Drag Illustrated Issue 114, October 2016 | Page 56

56 | D r a g I l l u s t r a t e d | DragIllustrated.com Issue 114 P HOTOG RA P H BY R OG E R RI CH A RDS Gateway Motorsports Park | Madison, Illinois | Sunday, September 25, 2016 Although he’s better known as the father of his world champion sons, Britt and Slate, Larry Cummings is a sportsman drag racing legend. In his four decades behind the wheel, Cummings has accumulated countless IHRA victories, and a number of division championships. He was a constant fixture in IHRA’s national top ten throughout the 1990s and was an original member of the Budweiser sportsman “Super Team” in the ‘80s – the first multi-car, corporate-sponsored sportsman racing team. The bulk of his success, however, came in IHRA competition. Since he and his Moser Engineering-backed team turned their focus to the NHRA about five years ago, Britt, Slate, and team driver Jody Simoneaux have all tasted victory, but the prestigious NHRA Wally trophy had proven elusive to the family patriarch – until the NHRA Midwest Nationals outside St. Louis, Missouri, where the 69-year-old scored his first NHRA Super Stock victory. Cummings was infallible in the final round with a .005 light and an 8.538 on his 8.52 dial to stop fellow 69-yearold Keith Lynch, who won back-to-back Super Stock national championships in 1982-83. LONG-AWAITED CAUGHT!