Sponsor Report of the MoparStyle Race Team
By Dave Schultz
May 19, 2015
This was the 10th Dave Duell Classic — arguably the biggest and best of the Nostalgia Super Stock events. The race honors Dave Duell, who was the coordinator of Nostalgia Super Stock at the Monster Mopar since the early 90s. He died in December of 2005 and the race was renamed the Dave Duell Classic for 2006. While the race moved from the Monster Mopar Weekend to NMCA about five years ago — it is still the big event of the year with Class Eliminations, Driver’s Dinner with Swag raffled out, and a $4000 purse for the Sunday Big Show. Dave’s son (and fellow Team Thug member) Doug Duell now administers this event with NMCA. Doug is my best racing bud and we pit together at the races. Dave Duell got me into NSS back at a race in 2003. I won Class (C/FX) for the first DDC in Big Red Ram, and a couple of other classes in the Vitamin C (C/NSS) and the black Coronet (A/NSS) since. I have yet to win the FX Class in my two attempts at the wheel of the Whale. Dallas has twice won the FX Shootout.
We left Wednesday morning and got as far as Jackson, TN before midnight. We got up at 6:30 Thursday and arrived at the track at noon. Despite the fact that I had a new untested motor in my car and Dallas had made numerous changes to his car — we elected to not pay $150 to make a couple of test hits — and simply established credentials and teched the cars in Thursday. I was very surprised that my Texas Whale was on the Event’s T-Shirt this year. The Chevy guys say it makes a great oil rag.
Friday morning I made 4 test hits on my car and Dallas made three on his. On the first Qualifying run we were both too fast for our 9.75 Index — both running an identical 9.669 (with Dallas having a faster MPH). On the 2nd Qualifying pass I was able to slow it down to 9.759 — giving me 6th of 54 in Qualifying. Dallas was still having issues with a consistent 60′ on his car (we now feel like it has to be the convertor he’d borrowed to see if it would make his car faster) and was in the 9.8s — putting him to 33rd.
I was looking forward to pushing it for the 3rd and 4th qualifying to make my 4th Top Qualifier in a row – but the rain came Saturday and the 3rd and 4th Qualifying were cancelled, and the FX Shootout was rescheduled for the Indy race. The Driver’s dinner on Saturday night was moved up a couple of hours to fit in between storms. I took a lot of photos at the dinner, which I’ll post on this site later in the week — after getting caught up from being away for a week.
The first two pits in the above photo were ours and Duell’s. We pit together parking in opposite directions to share a pit patio for dinners. The top of the Whale can be seen in the SE corner of the photo. 54 NSS cars creates a very long pair of lines. 
You would think with 54 racers that there would be no chance that Dallas and I have to race each other in the 1st round — but Nooooo, for the 4th time in ten races we had to race each other in the 1st round. On a Sportsman ladder with 54 cars — 6 races 33.
I won that first round — as Dallas’ car just wouldn’t 60′. Dallas would line me up (below) in round two against 00Joe. I’ve been 00’s bitch in our other two races — but I came out on top this time when he took too much stripe on a double breakout.
In the third round I was facing Russ Konkowski, who’d just came off a near perfect round. We both pressed the tree and his -.006 was worst than my -.003. He had to leave 3/4 second before me so I don’t know if his red bulb distracted me and made me go — or if I’d gone red anyway. I’d been fairly good on the tree for most of my passes this weekend.
Then the rain came down hard with 3 rounds left to go. A couple of hours later the remaining rounds were postponed until Indy. Indy is going to be busy with the postponed FX shootout, the finish of the Dave Duell Classic, and the normal Indy race. Sounds like a lot of passes — and a couple prayers that the car will stay together from the hot laps. On top of that – we’ll come a day early to wear the cars out even more. The below is the remainder of the ladder for the Dave Duell Classic.
We left the track at 2:30 and drove to a truck stop to watch (in a storm) the Houston Rockets win the series against the LA Clippers. We arrived at Walmart in Jackson, TN at about 10PM to park for the night. Up at 6:30 — and back to the shop in Richmond, TX at 7PM.
Again I’d like to thank the sponsors who have helped us (in order of how long they’ve helped us): Mancini Racing since 2003 (an account for parts); TTI since 2011 (headers on three cars – had to go custom on the Whale as no one makes); Fuelabs since 2013 (fuel systems on the Whale and Big Red Ram); Aerospace Components since 2015 (Brakes on the Texas Thug — but we have their vacuum pumps on all of our cars and their brakes on my Whale); and ATI since 2015 (convertor on my car – and we run their balancers on all motors). They say the quickest way to become a Millionaire in drag racing is to start out as a Billionaire. We appreciate our sponsors delaying how fast we go broke from our living the dream as father and son drag racing.
