Keith Haney Racing

Thursday, April 26, 2018

Haney Heading for NHRA Pro Mod with Summit Racing on His Side

TULSA, OK (Apr. 18, 2018) – Several giants of the sport are teaming up as Summit Racing Equipment has signed on as primary sponsor for Keith Haney Racing to enter the NHRA E3 Spark Plugs Pro Mod Series at three national events this season.

Driving a nitrous-boosted 2015 Summit Racing Camaro owned by three-time

NHRA Pro Mod World Champion Rickie Smith and tuned by Brandon Switzer, Haney will make his NHRA Pro Mod debut next month (May 18-20) at Topeka, KS, with additional outings in September at St. Louis and the following month in Dallas, TX.

“The deal came together pretty quickly after I met Keith down at the Mid-West Pro Mod race earlier this year in Dallas. We’ve been in Pro Mod a few times before and this is an opportunity to kind of get our feet back in the game for three races and have some fun,” Summit Racing Motorsports and Events Manager Jim Greenleaf explained.

“What I think is going to be really exciting is the fact that Keith will be showing up with a car and a team that can win right away. I also think he is going to be good for the class because he brings a competitiveness, a back-and-forth with some of the other drivers that’s sort of been missing from other forms of drag racing right now.”

For his part, Haney couldn’t be happier or more excited to have Summit Racing on his side as he embarks on the biggest jump of his 30-year drag racing career.

“This is huge,” he declared. “To have Summit Racing show faith in Keith Haney Racing like this, well, it’s unbelievably fantastic is what it is. I mean, this is Summit, the company that sponsors Greg Anderson and Jason Line in Pro Stock and the title sponsor for the NHRA national event up in Norwalk, Ohio. It just doesn’t get any bigger than this.”

Keith Haney Racing has been on quite a roll lately, capturing championships in both Pro Mod and Drag Radial within the Mid-West Pro Mod Series last year and following up in 2018 so far with a runner-up finish in Radial vs. the World at Lights Out 9 in February, another runner-up in RvW at the Mid-West series season opener in early-March, a semi-finals appearance at the elite Sweet 16 RvW event later that month, and Haney picked up the RvW win just a couple of weeks ago for Radial Revenge at Tulsa Raceway Park, a track he co-owns with fellow racer Todd Martin.

Haney said Switzer initially brought him the offer of a Jerry Bickel-built car from Smith that’s previously won on the NHRA Pro Mod circuit. It will carry a Pat Musi powerplant and Smith will be available, too, for additional tuning and set-up advice.

“We’re going to be racing as a team,” Haney stressed. “You’ve got Rickie driving one car, you've got Khalid Al Balooshi driving another, and you've got me driving the Summit car. With the data and the information we're going to get between each other we're going to be second to none. I'm really blessed by the fact that Rickie and Brandon believe in me going out there and making some noise for them.

“With the team we have in place and a car that’s already a front runner, all I can say is those other boys better watch out because I can be number one when I come out; I can drag everybody's asses when I come out; I can talk crap when I come out,” he added. “They're going to know my name when I come out because the side of the car is going to say 'You Know My Name' and I guarantee you're going to know it when I get to NHRA.”

Greenleaf said he’s looking forward to the fireworks.

“Pro Mod is definitely a little different than Pro Stock or even Funny Car, where we’re an associate sponsor for Tim Wilkerson, so they can trash talk and jab at each other, but still keep it PC, for lack of a better term, and Keith is a businessman and he understands that,” Greenleaf pointed out.

“So I like how these guys go at it, but if someone needs some help or

something they want to see each other make the call; they don't want a round win just because somebody broke. They’re very competitive and are there to race each other, but they also want to have a good time and that’s what I took away from Keith, his desire to grow the sport and the class while also having fun, which is exactly how everyone at Summit wants to go racing, too.”

Haney said his first callout will go to “Stevie Fast” Jackson, an NHRA Pro Mod regular with whom he’s clashed before, both online and on the track.

“I'm going to figure out if I can get with NHRA, because the very first pass I make down an NHRA race track, I'm calling Stevie out. Maybe me and him will have a little grudge race on top of qualifying. Hell, if he wants to go every one of the qualifying rounds against each other, I'll do that. And anybody else that has a little bit of oomph, if they want a piece of 'You Know My Name,' they know where to find me. I'm going to be in the NHRA Pro Mod pits and they can come find me anytime they want.

