Montecalvo claims a little luck was on his side, as he and the crew battled the car the entire weekend, changing motors twice along with many other parts on the car. Despite this trying weekend, the Chevrolet runners were able to oust reigning World Champ, Pete Berner, in round one. Montecalvo's car stuttered early, but when Berner had problems a little further out, Monte was able to get back on the throttle and take the win. Montecalvo then successively took out Chris Holbrook and Mark Martino to face off against Frank Gugliotta in the final. Montecalvo posted the quicker elapsed time with a 6.349 and the fastest mph of the weekend at 220.98, but Gugliotta was quicker off the line and made it to the stripe first. Still, Montecalvo counts his blessings for making it that far on a weekend that seemed determined to get the best of the team:

"This has been one of the most trying weekends we've ever had in drag racing. It was brutal. It looks like the trailer exploded. There are parts lying all over the place. We had no business getting past Pete Berner first round. That was purely luck on our side. We've been battling this car and changed every component we could possibly change. In the final we found the problem. I can't tell you what it was because we changed so many things we don't have a clue what fixed it. But now the good thing is, we know we have a fast hot rod here. The car's fixed. We outran Frank in the final and nobody could do that all weekend. Frank was flying. We went top speed of the meet and set a new track record. So we're just overjoyed. I'm not happy with a runner up. We've had too many of those this year, but I tell ya what I'm grateful for what we accomplished this weekend, because, like I said we had no business getting past first round.

"Right now we're still number two in points. We're battling it out with Frank Gugliotta. He's a great person to battle with. We've both been doing this for quite a while, and we've both been up in the points for the past 5 years. Of course you can't count out the guys that are behind us, because it's going to be at tight battle right to the finish here. My hat's off to Frank for his job this weekend. Congratulations to the team. They're great guys. We were a little late getting to the final round and they waited for us. I really appreciate that.

"Also my hat's off to the Bingham family and daughter Lisa getting engaged here. She's got a wonderful guy- we met him this weekend. Congratulations to Gary and Renee. We couldn't be happier for them, and he seems like a fine young man. Wish them all the best."

Montecalvo is quick to give credit where credit is due and knows that it takes a good team to be a successful racer. "What more can I say about this team that I have here! They did a phenomenal job, absolutely phenomenal job. They never gave up. We changed motors Saturday night. Ran one motor first round, came back, changed motors again between first and second round. Went back to the motor we had in Saturday night because we decided the problem wasn't in the motor. The team worked incredibly hard and was just phenomenal. I could have never made it to the final round this weekend without such a hardworking and dedicated team- Lois Anne, Tommy, William, Bobby, Doug, Pat, of course Sonny. What a team! They never quit."

Courtesy of Lisa Bingham