Dirt
drag racing in 2000, driving a 1998 Mustang
that he still owns.
“I’ve also got a 1,000-horsepower 2013 Mus-
tang GT500. It’s a stick car that I run a lot of
half-mile races with. Incidentally, that’s a big
market, and we’re going to add a ‘roll racing’
event to next year’s Mod Nationals. When you
look at the shutdown here at SGMP, it’s easy
to see that we could have some 180 mph cars
here, and I believe that will be a nice addition
to next year’s event. We’ll probably stop racing
at 7:00 p.m., and then roll race until midnight,”
Young explains.
The event as a whole is no doubt growing at a
rapid rate, although Young is cautious to not let it
expand too fast too soon. For that reason, Young
plans to continue presenting just one event per
season for the foreseeable future.
“I work all year to get sponsors for just one race,
so doubling my efforts to present a second event
is something I’ll proceed with very slowly,” Young
asserts. “In business, you can’t grow too fast.”
With the most recent attendance levels ap-
proaching 200 cars on Friday’s opening day,
Young feels as though he’s ahead of the game
after holding just two gatherings. The second
annual event awarded $36,000 in total payouts,
a number Justin hopes to increase to $50,000
for the third annual Mod Nationals. “As success-
ful as the most recent running turned out, I still
had probably 60 people message me and tell me
they’d like to be there, but couldn’t make it for
various reasons.”
For Young, it’s surreal to have some of his he-
roes in attendance, which include the guys he’s
watched and admired that are now competing
in an event that he organized with no previous
experience in race promotion.
“I aspire to be like Donald Long and Jason
Miller because those guys set the standard for
how an event is run. It’s all in the preparation,
and I hope one day they know my name! We’re
gonna keep grinding and keep getting bigger and
better,” Young concludes.
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38 | D r a g
I l l u s t r a t e d | DragIllustrated.com
Issue 130
MOD NATIONALS