“My goal is go out there and win some races for Summit Racing Equipment. And if I do, who knows what’ll happen? Maybe I'm going to run the whole series in 2019. If I do, you better watch out because I will win a championship, because they ain't got nobody out there like me.”

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ABOUT KEITH HANEY RACING

Based in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Keith Haney Racing (www.keithhaneyracing.com) fields two cars in the Mid-West Pro Mod Series (MWPMS), as well as for select NHRA and PDRA races and one-off special events. Keith Haney Racing appreciates the support of sponsors Summit Racing Equipment, Lucas Oil, Strange Engineering, RacingJunk.com, Reher-Morrison Racing Engines, MoTeC Systems USA, Switzer Dynamics, Brandon Pesz Performance & Tuning, M&M Transmission, Menscer Motorsports, Total Seal, Mickey Thompson, Kryptonite Kustomz, Browell Bellhousing, and Larry Jeffers Race Cars.

Hunt, Pharris and White Win with MWPMS at Outlaw Street Car Reunion

TULSA, OK (April 26, 2018) – Shortly after taking a two-year break from competition, Jerry Hunt scored his career-first win with the Frankenstein Engine Dynamics Mid-West Pro Mod Series (MWPMS) as he secured the Pro Mod title Mar. 21, as part of the Holley EFI Outlaw Street Car Reunion V (OSCR). Also notching MWPMS wins at historic Beech Bend Raceway Park in Bowling Green, KY, were Daniel Pharris in Radial vs. the World (RvW) and Jimmy White in the X275 drag radial class.

“I’m proud to say we had tremendous representation for the Mid-West Pro Mod Series in our first trip to Bowling Green,” said Keith Haney, owner and promoter of the all-eighth-mile, Tulsa-based drag racing organization. “We had 33 cars entered in Pro Mod, 18 in Radial vs. the World and 40 in X275. I couldn’t be any happier with the turnout and want to thank each and every team for supporting our sponsors at such a great event.”

Originally scheduled to run Mar. 20-22, a long-range forecast for rain prompted OSCR organizer Tyler Crossnoe to step up the schedule and move eliminations from Sunday to Saturday. It proved to be the right choice, but made for a hectic weekend, he explained.

“I’m so glad we made that call on Tuesday and let everyone know about the new schedule because it did rain hard on Sundayand we never would have got this race in if we hadn’t,” Crossnoe said. “Plus, we had more oildowns and wrecks on Friday than we’d had in all four previous events combined, so between those and the compressed schedule it put a lot of stress on me and my guys all weekend.

“But it all worked out in the end and the racers really seemed to enjoy the Friday-Saturday event because they all could drive home on Sunday. Going forward, if we continue with the event, we’ll stick with this new format and wrap it up on Saturdayevening.”

Hunt, who returned to racing just a month ago at the MWPMS season opener in Texas, brought his supercharged ’67 Camaro down from St. Louis and qualified

13th with a 3.83-seconds pass, directly ahead of Haney and his nitrous-assisted ’16 Camaro. Leading the 16-car Pro Mod field into race day was Arkansas racer Eddie Rogers with a new MWPMS record of 3.70 seconds at 201.16 mph, followed by Jonas Aleshire at 3.73 and 204.82, and Wayne Roberts with a 3.74 run at 198.03 mph.

Once eliminations began, Hunt opened with another 3.83 to hold off a hard-charging Steve Summers, then went 3.88 in the quarter-finals while 5th-place starter Mike Recchia lost control of his ’69 Camaro and sideswiped the right guardwall. Fortunately, Recchia was uninjured while Hunt went on to post 3.83 yet again in the semis while outrunning Stephan Stringer.

Meanwhile, on the opposite side of the ladder Aleshire remained in the 3.70s all day with his blown ’06 Corvette as he eliminated Tony Williams, Todd Martin, winner of the MWPMS Texas race, and Ron Muenks to reach Hunt in the final. Once there, however, Aleshire experienced a starting-line issue that led to a red-light start, while Hunt streaked to the win with his best pass of the weekend at 3.80 seconds and 198.47 mph.

In Radial vs. the World it was all Pharris, as the Sikeston, MO-based driver qualified number one with a 3.71 at 214.52-mph pass, just ahead of fellow Show-Me-State racer Mark Micke at 3.74 with the fastest speed of the meet at 221.20 mph, and Haney in “Enigma,” his second 2016 Camaro, posting a 3.78 pass at dead on 200 mph.

