Torco's CompetitionPlus.com managing editor Brian Wood made the trip to
England to cover the FIA European Drag Racing Championships. During Saturday's qualifying sessions he
compiled a gallery of images, including Top Fuel, Fuel Funny Car, Pro Modified, Pro Stock, Alcohol Dragster, Alcohol Funny Car, Fuel Bikes, Pro Stock Bikes, and more. Unfortunately, the event was eventually rained out, but the action was hot and heavy before the wet stuff came!

PHOTO GALLERY
FIA EUROPEAN CHAMPIONSHIPS

When fans see the Ron Capps-driven BRUT Funny Car at the NHRA POWERade Drag
Racing Series events June through September this year, they will be challenged
to take a test drive of their own.  
 
Just in time for race fans braving
the summer at-track heat, BRUT is offering consumers the chance to "test drive"
any BRUT Anti-Perspirant & Deodorant products. If
consumers aren’t completely satisfied, they can return the product for a full
refund.
 
To mark the promotion, BRUT Racing will transfer its NHRA
at-track presence from the blue and silver BRUT Revolution colors to a special
edition BRUT "Test Drive" funny car paint scheme – which returns to BRUT's
signature green racing color. 

The Daily
Gazette
of Schenectady, New York has reported the passing of Jack A. Muldowney, Jr. of
Niskayuna .  The former husband of four-time Top Fuel World
Champion Shirley Muldowney passed away on Thursday, May 24th after losing a difficult battle with
cancer.

As Ms. Muldowney told Torco’s CompetitionPlus.com, “I
wouldn’t have had a career if it hadn’t been for Jack.  He taught me how to drive, how to do
everything.”  Ms. Muldowney said she managed to see Jack before his
passing, saying “I was very glad to have been there.  He was a remarkable man, and I’ve always liked the
sound of his name, which is why I’ve kept it all these years.”

When Gary Scelzi recalls his
previous NHRA appearances at Heartland Park Topeka,
various scenarios emerge in his mind.
He hopes this weekend's O'Reilly NHRA Summer Nationals will add another positive
image as he seeks his first Funny Car win at this circuit.

"Actually,
Topeka is the place where I broke the all-time Top Fuel season win record, which
was six, set by Cory McClenathan in 1998," said the four-time NHRA world
champion. "We won our seventh (of nine) Top Fuel national event of the
year in Topeka in 2000.

"Topeka's been
good, but Topeka's been bad. I had my first major crash in Top Fuel there where
we actually went through two cars. One on Friday, one on Saturday, and we kind
of pieced those two cars together to run on Sunday, which turned out to be a
semifinal finish. So,
Topeka's been good, bad and in-between."

ProCare Rx, a premier
pharmacy benefit management company, has signed an agreement with NHRA to
become the title sponsor of the NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series event at
historic Old Bridge Township Raceway Park in Englishtown, N.J., NHRA officials
announced today.

The 38^th annual ProCare Rx NHRA
SuperNationals presented by R2B2 Motors, June 21-24, is the 10th of 23 events in
the NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series. The event, which will be televised by
ESPN2 and ESPN2 HD, will be a critical race for NHRA teams in pursuit of a top
eight points position in the NHRA POWERade Countdown to the
Championship.

John Zappia celebrates 23 years of sportsman drag racing this year, grounded in
hard work, innovative engineering and wild driving that has earnt him cult
status in Australia, and numerous World Records in the process. This week Zap
formally announces his move to full time professional drag racing status in
Australia due to new agreements secured with naming rights sponsors Striker
Crushing and Screening, who have substantially increased their involvement in
the team and drag racing.

Zappia Racing will move out of the "back
garage" at Zap's home to brand new state of the art premises in Perth Western
Australia, where the team will expand to a two car Top Doorslammer team and
build a solid foundation for their professional and business endeavours of the
future. The World Record holding Zap's Rat HQ Monaro will be duplicated, and
licensed by Zap before handing over to rookie Top Doorslammer driver Craig
Pedley, owner of Striker Crushing and Screening.

John Force will admit that at the outset he wasn't one of the most
enthusiastic backers of the Countdown to the Championship, the new format that this season will crown NHRA POWERade Champions in the Funny Car, Top Fuel, Pro Stock and Pro Stock Motorcycle categories.

However, circumstances change and, with them, so do opinions.

As a result, when the NHRA tour moves this week to Heartland Park-Topeka for the 19th O'Reilly Auto Parts Summer Nationals, it would be difficult to find a bigger supporter of the "Countdown" than Force.

That's because the 58-year-old drag racing icon, winner of a record 122 tour events, is mired deeper in the Funny Car driver standings this year than he has been in the last 25 seasons. 

The Quick 8 Outlaws' third race this season posted one of the best 16-car fields
yet with low ET of 4.16 and a 4.52 bump.

Darlington Dragway
had near perfect weather for the fans to enjoy watching 23 automatic Pro Mods
battle it out in three rounds of qualifying.

The first round of
eliminations saw three of the top five qualifiers go out, putting number four
qualifier Ronnie Davis with a 4.29 on the opposite side of the ladder from
number five qualifier Ric Fleck's 4.33.

After the dust had settled from
broken blower belts and burst panels it came down to this; Troy Jordan's nitrous
powered '63 Vette verses Fleck's ProCharged Camaro and Davis' nitrous
'63 Vette verses Kenny Kneece's nitrous '63 Vette in the semis.

The opening round of the FIA European Drag Racing Championship in Top
Fuel Dragster was dealt a raw deal as the weather turned from fair to
foul after only one complete day of qualifying, giving many of the
attending teams little or no time to take stock. It was the first time
the event had been rained out since 1985. Nine entries from seven
different European countries gathered for the first time in 2007, some
had managed to run a few test laps earlier in the month but others it
was their first time on track.

Leading the pack was the man from Holland Lex Joon in his MPM Oil
machine running what is one of the most state-of-the-art electronic
management systems allowed under the FIA rules, a 4.842 seconds pass at
just 277.62mph, a little below his stout Easter time of 4.750.

“I suffered a lot of tire shake on my first pass this morning, it felt
like my head was coming off my neck but I managed to drive through it
on the second pass and clicked off at 1000 feet which hurt both the
time and speed,” said Joon, “But I am number one qualifier and that is
good for championship points and is good on race day” he concluded.