<img src="http://www.nitromater.com/gallery/files/5/Castellana.jpg" alt="Castellana" align="left"borders="0"/>
(6-23-08) ENGLISHTOWN, New Jersey – Mike Castellana displayed the driving abilities of a champion this weekend alongside an equally impressive team that made their record-setting abilities quite obvious at Old Bridge Township Raceway Park in Englishtown, New Jersey during the NHRA SuperNationals. In just their first outing this year with the JEGS ProMod Challenge, Castellana came close to a final round victory, but would have to settle for Runner Up honors this weekend.
He started the day from the No. 11 qualifying spot, but that didn’t stop him from wading through the best Pro Modified has to offer – first in Rd. 1 against Taylor Lastor whose 6.078/239.40mph pass wasn’t enough to make up for Castellana’s starting line advantage (.050 to .093), who stayed ahead for the win with a 6.089-second pass at 238.98mph.
In Rd. 2, Castellana again used a .066-second reaction time to gain the advantage over Kirk Kuhns’ 6.502/234.78mph pass, to get the win light by a considerable margin considering his 6.098/235.60mph performance – approximately 24 feet at the stripe.
“This team is starting to get back in race mode,” said Castellana about his string of holeshot victories. “We’ve been doing the R&D program for so long that we had to knock a little rust off and get back to racing to win here in Englishtown. Being so involved with our engine program, we like to outrun the competition, but we’ll take a win however we can get it.”
In the semi-final round of action in Englishtown, Castellana unloaded the quickest and fastest pass by a nitrous car in NHRA competition – 6.048/239.65mph – which destroyed the previous record for these combinations by over a tenth of a second and 7 miles per hour.
With the stage set for an incredible final round between the quickest blown and nitrous Pro Mods in the history of the NHRA JEGS ProMod Challenge, Mike Castellana faced off with Josh Hernandez to crown a winner and put an end to an ultimately tragic weekend considering the loss of fellow racer, Scott Kalitta, on Saturday. Both cars left together, (Castellana .055 to Hernandez .050), but the race would end just after the 1/8th mile as Castellana ran into problems and had to abort the run, giving the win to Hernandez.
“We couldn’t find a better place to be in the final round than here in Englishtown in front of all the fans,” said a satisfied Castellana. “We got past some good racers en route to this final and our crew worked really hard this weekend with the short week and turnaround from Budds Creek.
“We knew starting a new engine program would be challenging, but we knew there was a lot left in this combination, so it’s all starting to pay off now. I’ve got to thank Shannon, Brandon, Reher-Morrison and Speedtech Nitrous for all they’ve done to put this Al Anabi AWESOME ’68 Firebird in the final round three races in a row.”
Photo courtesy of Roger Richards/ProModifieds.US
2008 JEGS ProMod Challenge Debut Results in a Runner Up Finish
(6-23-08) ENGLISHTOWN, New Jersey – Mike Castellana displayed the driving abilities of a champion this weekend alongside an equally impressive team that made their record-setting abilities quite obvious at Old Bridge Township Raceway Park in Englishtown, New Jersey during the NHRA SuperNationals. In just their first outing this year with the JEGS ProMod Challenge, Castellana came close to a final round victory, but would have to settle for Runner Up honors this weekend.
He started the day from the No. 11 qualifying spot, but that didn’t stop him from wading through the best Pro Modified has to offer – first in Rd. 1 against Taylor Lastor whose 6.078/239.40mph pass wasn’t enough to make up for Castellana’s starting line advantage (.050 to .093), who stayed ahead for the win with a 6.089-second pass at 238.98mph.
In Rd. 2, Castellana again used a .066-second reaction time to gain the advantage over Kirk Kuhns’ 6.502/234.78mph pass, to get the win light by a considerable margin considering his 6.098/235.60mph performance – approximately 24 feet at the stripe.
“This team is starting to get back in race mode,” said Castellana about his string of holeshot victories. “We’ve been doing the R&D program for so long that we had to knock a little rust off and get back to racing to win here in Englishtown. Being so involved with our engine program, we like to outrun the competition, but we’ll take a win however we can get it.”
In the semi-final round of action in Englishtown, Castellana unloaded the quickest and fastest pass by a nitrous car in NHRA competition – 6.048/239.65mph – which destroyed the previous record for these combinations by over a tenth of a second and 7 miles per hour.
With the stage set for an incredible final round between the quickest blown and nitrous Pro Mods in the history of the NHRA JEGS ProMod Challenge, Mike Castellana faced off with Josh Hernandez to crown a winner and put an end to an ultimately tragic weekend considering the loss of fellow racer, Scott Kalitta, on Saturday. Both cars left together, (Castellana .055 to Hernandez .050), but the race would end just after the 1/8th mile as Castellana ran into problems and had to abort the run, giving the win to Hernandez.
“We couldn’t find a better place to be in the final round than here in Englishtown in front of all the fans,” said a satisfied Castellana. “We got past some good racers en route to this final and our crew worked really hard this weekend with the short week and turnaround from Budds Creek.
“We knew starting a new engine program would be challenging, but we knew there was a lot left in this combination, so it’s all starting to pay off now. I’ve got to thank Shannon, Brandon, Reher-Morrison and Speedtech Nitrous for all they’ve done to put this Al Anabi AWESOME ’68 Firebird in the final round three races in a row.”
Photo courtesy of Roger Richards/ProModifieds.US