Driving a twin-turboed 2014 Corvette for Andrew Alepa, Pharris went on to defeat Keith Rhea in round one, made a bye run in round two thanks to the 18-

car, all-run field, then took down Jody Voyles and won with a holeshot over Micke in the semis. That Micke was even there was a testament to his team and the help of many others after he grenaded his twin-turbocharged engine in round two of racing. Only a heroic thrash got his Jason Carter-owned ’78 Malibu back in action for a third-round bye in which Micke merely broke the starting beam and idled down track to make things official.

Waiting for Pharris in the final was the nitrous-fed ’69 Camaro of 4th-place qualifier Jeff Naiser, who bested Ruben Tetsoshvili in the opener, followed by David Adkins and DeWayne Mills, who lost to a Naiser holeshot by a mere one-thousandth of a second. Again thanks to the unconventional starting-field number, Naiser then enjoyed a bye from the semis to the final, where Pharris led stripe-to-stripe with a 3.73 pass at 214.35 mph over the 3.74 at 196.82 combo put together by Naiser.

By the time the event was over, Pharris actually visited Beech Bend’s victory lane twice, as he also scored the win in Limited Drag Radial, beating Shane Stack in the final round to become the first double-up winner in OSCR history.

In X275, Ron Rhodes arrived from Townsend, DE, and laid down a 4.38-seconds pass at 159.97 mph in his ’67 Camaro to sit on the pole, leading a 32-car field into eliminations. However, it was 4th-place starter White and his ’89 Mustang that survived five rounds of racing to take the MWPMS win home to Memphis.

White caught a break in round one when Shannon Renfro went red by a

thousandth off the tree, but after that White settled in to beat Sean Lyon, Alan Felts and Eric Moore to reach Shane Fisher in the final. Fisher was a no-show, however, after damaging his engine in his semi-final win over Rich Bruder, who in the previous round set a new X275 elapsed-time record of 4.29 seconds, becoming the first driver in the class to run a sub-4.30-seconds lap.

“The racers of the Mid-West Pro Mod Association put on one helluva’ show and it was a real honor for us to be part of the Outlaw Street Car Reunion,” Haney declared. “But it’s also important to recognize all of our great sponsors and marketing partners who put their faith—and their money—on us to make things happen. They make all of this stuff possible; they allow us to do the things we love while providing the tracks we race at with $10,000 at each event and paying our racers a decent purse that makes them want to keep coming back.”

In addition to series sponsor Frankenstein Engine Dynamics, Haney expressed sincere gratitude on behalf of the Mid-West Pro Mod Series to Summit Racing Equipment, 74 Auto, Accufab, Aeromotive, Atomizer Racing Injectors, B&C Trailer Services, Chris Duncan Race Cars, ComSyncEFI, Dave’s RV, Extreme Racing Oil, Flying A Motorsports, Full Throttle Express, Grand Prix Auto Sports Centers, Hoosier, Jerry Bickel Race Cars, Kryptonite Kustomz, Larry Jeffers Race Cars, Lenco, M&M Transmission, Menscer Motorsports, Miami Chevrolet-Buick-GMC, Neal Chance, RacingJunk.com, Reher-Morrison, SLM, Strange, Stroud, Suburban Chevrolet, Team RFC, Twin Lakes Whitetails, VP Racing Fuels, and Waterman Racing Components.

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Photos courtesy OSCR

ABOUT THE FRANKENSTEIN ENGINE DYNAMICS MID-WEST PRO MOD SERIES

The Frankenstein Engine Dynamics Mid-West Pro Mod Series is an all-eighth-mile, no-profit organization that typically competes during each host track’s biggest event of the year. Its appearance is entirely funded by sponsorships passed along to benefit the host tracks (typically about $10,000). The Mid-West Pro Mod Series also provides trackside sponsor banners to be displayed at each event, on-site PA sponsor announcements, and links to each company on the MWPMS website (www.MidWestProModSeries.com), plus an extensive social-media presence, texts and e-mail blasts, and commercials during all events. Complete class rules are posted on the MWPMS website. Frankenstein Engine Dynamics (www.Frankensteined.net) offers access to a professional install shop with a multitude of services including custom CNC porting and machine work, chassis dyno, engine dyno, Spintron, and additional customer service and support.

