"I whacked every corner on that car," Glen says. "I couldn't even look at it for two months-it was that bad for me. But something just clicked one day, and I had to have another Outlaw Mustang."
Somehow, Glen located a Chicago Mustang that didn't have a speck of rust on it. Fittingly, the notchback was an '89 model. He salvaged the drivetrain from the wrecked car, had Tommy Z of TRZ work his magic on the chassis, and the new car was good for 8.10s on the stock suspension at the '02 NMRA Bradenton event. Before the '03 season, TRZ again updated the car with a ladder-bar suspension. Glen added new FAST electronics, and he was ready for another season. This time the car was going 7.90s, and it was competitive at Bradenton and Columbus. But, again, bad luck came Glen's way with a wreck at the World Ford Challenge. He hustled to get the car ready for Bowling Green-the World Finals for NMRA and one of the biggest Outlaw Mustang races of the year.
"I didn't think I was an underdog," Glen says of his thoughts before the big race. "I had old-school technology. I just wanted to go rounds. It was the only race I went past the third round. I'd never won a race in my life!"
And, as the event went down, Glen suddenly surfaced as a force in SSO. Qualified in the number 29 position of 32 cars, Glen did the impossible-he won one of the biggest Outlaw Mustang drag races the world had ever seen with a car that cost a fraction of some of the top qualifiers! Whether by mechanical breakage (Dwayne James), crashes (Gary Rohe) by his competitors, or through shear determination, he wore down the competition with consistent 7.90s that just couldn't be beat. Glen was still getting contingency checks when we last talked to him, but that one race netted him more than $6,000.
Surprisingly, before the Bowling Green race, Glen sold the car. He plans on someday building a 25.2-certified chassis car and returning to SSO. For now, he's content to build up a '67 Mustang fastback in the popular Eleanor theme that everyone is going for these days.
As far as the next car goes, Glen says, "It's got to be another old notchback. The new cars are nice, but I want a true 5.0 Mustang. I'm just comfortable in it."
Was it a one-race wonder, a flash in the pan, or 15 minutes of fame? Or could it be that Glen's victory at Bowling Green was the culmination of a lifetime of hard work and dedication to the sport he so treasures?