At the Dutch Classic, Super Stock/A "stick" and Super Stock/A Automatic cars, plus others in each eliminator class, run off against each other for NHRA "Wally" trophies.

Case wants to make the Dutch Classic NHRA's Sportsman Nationals, much like the race that was held each year at Beech Bend Raceway Park in Kentucky.

He recently upped the payout for Saturday night's Super Pro purse to $2,000, for a $60 tech card. Heavy Eliminator, of which the Grove gets from 120 footbraked cars up each Saturday, pays $1,000 for a $40 entry, and Case made the ET break 10-flat to 13.989. The Grove's Street Eliminator is for DOT-legal street cars, and they race for $500 to the winner.

More ideas to help make drag racing better, Case says, may be forthcoming. "It's great to have a guy like (northeast director) Bob Lang to bounce ideas off of and have him willing to try things," he says. "I come up with ideas and we toss them back and forth, then we go out and do it."

Maybe drag racing can change for the better anyway.

(more stories)