Thornton Racing & Lady Luck Team Up For Vegas Win!!!
Ed Thornton struggled all weekend with his combo but he had some luck (I mean a whole lotta luck) on his side as he captured his 1st Pro Street win an over a year!!
John Scialpi (pictured) qualified #1 with a stellar 6.242/221.56 in the Vegas nighttime heat!! Right behind Scialpi was series points leader Mike Maggio with a 6.250 at a staggering 244.21 MPH!! Wade Maggio had a few little gremlins and his lifting 6.748 at only 175.55 was good enough for 3rd, Thornton never really got off the starting line with overboost problems and ended up 4th...
The 1st Round Match-ups would put The Maggio Motorsports Team cars up against one another and your #1 Qualifier John Scialpi vs. the 3-time PSCA Hughes Performance Pro Street Champ Ed Thornton!! There was plenty of Text Trash Talking between the Thornton & Scialpi camps leading up to elimination's... "It's all in good clean fun" says Shane Tecklenburg (Thornton's Tuner) Shane goes on to say "Scialpi is one of the all time greats, and you need to be on your game when you line up next to him, but harassing John's son Kenny by text messages before elimination's gets your competitive juices flowing!!"
Saturday Night Elimination's started out with what might be the start of a classic Father-Son rivalry!! No "Team Orders" were in place as Mike wanted to put a strangle hold on the 2011 Championship and Wade looked for that 1st ever "Win Light" Father Mike would take the win with an Event Low ET (6.18) as Wade had his first attempt at pedaling a Pro Streeter as he spun the tires at the hit of the throttle!! In the other match-up, John Scialpi the #1 Qualifier had lane-choice and at the last second the team decided to switch from the right to the left lane... As the car staged and the lights dropped, Scialpi and Thornton both shook the tires but Ed drove it a little further through the shake and the car recovered to run 6.87/222 and take out the top qualifier!! This would set up a re-match from the Super Chevy Show earlier this year where Maggio took home the honors...
In the Final Round, Maggio continued to take the right lane (primarily because it's easier for Mike to see the tree with the big Injector hat) Thornton knew he was over matched as his '63 Corvette had issue after issue in the previous 4 runs, but Heads-Up Racing is never decided on paper or in the pits so Thornton stepped up the boost and see what would happen!! As the tree dropped, Ed left the line first with a stellar .418 Reaction time to Maggio's slower .470... The starting line advantage was gobbled up by 100ft as Thornton continued to have problems as Maggio Streaked to 6.35/230 pass to Thornton's 6.42.. But wait a second.... As some of the team celebrated Mike's 3rd win of the season, Crew Chief Kirk Kuhns (see picture below) noticed that Mike was hugging the centerline from halftrack on. In fact, Mike was on the centerline and knocked out the MPH Timing Block and was DQ'd handing the win to Thornton. At the time, a dejected Thornton did what every Heads-Up Racer should do, scale the car cause you never know if the other car comes up light or in this case DQ'd. As Ed sat in his car a call was made to the scales informing him of the situation and declared Ed the winner!!! "Sometimes it's better to be lucky than good" Thornton said... Ed went on to say "We totally sucked this weekend, but anyone could win (all you have to do is enter) and we just proved it!!" This was the 1st win since early 2010 for Thornton Racing, next up for the PSCA Hughes Performance Pro Street Teams is the Accufab "West Coast Shootout" October 7-9 in Las Vegas and then the much anticipated $20,000 to win Street Car Super Nationals VII Nov 17-20
