine
whether the 2009 season will be deemed a success or failure. If Patrick
can pick up four points on eighth-place ranked Cary Goforth, he will be
one of eight drivers qualified to compete in the ADRL’s Speedtech
Battle for the Belts competition within the Extreme Pro Stock division.

If Patrick’s most recent events are an indicator of his momentum, then the competition had better watch out.

“We’ve had a good running car lately,” said Patrick, who is currently
ranked tenth after the first session of qualifying at the ADRL
Dragstock event in Rockingham, N.C. “We know the challenge we have
before us and we are just going to go out there and do what we have to
do.”

The West Central division’s Lucas Oil Drag Racing Series is coming to a
close this weekend at Tri-State Raceway for its last of six events of
the year.  Competitors from eleven categories will be battling it out
during the three day event in hopes of claiming valuable divisional and
national points. No.1 qualifiers include Top Alcohol Dragster pilot Tim
Bowgren of Valparaiso, Ind., and Top Alcohol Funny Car driver Roger
Bateman from Winnipeg, Manit.

Bowgren, racing out of the North Central division, grabbed the No.1
qualifying position over Jim Whiteley of Grand Junction, Colo. Whiteley
currently leads the Pacific division points standings and has a high
possibility of grabbing the national championship.

Monday afternoon at the U.S. Nationals was both a great and bad day for John Force.

It was great because his daughter, Ashley Force Hood drove her Castrol
Shelby Ford to victory. It was bad because Force was baited into a
battle of words with Tony Pedregon after losing to Robert Hight in the
semi-finals.

There is nothing anyone can do to take away the glory of his daughter's
victory. However, the wound inflicted by the accusations of taking a
dive by Tony Pedregon and others, was salted today when the NHRA fined
Force $10,000 for pushing an official.

In over a dozen years behind the wheel, Terry McMillen has been close
to pulling off the ultimate in sponsor satisfaction – winning his sponsors event – but he simply has not been able to get it done.

In fact, McMillen, driver and team owner for the Amalie Oil/Wolverine
Boots and Apparel Top Fuel dragster has been in eight final rounds with
three wins in the past three seasons. Three of those final rounds have
even come at Amalie sponsored events, including a runner-up to Scott
Weis at the Texas Nationals back in May, but despite coming so very
close, McMillen has not been able to visit victory lane in front of his
dragsters namesake.

He hopes to change all that this weekend at the Amalie Oil North American Nationals at New England Dragway.

Jason Scruggs enters this weekend’s National Guard ADRL Flowmaster Dragstock VI at Rockingham Dragway as the reigning back-to-back Pro Extreme world
champion, class record holder, and 2009 points leader, but he’s far
from satisfied. After all, he’s still looking for that first Dragstock
victory.

Since the inaugural Dragstock in 2004 at Carolina Dragway in Jackson,
SC, Scruggs has reached the semis or final round each year of what has
become the National Guard ADRL’s oldest and most prestigious event.
He’s set records at Dragstock along the way, too, including the world’s
first 200-mile-per-hour pass over the eighth mile by a “door car,” when
he drove his supercharged 1963 Corvette to a 200.86-mph qualifying lap
in 2007 at Rockingham. He eventually left that day with both ends of
the series’ and track records set at 3.70 seconds and 205.22 mph.

“But something always happens to prevent the win,” Scruggs says.

Scott
Ray has a little more spring in his step and that has everything to do
with being half the man he used to be. That statement has nothing to do
with his personal character and everything to do with his physical
stature.

Ray suffered a heart attack in February, and underwent bypass surgery
to repair the damage. As a result, Ray completely changed his
lifestyle, lost a considerable amount of weight and admits he’s never
felt better.

Last weekend at the NHRA U.S. Nationals in Indianapolis, Ray climbed
behind the wheel of the family-owned Ohio Crankshaft Corvette for the
first time since beating the odds.

It has been eight years since the attacks on September 11th brought New York City and the United States to its knees.

Utter chaos reigned and the security once felt by millions was gone in an instant.

Men and women crossed the Hudson that morning never to return again,
their cars collecting dust in parking lots for months following the
attacks.

Moments passed, but time seemed to stand still as many watched in horror as their entire world came crumbling down around them.