NHRA CHAMPIONS TRADE DAY JOBS FOR PRO MODS
Instead of taking the traditional offseason break, Antron Brown and Erica Enders stepped out of their regular NHRA rides and into Pro Modified machines. Both multi-time NHRA Mission Foods Series champions brought their A-game to the Drag Illustrated Winter Series at Bradenton, sharing the lanes with some of the toughest Pro Mod racers in the world.
For Brown, a four-time NHRA Top Fuel champion, the DI Winter Series marked his Pro Mod debut. Driving a red Lexus RCF known as“ Jerome” for Team Buginga, he entered the Snowbird Outlaw Nationals presented by Motion Raceworks, U. S. Street Nationals presented by M & M Transmission, and the World Series of Pro Mod. Though he missed the field at Snowbirds, he qualified at the next two events, and Brown’ s best showing was at the U. S. Street Nationals when he made it to round three.
“ The guys that were at the DI Winter Series are diehard racers. They’ re serious, and you didn’ t just have a handful of them— there was a pack of them,” Brown says.“ It wasn’ t just showing up— you had more than 80 cars trying to run within a tenth to make a 32-car field. That’ s real racing.”
Enders, the six-time NHRA Pro Stock world champion and winningest woman in motorsports, returned to Pro Mod for the first time since a fire sidelined her program in 2019. In a ProCharger-powered Camaro backed by Elite Motorsports and Scott Tidwell Racing, Enders qualified at all three events, and she advanced the furthest at the WSOPM, getting to round three and finishing eighth in the Winter Series points.
“ I hadn’ t been in a Pro Mod since the explo-
> ANTRON BROWN
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