Tuesday, April 3, 2018

Haney Wins Radial Revenge in Tulsa with Track Record Run

TULSA, OK (Apr. 3, 2018) – Veteran drag racer Keith Haney saved his best for last Mar. 31, during Radial Revenge Tour 2018 at Osage Casino Tulsa Raceway

Park. Driving “Enigma,” his nitrous-boosted 2016 Camaro, Haney covered the eighth mile in 3.75 seconds at 197.86 mph to set a new track elapsed time record while leading stripe-to-stripe for the win over Tim Slavens in the Radial vs. the World final.

Slavens ran 3.78 at 212.26 in his twin-turbocharged ’69 Camaro for a close runner-up finish. The track ET record prior to the Radial Revenge event was 3.79 seconds, with Slavens and Haney trading it back-and-forth five times throughout qualifying and eliminations.

“Yeah, I treed him by over two hundredths (of a second) and never looked back; never saw him the whole way down,” said Haney, a local businessman who co-owns the Tulsa track with Todd Martin, as well as several new car dealerships in the Tulsa area. “It felt good and I knew it was on a good pass, too, but it wasn’t until I looked up and saw the scoreboard that I knew just how good. This was a big win for our team.

“We thought Slavens would go 3.76 or so, somewhere in that area, so we tuned ‘er up. My guys told me when I went up there, we’re either going to spin or win,” Haney recalled. “But it was a good track, David Cook did a great job on it there, and that car was on a rail from A to B. It was pretty much a perfect run for conditions.”

Despite securing championships in both Pro Modified and Radial vs. the World last year with the Frankenstein Engine Dynamics Mid-West Pro Mod Series

(MWPMS), the Tulsa triumph marked Haney’s first drag radial race win. It was the second win for Enigma, however, after Haney’s co-crew chief Brandon Pesz drove it to victory lane last August in the MWPMS event at St. Louis.

“We’ve had good luck with this car; it’s gone to the quarters, semis or finals in every race since the day I had it finished,” Haney said.

After qualifying number one in the eight-car field for Radial Revenge 2018, Haney beat Justin Martin in the opening round of racing, then took down Mark Micke in the semis before facing Slavens for the event final.

“I’m proud to say I’m the first to beat ‘Mr. 221’ since Sweet 16, so I beat the

fastest man in the world,” Haney declared of prevailing over Micke, who two weeks earlier set the drag radial world on fire with an unprecedented 3.62-seconds ET record and top speed record of 221.20 mph on his way to winning $101,000 in the Sweet 16 drag radial event at Valdosta, GA.

“We had a badass car this weekend and raced against the baddest RvW cars in the country. This was a great win for our team and much deserved after winning the 2017 Mid West Pro Mod and Radial Championships, then going to Lights Out 9 and finishing runner up, then going to the Sweet 16 and going to the semis,” Haney concluded.

“I have so many people to thank. Of course my crew chiefs, Brandon Pesz and Brandon Switzer, those guys are the best, as well as Cody Moore, Dale Hancock, Cale Hancock, Trey Elbre, Shane Goodnight and Kimmy Pesz. I also want to thank my helpers Braylee and Kilee and their beautiful mother and my girl Misty Hayes, along with my close friends who came and stayed all day and supported me: Roman Lamborn, Scott Farley, Chris Williams and Beth Dalton. But most of all thank you to all my sponsors and fans. I can’t say enough about how much your support means to me and our team.”

Both Keith Haney Racing cars will return to the track with Haney behind the steering wheels Apr. 20-21, as the MWPMS competes within the Outlaw Street Car Reunion at historic Beech Bend Raceway Park in Bowling Green, KY.

Photos by Mary Robinson

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ABOUT KEITH HANEY RACING

Based in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Keith Haney Racing (www.keithhaneyracing.com) fields two cars in the Mid-West Pro Mod Series (MWPMS), as well as for select Professional Drag Racers Association (PDRA) races and one-off special events. Keith Haney Racing appreciates the support of sponsors Lucas Oil, Strange Engineering, RacingJunk.com, Reher-Morrison Racing Engines, MoTeC Systems USA, Switzer Dynamics, Brandon Pesz Performance & Tuning, M&M Transmission, Menscer Motorsports, Total Seal, Mickey Thompson, Kryptonite Kustomz, Browell Bellhousing, and Larry Jeffers Race Cars.

