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NMRA and NMCA - Kiss The RingsNMRA and NMCA Joliet, Illinois From the January, 2013 issue of 5.0 Mustang & Super Fords By Michael Johnson Photography by Michael Johnson
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The NMRA/NMCA Super Bowl of Street Legal Drag Racing is a special event. Not only are racers from both the NMRA and the NMCA on the same property, they also face off against each other. So once each respective winner from each NMRA and NMCA class has been crowned, racers from the two different sanctioning bodies square off to see who gets a Nitto Tire Diamond Tree ring. You see, instead of winning as an individual, the Super Bowl is a team sport, meaning members of the winning team receive the Nitto rings whether they won their individual match-up or not. After the NMRA and NMCA battles, it was time to match up the Super Bowl face-offs. The NMRA has dominated the Super Bowl leading up to this year, and it looked like more of the same with the first couple match-ups. However, the NMCA rallied, reeling off a few wins to take the lead. It came down to a pairing of Mustang legends, with Mike Murillo, the last surviving Mustang in Pro Outlaw 10.5, against Don Walsh Jr., the NMCA Pro Street winner. We'll let the captions tell the rest of the tale. Horse Sense: The NMRA owns the overall Super Bowl wins record with five victories over its NMCA counterparts.  Don Walsh and Mike Murillo...  Don Walsh and Mike Murillo are two of our Mustang heroes. To see both of them racing at the Super Bowl was a treat in itself. With Mike being the last surviving Mustang in the Pro Outlaw 10.5 class, he was lined up against the winner of the NMCA's Pro Street class, which happened to be Don Walsh Jr. We were shocked to find out the two had never raced each other in competition all these years--Don always raced Pro 5.0, while Mike competed in Super Street Outlaw until the last few years in 10.5W-style classes. It was truly a historical moment to witness the two Mustang drag racing legends lined up against each other, but their Super Bowl match-up was hugely important since it would decide which sanctioning body would come out victorious. Both cars left strong, but Don's Pro Street Mustang hurt a converter around half-track, handing the Super Bowl win to Mike Murillo and the NMRA. Don's problems were, of course, unfortunate, but we were happy the NMRA take the Super Bowl win.  Adam Arndt went for a wild...  Adam Arndt went for a wild ride in qualifying when his Renegade Mustang went up on the bumper and crashed back down to earth, bending, buckling, and crinkling several underside components, not limited to the car's headers. Undeterred, Adam soldiered on in eliminations, winning his first-round match-up with an 8.66 at 159 mph. However, eventual runner-up Scott Grove ended Adam's weekend in the second round.  With the demise of the NMRA...  With the demise of the NMRA Pure Street class, the NMCA's Mean Street class now has more Mustangs than ever, which doesn't bother class stalwarts the Gillam twins in the least. In fact, it seems the flood of NMRA Pure Street has made them even more focused and determined to win. Rich Groh from RGR Engines, says the twins bought up all his horsepower, but we know that's not true. At Joliet, family driver Jeremy Gillam qualified the car in the top spot, and was the only Mean Street racer in the 9s during eliminations. He was able to get past Dennis Morrow in the finals to win the event.  Speaking of Dennis Morrow,...  Speaking of Dennis Morrow, the Northeast racer bought Sea Biscuit, Ron Anderson's former Pure Street car. Dennis went through the car's suspension and rearend after breaking the ring gear in testing. Notoriously geared to the moon while under Ron's right foot, Dennis continued the car's strong ways by making it to the finals of the NMCA's Mean Street class until falling to Jeremy Gillam in the final.  Mark Magnuson has a long history...  Mark Magnuson has a long history of racing in the NMRA in Real Street and Drag Radial, but nowadays he's racing the boss' car, a '10 Cobra Jet, in Modular Muscle in NMRA competition. Mark went rounds at Joliet, running close to his 9.27 index each round until Donnie Bowles strapped a 0.509 light on him, and was able to carry out the win against Mark in the semis. Mark also competes with the Cobra Jet in various shootouts in the Midwest, including NMCA-held events.  Super Street Outlaw Filthy...  Super Street Outlaw Filthy Phil Hines has competed in SSO for several years now, and with ProCharger power on board. With John Urist's class dominance, Phil's kind of been stuck in the shadows, but at Joliet he came out in the sun with a victory. Phil stuck with his usual combo, while John had to scramble to even get his old car together after wrecking his primary car at Milan. John also tried running radials at Joliet, and although it seemed he was on to something, he blew the tires off in the final, handing the win to Phil. In his Super Bowl match-up, Phil won his race, which tied it up at five wins a piece, enabling Mike Murillo to bring home the victory for the NMRA side.  Hot Street In the hotly contested...  Hot Street In the hotly contested naturally aspirated Hot Street class, NMRA regulars had to fight their way through their NMCA Pro Stock counterparts. Pro Stock is the NMCA's Hot Street equivalent, and the rules are basically the same for the Mustangs between classes. Therefore, many guys run both Hot Street and Pro Stock. Charlie Booze Jr. runs both classes, but at Joliet he played for the home NMRA team in Hot Street, while fellow Mustang racer Andy Schmidt ran for the NMCA Pro Stock side. Both Charlie and Andy made it to the final, where Charlie was able to take the win. Funny thing is the two would have to race again in the Super Bowl, and Charlie was able to take the win there, as well. Poor Andy couldn't catch a break against Charlie at Joliet, as the score improved to 5-3 for the NMCA.  