In the final round, Orange Park, Florida racer John Gullet and his turbocharged,
'88 'Stang had a walk over against Steve Kirk Jr. and his Camaro. Kirk
recorded low elapsed time of eliminations with a 7.48/192.55 lap that
trailered Elias Delatorre's turbo-Stang. That apparently gave him a slight
performance edge over number two qualifier (7.405/192.00) John Gullett
whom he would meet in the final round. The big showdown wasn't to be,
however, as Kirk must have hurt the Chevy in the semi- finals against
Delatorre and got no time in the final round. Gullet cruised to the win
with a 7.855/176.85 single.
HEAVYWEIGHT ACTION IN HEAVY ELIMINATOR
This year marked the first time for a new class at Orlando.
The Heavy Street class required the cars to weigh 3500 lbs and use an
automatic trans. Amazingly enough or perhaps not so amazing the Heavy
racers' qualifying was lead by Jim Bullet's 'Stang with a stout 7.695.
Top Speed honors went to Phil Plestis and his '85 Camaro with an equally
impressive 173.87 clocking.
Plestis, who races out of Mentor, Ohio, came as close
to running the table as anyone. He managed to get the Top Speed of the
meet and then ran a series of laps in the eight-teens at about 170 mph.
He met and defeated Ken Anderson's '78 Malibu in the final round.
Jim Gullett looked like he was going to wade through the
field without a problem but apparently wasn't use to the 5/10th tree
that the Heavy street class ran on and wasted a 7.979 pass in the semis
against Ken Anderson when he bulbed with a .476 light.
Phil Plestis needed all of his driving skills to get to
the final round. In perhaps the closest race of the event, in quarter-final
action Plestis ran a 8.118/173.07 with a .505 light and still needed
a little luck to beat his opponent John Schroeder. Schroeder had a perfect
.500 light and ran an 8.128/169.97 and ended up losing by just five-thousandths
of a second.
RADICAL RADIAL RACERS
The Radial class probably featured cars that were closer
to being honest to goodness street-legal cars than any other class.
Rules for these cars required DOT tires no wider than 12 inches across,
3400 lbs, factory transmissions and converter and NO WHEELIE BARS! These
are real street cars, folks.
Fifty-four of these beasts tried to qualify for the elite
32 car field. Number one qualifier was NMCA veteran Tony Pirez in his
tricked-out, 468 inch "rat-motored" '70 Nova. Pirez ran a blistering
8.954/153.60 to hold down the top spot. On the "bump" was Florida racer
David W Burgess with his '77 Nova that ran a respectable 10.323 powered
by his 280-inch "mouse-motored" Chevy.
Lamar Swindoll Jr. ran a mind blowing 9.03/162.04 for
the number two spot and top speed for the class driving his 347 cubic
inch, small block Ford-powered '88 Stang.
There is an old say that goes something like the race
doesn't always go to the swiftest. Lamar Swindoll evidently never heard
that saying. Swindall drove his '88 'Stang to the winners' circle by
running a series of low nine-second passes at speeds hovering around
160 mph. Pirez evidently hurt his Nova in a third round win over Bob
Lavoie and couldn't make the semi-final round, which gave Shannon Wren
a pass into the final.
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