PHOTOS: CHRIS GRAVES |
In a season that saw him earn some big race wins, Steve Wiley capped off 2016 with his first-ever Texas Outlaw Pro Mod Association title on the strength of three victories and five final-round appearances. Even though he was eliminated from the season-ending San Antonio race in the semis in October, Wiley topped runner-up Bob Alexander by 37 markers in the final tally. Over the course of a nine-race season contested at San Antonio Raceway, Texas Raceway in Kennedale, and the Texas Motorplex near Dallas, Wiley basically only had to show up at San Antonio to lock down the title. Despite the season of domination, the man who started his quest to go fast at the age of 15 said it wasn’ t easy.
“ No, it’ s really not( easy),” he said.“ You’ ve got guys like Gaylen Smith and Bob Alexander and the Clark brothers, Eric Clark and Scotty Clark, that are pretty tough when it comes to Pro Mod racing in our series on the outlaw tracks and so forth. You gotta’ be on your game here or you’ re just wasting your time.”
Attributing good backing, a good team, and ensuring the parts on his’ 63 Corvette were fresh and as well-maintained as possible, Wiley and the Texas Grim Reaper team also earned impressive victories at several races, including the no-prep Outlaw Armageddon event.
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“ Well, we run( the car) up at American Outlaws Live on the Friday race to get into the race and then we run it up on Saturday at the race,” Wiley said.“ That’ s the deal they had. Then we won |
the Outlaw Armageddon they had in Oklahoma.
“ The Bounty Hunter race we won, then we raced nine races in our series, and in the middle of all that, we went to the American Outlaws Live and run it up there, and then won Outlaw Armageddon, the $ 30,000 race.”
Wiley has every intention of defending his noprep title even with some of the changes in the rules package.“ Yeah, I fully expect we’ ll go back to Armageddon. With all the rules that they’ ve changed, they’ re putting so much weight on the screw blowers, we’ re having to change up our combination if we want to go. We’ ve got a steel-bodied vehicle. If we’ re made to change to go away from the vent to go to some of these races, we’ re able to do that, if that makes sense.”
The“ offseason” in racing is the shortest of any sport and when racing in the South, there is always a race that can be run. First up for the Texas Grim Reaper might be one of the biggest grassroots races on the calendar in addition to defending his TOPMA title.
“ We’ re readying the car as we speak, trying to get the combination right to win the Bounty Hunter race and defend our title,” Wiley said.“ That’ s a start. We were actually talking about going to( Donald) Duck( Long’ s) race( Lights Out 8), but we just have to put it all together and get the car done and ready for that. That’ s kinda’ on the radar.
“ That’ s in February, and in March, we’ re going to go to the Bounty Hunter race, which is the second weekend and then our series starts the third weekend and we’ ve got three in a row, three weekends in a row to race( TOPMA).” The Texas Outlaw Pro Mod Association season kicks off March 18th at Kennedale.
- BRANDON W. MUDD DI
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