“Our cars are similar to Pro Stock, but with about 15-hundred horsepower more,” Pontieri points out. “So if they’re having issues, then we’re going to have issues.”
The NHRA argument goes that spraying the extra 320 feet to the quarter-mile can damage the tires of nitro cars now racing to only 1,000 feet as the dynamics of decelerating on a treated surface can pull chunks of rubber off the tires, but with limited aerodynamic downforce, the Pro Stock and Pro Mod groups insist to be safe they need the track sprayed all the way to their still-1,320-feet finish line.
And though he emphasizes a desire to remain racing the traditional quarter-mile distance, Pontieri supports either every class racing to a thousand feet or laying down the glue for the full distance of 1,320 feet.
“What’s more important,” he asks. “Their tires or our lives?”
