LAS VEGAS – As the Countdown to 1, NHRA’s championship playoffs, comes to the season’s penultimate race in Las Vegas, each professional category in the NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series features its own dramatic storyline.

In Top Fuel, every championship contender is gunning to remove a category dominator from the throne he has held for the past five seasons.
In Funny Car, a female driver is trying to make history and become the first of her gender to win a world championship crown in the wildly unpredictable category which her father has dominated for most of two decades. In order to do it, she’ll need to stop five other men who are also in contention, including one multi-time champ, her former driving instructor, a teammate, last season’s series runner-up, and a driver who’s finished second in the championship standings three times.

By John Wells
Greetings MIS Fans...here is the latest from Madison International Speedway.

By Jordan Kuehne
LOVES PARK, Ill. (Sunday, October 25th, 2009) -- Scott Dixon should race more often, as the father of three regulars at the Rockford Speedway outlasted a massive field of 130 cars to collect the final event of the year at the historic facility, the Goblin 250 enduro. Dixon hadn't raced in six years before entering the event, seeking permission from his wife to get back on the track and in his return, the Wisconsin driver made it seem like he had never taken time off. Dixon assumed control with 25 laps remaining, passing Corey Marshall for the top spot, and held Marshall off for the victory. Carolyn Johnson won the Fair Demo Derbies while Greg Elser and Rick Dobbles also collected feature wins.

By Reid Spencer
Sporting News NASCAR Wire Service
MARTINSVILLE, Va.—Denny Hamlin may have won the Virginia campaign with a victory Sunday at Martinsville Speedway, but Jimmie Johnson moved ever closer to a record fourth straight NASCAR Sprint Cup Series championship with a runner-up finish at the .526-mile short track.

Martin Defries Photo2010 Rules Package (PDF) • 2010 Driver Registration • ROL Forum Discussion

By: Kevin Ramsell
BURLINGTON, WI (Friday, October 23, 2009) – Tim Olson and Steve Einhaus, owners of the American Speed Association Midwest Tour Super Late Model Series has announced the formation of the new American Speed Association Midwest Sportsman Tour. The first touring division for the popular Area Sportsman division styles of cars that race weekly at your favorite local track.

by Andrew Schaller
COLUMBUS, WI (Wednesday, October 21, 2009) Columbus 151 Speedway, in conjunction with STM Promotions and Dan Thiel, would like to announce that the dirt has returned to 151 Speedway for one show this summer. This will be the first show on dirt at Columbus 151 since it was originally paved circa 1962. On Saturday night, July 3, the asphalt will be covered with clay for the running of this great event. Raindate will be Sunday, July 4. Participating divisions will be announced in early November. Mark your calendars! Please visit www.columbus151.com for more information regarding the speedway.

By Jordan Kuehne
LOVES PARK, Ill. (Sunday, October 18th, 2009) -- John Paul Odegaard logged a lot of mileage traveling to the Rockford Speedway for this weekend's 18th annual Bahama Bracket Nationals, and for the second consecutive year, the Minnesota driver made it time well spent, finding victory lane in the 50-lap 'A' Bracket main event and collecting a TIKI Torch trophy to commemorate his win. Odegaard started in eighth and quickly worked his way through the field, pushing past Matt Berger as the event approached the halfway point and holding on from there, collecting another October victory at the high-banked quarter mile. In the 'AA' Bracket, Scott Lawver rallied back from a late-race spin to come out on top, fending off Brad Carson for the win.

By: Kevin Ramsell
BURLINGTON, WI (Monday, October 19, 2009) – Steve Carlson will admit that going into the 2009 racing season, one thing not on his agenda was to capture the American Speed Association Kwik Trip Midwest Tour presented by ECHO Outdoor Power Equipment’s Championship. But the racing veteran from West Salem, WI won his tenth touring championship in his career, first with ASA, at the track that is only six blocks from home.

“It’s cool, real cool,” Carlson said after his second place run at the Oktoberfest 100 season finale event where he sewed up the championship as he battled Travis Sauter for the win with ten laps to go and almost saw his championship hopes go away when the two touched. “About ten laps to go, I didn’t think I was going to win it because I was pointing at the sky and I figured I was going to crash down and there would be nothing left. But, it was still there but there had to be something bent because the car didn’t quite corner that good after that.”

Jimmie Johnson has done it again. He won the NASCAR Banking 500 Saturday night, extending his lead over teammate Mark Martin to 90 points in the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup championship.

Johnson drove away from the field after dicing with teammate Jeff Gordon in the closing laps of the 334-lap race.

It was Johnson's sixth win at Lowe's Motor Speedway and put him another step closer to a fourth consecutive championship, which would be a first in NASCAR history.

Trailing Johnson at the finish line were Matt Kenseth, with his best finish since winning at Auto Club Speedway in February, Kasey Kahne, Gordon, Joey Logano, Clint Bowyer, Casey Mears, Kyle Busch, Martin Truex and Kurt Busch.

Martin had his worst night of the Chase thus far after accidentally hitting the rear of Juan Pablo Montoya's car on a restart. The accident ended Montoya's streak of top-five finishes at four, and relegated Martin to a 17th-place finish. Montoya didn't fare so well. He wound up 35th.

By Jordan Kuehne
LOVES PARK, Ill. (Saturday, October 17th, 2009) -- James Swan took flight tonight at the Rockford Speedway, pacing a field of almost 200 cars in setting fast time and collecting the Short Track News Fast Qualifier Award at the 18th annual Bahama Bracket Nationals. On a chilly October day, Swan was blazing fast, laying down a blistering lap of 14.333 seconds to top a field of 150 bracket cars. In addition to that, 44 Hornets took to the track as Brad Chandler set the mark to beat with a quick time of 17.135 seconds. 30 races were conducted as most of the field was set for tomorrow's Bahama Bracket 50-lap feature events.