IN THE CLOSEST FINAL IN WSOPM
HISTORY, KING DEFEATED FAN- FAVORITE“ STEVIE FAST” JACKSON BY JUST ONE-THOUSANDTH OF A SECOND.
King says it wasn’ t until he was driving up the road and looked over at the trophy in the passenger seat that he could finally think,“ Wow, we really just did this.”
Pilot Racing’ s performance at the WSOPM was affirmation that they could indeed perform at the highest level. King, who’ s driven Pro Street and Pro Mod cars for 25 years, is no stranger to big wins— he took home $ 50,000 last year at the Pro Mod Invitational at Cecil County Dragway— but says they’ d hit a bit of a rough stretch leading up to Bradenton.
Although they ran well throughout the Drag Illustrated Winter Series presented by J & A Service, qualifying for all three events— an impressive accomplishment in itself— success had not been found in eliminations. King was forced to abort his run during round one of the Snowbird Outlaw Nationals presented by Motion Raceworks in a losing effort to Ty Tutterow. At the U. S. Street Nationals presented by M & M Transmission, King ran a stout 3.604 in the first round; unfortunately, he was paired against Mark Micke, who ran a 3.566— the quickest pass of the entire series.
“ That was our Winter Series in a nutshell,” says King.“ We tested very good at all those races. We just drew the wrong guy at the wrong time. We came back to WSOPM, and honestly, even though we had a good car, our confidence level was down from not going rounds. The World Series really gave us a big boost by restoring a little bit of that confidence.”
With the victory, King continued the time-honored WSOPM tradition of winning the event as an underdog. Two years after Spencer Hyde was victorious from the No. 32 spot, King ran through the 32-car field from the 30th position. But just attempting to qualify brought its share of uncertainty as well. As drivers continued to move up in the final session, he saw his position slip. By the time King made his run, he’ d dropped to 30th. Luckily, there were no drivers left that could bump him out at that point, which meant King would be in the hunt on race day.
In the first round of eliminations, he drew Cameron Hensley in the ProCharger-boosted Coast Packing’ 69 Camaro. Both drivers were nearly identical on E. T., but King’ s slightly better
KING SHARES A MOMENT WITH CAMERON HENSLEY PRIOR TO THEIR FIRST-ROUND MATCHUP.
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