WELL-LIKED John Meany laughingly says he discovered drag racing in his early 40s by way of a mid-life crisis. He and wife, Kim, are now completely attached to the sport, and can be found every Saturday at South Carolina’ s Greer Dragway.“ We’ ve raced all over the southeast, but we love the people and atmosphere at Greer!” says Meany. He enjoys racing his clean 1978 Ford Fairmont( a car his brother-in-law built in 1985) and reveals that it’ s a durable and great-driving race car while on Greer’ s eighth mile.

Philadelphia Eagles defensive tackle Fletcher Cox, the highest-paid non-quarterback in the NFL, obviously has a busy schedule during football season, but the Pro Drag Radial car owner makes a point to attend a few races per year. Cox is pictured here with PDRA Pro Extreme driver and Osage Casino Tulsa Raceway Park co-owner Todd Martin.

OFF TO SCHOOL Seven-year-old Brody Jeffers sits atop the injector hat on the Bad Bus, a one-off Pro Modified school bus built and driven by his father, Larry Jeffers. Capable of covering the eighth mile in under four seconds at 200 mph, the Bad Bus is surely the envy of young Brody’ s classmates.

ELECTRIFYING While racing at Bristol Dragway earlier this year, the event announcer nicknamed Kelsey Brinkman“ The

Girl with the High Voltage Hair”. The

13-year-old Pennsylvania native is well-known for being tall for her age, and also having locks that possess a jolt of personality! Brinkman enjoys hanging out with friends at Maple

Grove Raceway where she regularly races her Junior Dragster in the Money Trail Bracket Series. She’ s gone to two finals this year, and has also picked up a win at Pennsylvania’ s Numidia Dragway

FATHER-SON SUCCESS Jaxon Messamore( left) and his father, Mark, doubled up with wins at the Kentucky Jr. Dragster Big Buck Nationals, held at I-64 Motorplex. Jaxon won the gambler’ s race on Friday night, while his dad took home the victory in the parents race, in which the grown-ups squeezed into their kids’ race cars and competed amongst each other. For Jaxon, he closed out his Jr. Dragster career in fine fashion, as the race was his last race in the half-scale machines before moving up to a“ big car”.

Issue 117