The Southwest Heritage Racing Association made their first appearance at Pine Valley Raceway in Lufkin, TX, on July 21.

Tera Graves was the winner in Nostalgia Eliminator 1 (4.60 index), besting Jason O’Neill in the final with a .0199 RT and 4.653 ET at 140.41 mph over O’Neill’s .0640 RT and 4.816 at 145.82. The win moved Graves within six points of the class points leader, Steve Matthews.  (Chris Graves photo)

NE2 (5.05 index): Kevin Wendland, .0245 RT, 5.098, 135.22 mph def. Bruce Dodson, broke

NE3 (5.55 index): Doug Morrison, .0218 RT, 5.527, 122.88 def. Bobby Bates, .0468 RT, 5.512, 120.19

Nostalgia Super Stock: Gary Durham, 6.73 dial, .0386 RT, 6.738 ET, 103.64 mph def. Doug Watkins, 6.41 dial, .0659 RT, 6.391 ET, 98.23 mph

Old School No Electronics: Jim Baughan, 6.03 dial, .0490 RT, 6.0207 ET, 115.21 mph def. C. Llano, 6.23 dial, -.0157 RT, 6.234 ET, 109.17 mph

Old School Electronics: Terry Roper, 4.98 dial, .043 RT, 4.981 ET, 139.66 mph def. Ricky Marshall, 5.98 dial, .0400 RT, 6.0279 ET, 100.00 mph

The next event for the SHRA is the 3rd annual Bee Godwin Memorial Nostalgia Nationals at Wichita Raceway Park in Wichita Falls, TX, on Saturday, Sept. 8.  [07/27/18]

DRO’s own Jeff Burk and Todd Silvey will be at the Funny Car Chaos on Saturday, July 28, at Central Illinois Raceway in Havana, IL.

Chris Graves, Texas photographer and president of SHRA, is owner of the Funny Car Chaos series coming to Illinois for the first time. Sixteen cars are expected and will be split into A and B fields. Qualifying begins Friday night.

“I can’t wait to see the CHAOS at Havana, a track I used to visit regularly back in the 1970’s and ‘80s,” said Burk.

Among those pre-entered are former DRO AA/FC Challenge racers John Hale in “One Bad Texan” and Bazz Young in “Down Under Thunder” along with racers from Colorado, Illinois, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Texas and Wisconsin.  (Tim Marshall file photo)    [07/27/18]

Melissa Milano of Island Dragway located in Great Meadows, NJ, got a heart-stopping surprise when she opened her recent power bill for the track. She was used to seeing $500 to $700 invoices in the summertime, mainly to operate their lighting system for night-time events.

What the envelope from Jersey Central Power & Light (JCP&L) contained was a June 2018 bill for over $5,200, www.lehighvalleylive.com reports. Upon calling JCP&L for what she considered some kind of billing error, Milano was equally astounded to find out the track has a July bill in the works from them for another $11,000 currently placing the 50+-year-old race track in debt with the power company for over $15,000.

It is common knowledge for anyone grumpy about electrical rate increases to be aware that new billing calculations from power companies are made based on the theory of "peak usage." Simplistically explained, business customers are charged a much higher rate for power used during what they consider peak usage days.

Even though the track's lights are on for a small percentage of the 168 hours in a week, they are now classified as a "high-voltage account." So, when everyone in New Jersey flips on the summer air conditioning, essentially the dragstrip pays a calculated 10-time electric rate, whether or not the track’s usage of power is at the same timing as peak electrical demand.

Though the area township and local newspaper have been on top of JCP&L for an explanation concerning their local track, the power company has only issued a "we are looking into it" response to this point.

Many dragstrips rely on night racing as a break from the summer daytime heat to bring in a profitable car-count. The Agent bets that many dragstrips across the U.S. will be examining their electric bill quite keenly. You may even see a growing trend by strips to put their track lighting system "off of the grid" by using large generators as some track already do.   [07/27/18]

Update 7-30-18: Island Dragway gets power bill issue resolved

From a Facebook post seen over the weekend from Melissa Milano at Island Dragway reports that the billing issue with Jersey Central Power & Light is supposedly resolved. Though the revised bill has not reached their mailbox as of now, a representative from JCP&L spoke to Milano over the phone telling her that their "capacity charges" are being adjusted down to their original billing rate and the track will be receiving a revised power bill.

Social media being what it is, the few days that have transpired since the news has been a flurry of everyone from outrage, offers of donation programs and even technical help from race enthusiasts offering their expertise on converting the track "off of the grid."

Milano said it best in her post, "Thank you, everyone, for your support and encouragement, you will never know what it means to me, to us, and to our family. There are days (many, recently) that I wonder what the hell we fight so hard for, but when our community comes together it makes me realize this is bigger than I could ever imagine."   [07/30/18]

Here’s a drag strip that might be in the budget for some of us.   [07/27/18]