Tuesday, March 27, 2018

Haney Reaches Semis at Sweet 16

TULSA, OK (March 27, 2018) – For veteran drag radial competitor Keith Haney of Broken Arrow, OK, a top-10 start plus a semi-finals finish added up to a successful outing Mar. 22-24, in promoter Donald “Duck” Long’s inaugural Sweet 16 event at South Georgia Motorsports Park (SGMP).

With a then-career-best 3.74 at 200.74 mph, Haney qualified “Enigma,” his

nitrous-boosted 2016 Camaro, 10th of 34 entries in the quickest and fastest Radial vs. the World (RvW) field ever assembled. Six drivers, led by eventual race winner Mark Micke, made unprecedented runs in the 3.60s to pace the field, which was going after a $101,000 winner-take-all prize fund.

“This was a great, great event. I applaud Donald on trying something a little different that turned out to be very cool and special,” Haney said of the event which featured two classes of racing, nine rounds of qualifying, and only 500 spectator ticket sales, though a live online feed shared the action with the masses. “I think the Sweet 16 overall is a great concept. It’s something just for the racers; it’s Donald just giving back to the guys that support his Lights Out and No Mercy events. He did a great job here.”

In the opening round of racing Haney squared off against fellow nitrous racer Jeff Naiser and his ’69 Camaro. After leaving with an impressive .020 reaction time, Haney led stripe-to-stripe with a 3.74-seconds run at 200.56 mph that further lowered his career-best elapsed time by six-thousandths of a second.

Round two saw him go to the line with number-two qualifier Daniel Pharris in a

twin-turbocharged ’15 Corvette, which encountered traction trouble on the SGMP eighth mile while Haney ran another solid 3.78 at 195.96 mph. However, when Haney’s crew saw flames shoot out of both header pipes as he crossed the finish line they feared broken rods or burned pistons might be waiting for them back in the pits.

Prior to the start of eliminations, Long had announced all Sweet 16 semi-finalists and finalists would be allowed "as long as it takes" to make repairs, if necessary. That proclamation paid off for Haney, as it turned out his car suffered no engine damage, but all the bolts holding its flywheel in place had sheared off, requiring a lengthy, painstaking procedure of drilling them out for removal and replacement.

Remarkably, fellow competitors including Naiser, Travis, Mark Woodruff, Kenny Hubbard, Jack Barbee, Rodney Whatley, Taylor Lastor and “Stevie Fast” Jackson, among others, congregated in Haney’s pit, providing parts, labor and expertise to get him ready to take on fellow Oklahoman DeWayne Mills in the semi-finals.

“You know, to have people from at least six different teams over here helping us has to be one of the better moments of the weekend for me,” Haney said. “It was very gratifying to see.”

With repairs finished, Haney rolled Enigma to the SGMP starting line, ready to take on Mills and his twin-turbo “Golden Gorilla” ‘68 Camaro. When the lights came down Mills left with a .041 reaction in the left lane, while Haney turned on the dreaded red bulb, leaving just two-thousandths of a second too soon.

“I knew I had to push it, but I'd rather lose like that than with a .080 light or something," Haney said. "I want to add that I appreciate Duck and especially DeWayne Mills for waiting on us to get the car ready.

“We may not have been the fastest here—but we will get there, make no mistake about that—but we don’t hurt parts and that’s a big deal,” he added. “I mean, there were 34 total cars here, 16 made it into the main event, and I made it down to four, so I’d say that’s a pretty good outcome.”

The Sweet 16 result continued what’s turned out to be a great start this year for Tulsa-based Keith Haney Racing. Haney opened his 2018 campaign in February with an RvW runner-up finish at Long’s huge Lights Out 9 event at SGMP.

Then the team struck success a week later with another RvW final-round appearance in the season opener for the Frankenstein Engine Dynamics Mid-West Pro Mod Series (MWPMS) at the Texas Motorplex, with “Daddy Dave” Comstock of Street Outlaws TV fame at the controls of Enigma that time. Meanwhile, Haney steered “Notorious,” a second, nearly identical-appearing Camaro, to a quarter-final finish in Pro Mod at the Motorplex, again with career-best performance numbers.

“The great thing is we haven’t changed our program from last year when we won two championships in the Mid-West Pro Mod Series. We have the same

team and to have Brandon Pesz and Brandon Switzer here as my crew chiefs, you just can’t ask to have two better guys on the job. We just work real well together,” Haney stressed. “I want to thank Cody Moore, Dale Hancock, Cale Hancock, Shane Goodnight and Trey Eberle for all their help, too.”

