Words and photos by Ian Tocher
8/11/04

rom the starting line it was too close to call, but the scoreboard confirmed Michael Robinson beat Marcus Birt to the stripe in the Outlaw 10.5 final Aug. 8 at Brainerd Optimist Dragstrip, the venerable 1/8-miler nestled on the Georgia-Tennessee border near Chattanooga. "When we went through, we both didn't quite know what was going on," Robinson said later.

Robinson began the weekend by qualifying his 1970 Camaro seventh in the nine-car field, then had a bye in the opener on raceday before beating Rob Hale in round two. He benefited from Mike Hill's bad luck in the semis when Hill apparently broke the crankshaft in his 2002 Mustang during the burnouts -- especially since Robinson also had trouble with his trans-brake solenoid before staging.

That set up the final against number-one qualifier Birt, who also made a bye run to start eliminations, then easily handled Ken Rainwater and Steve Longley. With lane choice by a wide margin, Birt took the preferred left lane, but at the green Robinson left first with a .419 reaction to the .452 by Birt, his worst light of the weekend. That .033 advantage was all it took for Robinson's 4.865 at 149.95-mph pass to edge the 4.837/149.55 combo assembled by Birt.

Michael Robinson (far lane), had just enough of a holeshot over Marcus Birt in the Outlaw 10.5 final to post a .005 margin of victory at the top end.

In Limited Street, Shannon Ragsdale, from Marietta, GA, inherited the title in his '95 'Vette after all three of his fellow semi-finalists were unable to answer the call to stage. The EZ Street final round went to Shane Stack from Huntsville, AL, with a 5.813 against Brian Murphy's 6.308, and both drivers broke out in the 6.0 index class, where Jerry Bryant's 5.989 beat the 5.981 by Mike Farley. Finally, in his first time out in a 7.50 car, Gainesville, GA's Trent Sanders doubled up in Todd Berry's '82 Corvette with a pair of runner-ups, falling first to Victor Morton on Saturday night and then to Dennis Smith on Sunday.