PRO EXTREME MOTORCYCLE

Defending Pro Extreme Motorcycle champ Eric McKinney has a perfect PDRA record this year as he has won every race he has attended. He kept his perfect 2015 record intact with his third number-one qualifier and third event win in as many races.

"Man, it's not really the way we want to get it but a win's a win," McKinney said after making a 4.07-second solo pass at 175.50 mph in the final round.

He made a single for the win because his teammate and tuner, Ashley Owens, in his semi-final win over Terry Schweigert, had a steering malfunction towards the top end and the bike leaned over, scraping the right frame rail along the track in a 150-mph shower of sparks.

"We had just run and I was by the scales when Ashley came by with the sparks flying," McKinney described. "It wore a hole in the bottom of the frame and knocked the exhaust off, so there's no way he could've run.

"I really don't want to win like that, but we had a good weekend here," he continued. "Sometimes it seems like we have to overcome a lot of stuff but the bike ran really good all weekend here; no problems at all."

TOP SPORTSMAN

An influential figure in Top Sportsman after many years in the IHRA and NHRA, Ronnie Davis was instrumental in getting PDRA to adopt the class and served as a sounding board to series officials regarding rules and procedures. However, until the Cajun Nationals securing that first PDRA win had proven elusive for the golf cart dealer from Suwanee, Ga.

"I like to have at least one win with everyone I ever race with and this was the only one I was missing, so we got that and now we're ready to roll," Davis said after defeating defending class champion Dan Ferguson in the final round.

Davis qualified second behind rookie Tricia Musi with a 3.99 pass at 181.11 mph in his '63 Corvette. He beat Cheyenne Stanley, had a second-round bye, and outran Earl Folse in the semis. Ferguson, meanwhile, started fifth and defeated Keith Hollenshead, Musi, and Bob Gulitti to reach the final.

In the final, Ferguson left with an excellent .004 light, but broke out with a 4.08 pass against his 4.09 dial-in while Davis posted a .034 reaction time, then ran 4.09 on a 4.07 dial for the win.

"I really didn't think there was any way it could go quicker than 4.09 so I ran it out the back door," said Ferguson, who won the 2015 PDRA season opener at Dallas in March. "All I had to do was dump it at the finish line, so I gave that one away."

Davis revealed his engine was hurt before the second round, but it lasted just long enough to secure the win.

"We hurt a lifter in the second round, patched that up and we ran the semi finals, then we repatched it up for the final and it was squeaking so bad up there that Todd Tutterow came up giving me the broke signal with his hands before we ran," Davis said with a laugh. "I was already doing pretty good in the points here so this should really help us out, too. We're really happy about that."

TOP DRAGSTER

Another first-time winner got the job done in Dart Machinery Top Dragster at Thunder Road, as Mike Greene of Burleson, Texas, survived from the number-11 qualifying spot to beat number-12 starter Derrik Sholar in the final.

Greene qualified his 598 BBC-powered '08 Undercover dragster with a 4.13 pass at 171.31 mph and dialed in at 4.13 for three of his four elimination rounds. He ran 4.18 against the .13 in his first-round win over Louisiana's own Michael Kile, then went 4.14 on the 4.13 dial to beat Jeb Adams, who broke out by a hundredth in round two. In the semis, Greene dialed in at 4.12 and ran another 4.14, but won courtesy of an excellent .006 reaction time after Cody Moore ran dead on his 4.18 dial.

That left only the final, where a 4.16 on his 4.13 dial-in got the job done for Greene as Sholar also broke out by a hundredth under his 4.22 dial.

JR. DRAGSTER

In the Huddleston Performance Junior Dragster ranks, fourth-place qualifier Brooke Heckel of Cove, Texas, won the 7.90 index Pro Jr. Dragster class with a 7.90 run at 80.72 in the final over number-nine starter Preston Tanner, who broke out at 7.89 and 80.78 mph.

The Huddleston Top Jr. Dragster final saw Scottie Taylor, son of PDRA Pro Extreme star Frankie Taylor, take the win with an 8.97-second pass at 72.91 mph on an 8.95 dial over number-one qualifier Mia Schultz, who dialed in at 8.79 and ran 8.80 at 75.88, but left .077 later than Taylor off the start.