Haney will return to the track this coming weekend (Mar. 30-31), for the Radial Revenge Tour 2018 at Osage Casino Tulsa Raceway Park, which he co-owns with Todd Martin, winner of the MWPMS Pro Mod race early this month in Texas. Following that, both KHR entries will be back in action Apr. 20-22, with the MWPMS as part of the Outlaw Street Car Reunion at Beech Bend Raceway Park in southern Kentucky.

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ABOUT KEITH HANEY RACING

Thursday, March 22, 2018

Keith Haney Racing Ready for South Georgia Sweet 16 Party

VALDOSTA, GA (March 22, 2018) – A month ago, when Keith Haney visited

South Georgia Motorsports Park for Lights Out 9, he made it all the way to the final round, where he ran a career-best elapsed time and speed, but still finished runner-up in Radial vs. the World (RvW) to Steve Jackson. This weekend (Mar. 22-24), he and his Keith Haney Racing (KHR) team will be back at SGMP, where Haney plans to finish one position better in Donald “Duck” Long’s inaugural Sweet 16 event.

“All those other guys—and especially Stevie—they better watch themselves because KHR and ‘Enigma’ (the name for Haney’s 2016 RvW Camaro) are coming and the difference for us this time will be winning,” Haney stated as he prepared to make the long haul from his home near Tulsa.

“Well, there might be one more difference,” he added, “but people will just

have to tune into the live feed to see what combination we’re showing up with. All I can tell you right now is it’ll be set on kill because there’s a lot at stake with $101,000 going to the winner. That’s the biggest purse ever for drag radial racing and I plan on it heading back to Oklahoma with me.”

Keith Haney Racing has enjoyed a great start to the 2018 campaign, following up its Lights Out success a week later with another RvW final-round appearance in the season opener for the Mid-West Pro Mod Series at the Texas Motorplex, near Dallas. “Daddy Dave” Comstock of Street Outlaws TV fame was at the controls of Enigma that time, while Haney wheeled “Notorious,” a second, nearly identical-appearing Camaro, to a quarter-final finish in Pro Mod, and again with career-best performance numbers.

“My co-crew chiefs, Brandon Switzer and Brandon Pesz, they’re the absolute

best and they’re gonna’ have that car ready for me to hurt some feelings again in Georgia,” Haney promised. “Between them and all the great sponsors we have I feel very confident going into this race.

“This weekend is going to be like a WWE wrestling match where we’re just going to pound on the competition. And whether we’re blown or whether we’re nitrous you’ll just have to wait and see, but one thing you can count on is we’ll have no mercy on anyone once we get there.”

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ABOUT KEITH HANEY RACING

Based in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Keith Haney Racing (www.keithhaneyracing.com) fields two cars in the Mid-West Pro Mod Series (MWPMS), as well as for select Professional Drag Racers Association (PDRA) races and one-off special events. Keith Haney Racing appreciates the support of sponsors Lucas Oil, Strange Engineering, RacingJunk.com, Reher-Morrison Racing Engines, MoTeC Systems USA, Switzer Dynamics, Brandon Pesz Performance & Tuning, M&M Transmission, Menscer Motorsports, Total Seal, Mickey Thompson, Kryptonite Kustomz, Browell Bellhousing, and Larry Jeffers Race Cars.

Wednesday, March 7, 2018

Keith Haney Racing Encouraged by Strong Start at MWPMS Season Opener

TULSA, OK (March 7, 2018) – After fielding championship-winning entries for both the Pro Mod and Radial vs. the World (RvW) classes in last year’s Frankenstein Engine Dynamics Mid-West Pro Mod Series (MWPMS), Keith Haney Racing went into the organization’s 2018 season opener this past weekend as

the team to beat. With team principal and MWPMS organizer and promoter Keith Haney driving his nitrous-fed 2016 Camaro for the Bruce Lowrie Chevrolet North vs. South Frankenstein Pro Mod Shootout, it was left to Street Outlaws star “Daddy Dave” Comstock to wheel Haney’s nearly identical-appearing RvW entry at the Texas Motorplex, just south of Dallas.

“Since we won the championship last fall we didn’t even test my Pro Mod car, ‘Notorious,’ but we did test in ‘Enigma,’ the radial car at Dallas, because Daddy

Dave needed to make those passes in order to get his NHRA license,” Haney explained. “So I just kind of helped him, walked him through things until he was pretty comfortable in the seat and he ended up doing an amazing job all weekend.”