Renegade Is there anyone...  Renegade Is there anyone capable of derailing the Brian Mitchell Renegade train? At Joliet, it didn't look like it. Alton Clements tried in the second round, and even strapped a holeshot on Brian, but Alton was unable to stay out front. Next up was Bob Cook in the semis, and once again Bob chopped down the Tree, but Brian was able to drive around and take the win. In the final against Scott Grove, it seemed Brian finally got serious about cutting a light with a 0.453 reaction time, paired with an 8.49 against Scott's 8.57, meaning it would be another win for the Vortech-powered Wizard. In the Super Bowl, Brian continued his stellar reaction time tendency against Joe Bucaro to get a point for the NMRA side, and continued the comeback to make the score 5-4.  Drag Radial With both the...  Drag Radial With both the NMRA and NMCA on the same property, Jason Lee had company in Drag Radial at Joliet. However, his ProCharger-urged '86 GT was still able to get through with a couple 7.40s during eliminations before taking out Ronnie Diaz in the finals. Though he beat the NMCA Drag Radial competitors, he had to race Dan Kroll in the Super Bowl, where Dan managed to extract some revenge on Jason and get the Super Bowl win for the NMCA, making the Super Bowl score 5-2.  Coyote Stock Coming into...  Coyote Stock Coming into Joliet the Coyote Stock class looked to be another final-round match-up of Joe Charles against Justin Burcham in a fight to see who could hit the hazards first. Unfortunately for Justin, his car had a glitch in the burnout box, which basically left him to battle Jacob Lamb at way less than full strength. Consequently, Jacob was able to move on to face Joe, who was able to get past Joe Guertin in Round 1. The final was a close one. The guys had identical reaction times, but Joe won by a nose with an 11.003 to Jacob's 11.089. In his Super Bowl match-up, Joe's clutch issue reared its ugly head, costing him the win as the NMCA picked up another point. At this point, the NMCA was up 4-2.  Factory Stock Historically,...  Factory Stock Historically, Joliet has always been a strong race for Factory Stock entries. Even Michael Washington showed up to crash the party, which featured three Leslie family members. Unfortunately for them, Sondra lost to Matt Amrine, and John Sr. had to race John Jr. in Round 1, with John Jr. taking the round. Then in Round 2, Matt Amrine won his round against John Jr. Meanwhile, Carlos Sobrino took out Alan Cann for a bout with Matt in the final. Carlos had at least a tenth on Matt all weekend, so Matt knew he would have to cut a light and get out on Carlos, and that's exactly what he did, winning the race with an 11.023 against a quicker but losing 10.964. In the Super Bowl race, Matt had to race the NMCA's Mean Street winner Jeremy Gillam, and like all the Mustangs in his respective class, Jeremy beat Matt to the stripe to get the NMCA a point. Make that three Super Bowl points in a row, giving the NMCA the lead.  Modular Muscle After Mod...  Modular Muscle After Mod Muscle qualifying, we didn't give Donnie Bowles much of a chance at taking the class win since he qualified 10th, but he got his act together in eliminations to take out top qualifier Joe Marini in Round 1, and went on from there. He was able to take out Mark Magnuson in the semis before a final round match-up against Randy Mounce. In a double breakout, Donnie took the win. However, in his Super Bowl race, Donnie broke a couple rearend suspension components and had to get out of the gas. That tied up the Super Bowl at two wins a piece.  Open Comp Rodney Ward is...  Open Comp Rodney Ward is a regular on the NMRA Open Comp scene, and he's one of the few who pilot an early Mustang in competition. Randy's '65 fastback features a 342ci stroker, which is a stock-bore 302-based 347 stroker. Most people bore a stock block 0.030-inch over, which makes the combination the more-popular 347 ci. Evidently, the extra 5 cubic inches mean little to Randy, and he doesn't really need them in Open Comp anyway. At Joliet, all he needed was his driving skill to get the Open Comp win. Unfortunately, Randy was unable to run the number in his Super Bowl match-up, giving the NMCA its first point.  Super 'Stang Terry Reeves...  Super 'Stang Terry Reeves has several nicknames. The most popular, and the one he most acknowledges, is Beefcake, but his friends like to call him MeatPie or The Goat. For Joliet, you can simply call him winner. Terry's program is making big steam these days, as indicated by his 9.69 index. Terry and his Vortech-powered ‘11 GT were quick out of the gate at Joliet as he was able to take the Super Stang win. Terry was also able to get a Super Bowl point for the NMRA by winning his match-up against the winner of the NMCA's EFI/Rumble class via a redlight start in the other lane.  Truck and Lightning Another...  Truck and Lightning Another racer who was able to cut a light at Joliet was Johnny Lightning. He had consistently quick reaction times...at least, until the final round against James Steamer, but since James redlit first, the win went to Johnny. He was the first Super Bowl match-up, he was able to get the NMRA side off to a good start by winning the point for the good guys.
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