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By Nate Van Wagnen
Outgoing Switzer Dynamics Pro Nitrous world champion Fredy Scriba went back-to-back at the fifth annual Summit Racing Equipment PDRA ProStars, winning the Red Line Oil PDRA Drag Racing Series’ all-star race for the second straight year. Scriba picked up the $ 15,000 win at Virginia Motorsports Park when he defeated two-time Pro 632 world champion turned Pro Nitrous rookie Amber Denton in the final round. This year, ProStars served as a lead-in to the
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Brian Olson Memorial World Finals. Drivers qualified to compete in the ProStars race using a special points system. Those drivers got the chance to make two test passes before random chip drawings set the pairings for eliminations.
One year after securing his first career Pro Nitrous world championship at the 2024 World Finals, Scriba raced to his second consecutive ProStars victory in his Musi-powered“ Sorcerer”’ 69 Camaro. The final round pitted him against two-time and reigning Pro 632 world champion Amber Denton, who stepped up to Pro Nitrous this season. Though Denton moved first, Scriba rolled to his quickest pass of the season, a
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3.622-second blast at 207.24 mph, and Denton lifted to a 4.283 at 130.89.
“ Sometimes it’ s the car, sometimes it’ s the driver,” Scriba said, who went on to set a new class E. T. record later in the weekend.“ I was a little tardy on the tree, but we made up for it down track. I’ m just happy the car is making consistent runs right now. It’ s a good start for the weekend. We’ ll see how the rest of it goes. It’ s pretty neat – two events in one weekend. It’ s good to get a lot of laps the first day. It’ s really helpful.”
In Pro Boost, Melanie Salemi wheeled Eddie Whelan’ s screw-blown Al-Lee Installations“ Purple Reign”’ 68 Firebird to a string of 3.50-second passes to earn the ProStars win. All three of Salemi’ s passes in eliminations were quicker than the class E. T. national record of 3.555 seconds. She capped off the streak with a 3.547 at 210.87 in the final round to defeat a red-lighting Jason Lee, who recorded a 3.566 at 211.20.
“ Evan and Jon [ Salemi ] have been working tirelessly to get our program to be where it is right now,” Salemi said.“ We’ ve had a lot of struggles, but then we’ ve also had a lot of great times at the racetrack this year. I’ m going to probably say it’ s been my best season so far, but like I said, there’ s been trials and tribulations along the way.
“ To get this win tonight, obviously it’ s not a full four-round race, but there were tough competitors and I don’ t think anybody was ready for us to come out this evening and lay down the 3.54,” Salemi added.“ I actually wasn’ t even ready for it because I just focus on driving. It’ s just really awesome being able to race with our family and
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PHOTOGRAPHS BY TARA BOWKER |