After qualifying second with a 3.85-seconds pass behind Jeff Naiser’s 3.79 in Radial vs. the World, Comstock wound up racing the top qualifier in the final round, where Naiser took the win home to Houston after making another 3.79 run over the Motorplex eighth mile.

“You know, I finished runner-up with that same car just a couple of weeks

earlier in Georgia,” said Haney, referencing Lights Out 9, the first big radial race of the year. “It’s obviously a great car and Dave got everything he could out of it. He did a great job and my hat’s off to him.”

Meanwhile, after 27 Pro Mod entries made attempts over four rounds of qualifying, Haney sat fourth in the 16-car field for eliminations. Jim Sackuvich and his nitrous-boosted ’69 Camaro took the number-one spot with a solid 3.74-seconds pass, with Todd Martin, who co-owns Osage Casino Tulsa Raceway Park with Haney, placing second with a 3.75 in his supercharged ’68 Mustang. Aaron Wells and Haney ran identical 3.77 elapsed times, but Wells and his blown ’68 Mustang got the nod for third based on going about 1.5 miles per hour faster than Haney.

Despite seeing smoke billowing from his engine’s headers after completing his burnout for round one of racing against Clint Hairston in the Elite Motorsports twin-turboed Camaro, Haney insisted on making the pass and posted a 3.80 at just over 200 mph to advance.

“There was so much smoke coming out the right side of the car that I think I killed all the mosquitoes in the place,” Haney said. “Then I'm sitting there and my guys ask, ‘Well, what do you want to do?’ So I'm on the mic and I said, ‘Send it! I ain't giving a free win to nobody!’ So I staged the car, let go of the button, and that sucker comes up and the smoke goes away and we end up winning the round.”

Back in the KHR pits, crew chief Brandon Pesz immediately consulted via phone and online with tuner Brandon Switzer in North Carolina to diagnose the cause of the smoke and determined it probably was just a sticking oil ring, far from ideal, but not necessarily disastrous. So with Ron Muenks driving Dave Pierce’s ’68 Camaro in the opposite lane, Haney knew he was in for another starting-line challenge.

“I think everybody thought we were going to blow up. I mean, it's doing the exact same thing, got that smoke going after the burnout, but I'm like, what the heck, we know what we doing,” Haney recalled. “So I get up there and I know Muenks is gonna’ be ready, which he was, he goes .017 on the tree—and I go -.018 red and then run my fastest 60 foot, my fastest 330, my fastest ET and my fastest speed ever in the car. I go .958 at 60 foot, 2.517 to the split, and then we go 3.73 with a 5 at almost 202 miles an hour! I didn’t know I had gone red at first, not until the nose came down and I could see the win light already on his scoreboard, but of course I stayed in it. I mean, it felt so good I didn't care if I red lit; I was there to race!”

With his own car on the sidelines, Haney threw his support behind business partner Martin, who beat Craig Sullivan, Costa Jones and Aaron Wells before defeating Sackuvich with a 3.77-seconds pass in the final round.

“Of course I wish we could’ve won, but overall the weekend was absolutely outstanding. We ended up second with Daddy Dave and Enigma in Radial vs. the

World, made it to the quarters and ran our best pass ever in Notorious, my good friend and partner Todd Martin won his first time out with his car in over two years, and we met a lot of great people. So some mixed results, but still very encouraging in the long run,” Haney concluded.

“And we couldn't really lean on it and step on it a whole lot this weekend just due to the fact we’ve got to have both motors ready for the $101,000 Sweet 16 Radial vs. the World race back in Georgia in three weeks. So unfortunately the truck and trailer had to stay in Texas with Brandon (Pesz) because he had to take the block over to Reher-Morrison to put a sleeve in it. So we're already getting to work on it and we'll have it all back together in time to be ready for Sweet 16. You can bet on that.”

After the Sweet 16 event (Mar. 22-24) at South Georgia Motorsports Park, Keith Haney Racing will field “Enigma” at a radials-only event the following weekend at Tulsa Raceway Park, and will have both KHR cars back in action Apr. 20-21, in the MWPMS event at historic Beech Bend Raceway Park in Bowling Green, KY.

Photos courtesy MWPMS/Bland Bridenstine

ABOUT KEITH HANEY RACING