PRO EXTREME

Pro Extreme qualifying finished with a couple of drag racing’s young lions at the top of the list. Jason Hamstra and Cody Barklage, both 21 years old, finished one-two on the qualifying ladder with stellar 3.71-second passes at 200 miles per hour. Hamstra just edged Barklage for the number one spot by three-thousandths of a second. Hamstra had a 3.715/205.10 effort and Barklage a 3.718/203.25. Defending race champ Jason Scruggs, who has dominated the class for a couple of years, managed “only” a 3.778/205.47 good for the eighth spot. Hamstra’s supercharged ’68 Camaro, ran the quickest and fastest lap ever by a torque converter-equipped car.

“We stepped it up a little bit at night, but it was far from a perfect pass,” the young driver from Demotte, Indiana, said. “It moved around quite a bit out there. Our computer shows it pulled 2Gs lateral movement at one point. My teammates pointed out I missed my shift point a little and I told them that was because I was kind of busy driving!”

Hamstra, who never ran slower than 3.768 or quicker than 3.78, recorded wins over Travis Swearingen, Gaylen Smith and Joshua Hernandez to get to the finals and a showdown with Pro Extreme newcomer and longshot finalist Ken Walsh who had qualified at number 11. In the final Hamstra and his crew just kept the pressure on. He “treed” Walsh big time with a .017 RT to Walsh’s .069  and then ran a 3.76/ 204.73-mph lap that easily covered Walsh’s 3.87/196+ effort.

“Our car was driving really smooth all weekend, it didn’t spin the tires even once,” Hamstra said of his supercharged 1968 Camaro. “Everything just went perfect for us here.”

Joshua Hernandez

Dragstock VI also represented the final points-paying opportunity to secure a qualifying position in the ADRL’s unique Battle for the Belts “playoff” on technically the first race of the 2010 racing season. The race, which is held each year at the Texas Motorplex, pits the top eight finishers in each of the series’ five pro classes against each in a winner-take-all, championship-deciding race.  With the win, Hamstra cemented a seventh-place points finish and a chance to win the National Guard ADRL Pro Extreme championship.

“That was our first priority when we arrived here,” Hamstra said. “Once we won our second round and knew we’d be in the Battle for the Belts we were able to relax a little and just go racing.”

Thirty-five Extreme Pro Mods were qualifying for the 16 available spots. Twenty-four cars ran a sub-four second lap. The 3.827 bump spot was occupied by the National Guard-backed Travis Swearingen team.