“This feels awesome. Everybody out here is great and the competition is just incredible, so this means a lot to me. But it meant even more to get this win for Mark,” Stevens said. “This trophy is going right to his house.”

Stevens put together back-to-back 4.09s in his Jerry Haas Race Cars Mustang to finish his day, which followed a lucky break when he pedaled to a win in the quarterfinals against Pete Berner.

“We had a good day and a couple lucky breaks, but you need that,” Stevens said. “(Crew chief) Tom (Pierson) gave me a great car and we pulled it together when we had to. It was a good effort by everybody.”

A blown head gasket almost cost Casey Stemper in the Pro Extreme Motorcycle finals, but he was determined not to let it get the best of him.

It might have cost some parts on the bike, but Stemper continued to fight even as his bike caught fire in the finals against Eric McKinney, holding onto the win with an impressive 4.034 at 164.77 mph.

“I was not going to let up. I felt the flames on my arm, but if I was that close to the win, I wasn’t going to give it up in the last 100 feet. When I saw that win light come on, it was just awesome,” Stemper said. “It was so close at the end and I thought he might get me, but that was just incredible.”

Stemper went as quick as 4.034 to qualify No. 1 and picking up his second victory in 2012 also put him closer to points leader McKinney in the championship chase.

“Eric’s a great rider and we’re always trying to chase him down. You always want to beat the best,” Stemper said.

Brad Brand broke through for his first ADRL victory in Mickey Thompson Extreme 10.5, just avoiding the left guardwall en route to a 3.949 at 185.72 mph to beat Alan Pittman in a highly entertaining come-from-behind victory.

The Extreme 10.5 final.

Brand qualified No. 2 with a 3.938 and his turbocharged RJ Race Cars Mustang went 3.972 to beat Chuck Ulsch and advance to the finals. Pittman left first on Brand, but Brand never lifted despite the scare with the wall to end up with a satisfying victory.

“We had been to two finals and had not won, so that felt really good,” Brand said. “We had the low round every round in eliminations, too. We wanted to get aggressive, but we did that what to be done.

“We just had to work with the track and it was definitely a satisfying win.”

Fredy Scriba had an impressive run for his first ADRL victory, knocking out stalwarts Rickie Smith and Todd Tutterow in Aeromotive Fuel Systems Pro Modified.