Burbage gets the final win of the 2011 WCOPMA season and clinches his third championship

Words and photos by Steven Bunker

In a points battle that came down to the wire, Rod Burbage was victorious and won his third West Coast Outlaw Pro Mod Association championship (2008, 2009 & 2011) last weekend at Auto Club Famoso Raceway in Bakersfield.

Burbage, who was in first place going into the final event, had to go further than Marc Meadors and the Good Guys Racing “Pure Hell 2” Camaro who were right on his heels after closing the gap between #1 and #2 with their win at the Super Chevy Show event in Denver last month.

Through qualifying it was set up perfect as Meadors and Burbage ended up on opposite sides of the ladder, Meadors qualified #1 with a 6.03 and Burbage was #2 with a 6.09. #3 in qualifying happened to be Bret Williamson, with a 6.10, who also had a chance at the championship (a slim one) as he needed both Meadors and Burbage to loose in the first round. Jay Diedrich rounded out the top half of the qualifying order with a 6.14 and that set him up in the first round with the lone nitrous car of the event, Joe Lepone Jr., who was driving the D-D Racing 70.5 Camaro of Derrol Hubbard. Lepone landed in the #5 qualifying spot after setting a new WCOPMA nitrous ET record at 6.17. Sitting in 6th was Dan Nickelson with a 6.20, Dan Myers ended up 7th with a 6.55 and first time WCOPMA racer Scott Loomis landed on the bump spot with a 6.81.

Sean Renteria, John Durdan and Scott Bailey landed on the other side of the bump spot.

Final Qualifying Order:
1) Marc Meadors - 6.036 @ 242.84
2) Rod Burbage - 6.097 @ 235.78
3) Bret Williamson - 6.105 @ 236.03
4) Jay Diedrich - 6.144 @ 231.00
5) Joe Lepone Jr. - 6.170 @ 231.54
6) Dan Nickelson - 6.204 @ 226.64
7) Dan Myers - 6.551 @ 172.87
8) Scott Loomis - 6.813 @ 203.57
----------------------------------------------
9) Sean Renteria - 6.819 @ 173.54
10) John Durden - 7.202 @ 189.91
11) Scott Bailey - 10.456 @ 81.35