Drag Illustrated Issue 144, May 2019 | Page 30

Dirt ‘The Bandit’ Strikes Doug Winters claims Carolina Xtreme Pro Mod victory at series’ return By Josh Hachat ter, Jeremy Ray, Jay Cox, Chris Rini and Tommy Mauney at the first of five races during the 2019 Carolina Xtreme Pro Mod season. With 22 total entries for the one-day Pee Dee Fleet Winter Nationals, it went down as a massive success for the series, which returned with no- ticeable energy and interest after taking 2018 off. The series provided free testing on Friday and jumped into two rounds of qualifying on Saturday before moving into eliminations. The entire event was finished by 10 p.m. and with INTRODUCING THE NEW BRT-XLT strong participation from both racers and fans, co-founders Nathan Vanbeek and Tony Wilson called it a rousing success. “I think it went better than we could have ever expected,” Wilson said. “It turned out to be a near-perfect weekend as far as racers and spectators, and just the race in general. We had a lot of fans there, the caliber of racers was fan- tastic, and it was really good to kick it back off with a race like that. I think we’re really going to feed off this.” CONGRATULATIONS TO JEREMY RAY NHRA PRO MOD ROOKIE OF THE YEAR & DALLAS EVENT WINNER THE BEST CONVERTER DRIVE IS NOW ALSO THE LIGHTEST WE INVENTED, PATENTED AND PERFECTED THE CONVERTER DRIVE. AVAILABLE IN LOCKUP OR NON LOCKUP WITH PROVEN FLUID MANIPULATION THAT OTHERS CAN’T TOUCH. XLT FEATURES INCLUDE BILLET MAGNESIUM COMPONENTS THAT MAKE IT LIGHTER THAN ANYTHING ON THE MARKET. 3LBS STILL THE BEST CONVERTER DRIVE AT ANY PRICE, BUT WITHOUT THE STICKER SHOCK! FOR MORE INFO CALL 630.458.0043 OR LOG ONTO WWW.BRUNOSAUTOMOTIVE.COM 30 | D r a g I l l u s t r a t e d | DragIllustrated.com LIKE US ON FACEBOOK Issue 144 W ith a full NHRA Pro Mod schedule, Doug Winters doesn’t get to do much racing outside of those 12 races. But when the op- portunity came to race at Darlington Dragway with a host of big names at the season-opening race for the Carolina Xtreme Pro Mod series, Winters couldn’t pass it up. What started as a test session turned into a ma- jor moment for Winters, as he powered his Bandit Big Rig Series ‘69 Chevelle past Rickie Smith in the final round with a 3.760 at 197.28 mph. “It was very exciting to get a win with that level of competition,” Winters said. “There were some legends, some PDRA racers, some NHRA racers, so it was pretty special. The series is doing a lot of stuff to get good fields and Darlington is just a great venue. It was a really good weekend.” It was the final highlight in a satisfying week- end for Winters, who thoroughly enjoyed compet- ing alongside the likes of Smith, Charles Carpen-