Words by Jeff Burk
Photos by Ron Lewis, Tim Marshall and Mark Rebilas

The Summit.com-sponsored NHRA event at Bruton Smith’s Las Vegas drag strip attracted the largest gatherings of sportsman racers of the five NHRA national events held so far this year. Four hundred sportsman racers were on hand and delivered some of the best class racing we’ve seen so far this season.

The star at this race didn’t come from the TAD or TAFC, the “Pro” sportsman divisions, no sir!

Instead the dominant racer was veteran Stock and Super Stock racer Jody Lang, who managed to win both the Stock and Super Stock Eliminators at this event, only the third racer in NHRA to do so. Lang qualified number 102 out of 105 Stock Eliminator qualifiers and 67th out of 72 Super Stock entries. In eliminations he was deadly on the tree and converted driving skills and dead consistent cars to a rare double victory at Las Vegas.

Other sportsman winners included veteran TAFC driver Tony Bartone, who has spent the last several years driving Jim Dunn’s fuel Funny Car but got out of that seat this year and returned to the sportsman ranks in style with a Mustang-bodied TAFC.  He won his second event of the young season after a DNQ last week.

In the Top Alcohol Dragster class, Murrieta, Calif., racer Justin Davis scored his first national event win of the season driving his blown alky car from the No. 5 qualifying spot into the winner's circle.  Davis beat three-time Pacific Division champion Chris Demke of Sunland, Calif., in the final.  This was Demke’s fourth straight final-round appearance this season but he has yet to make it to the winner’s circle.

In Comp Eliminator, Dan Fletcher, Churchville, N.Y., won his third national event of the season when he outran Scott Hedlund, Anaheim, Calif., in the final.