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Both Speedworld & Firebird attended the NHRA Divison 7 Track Operator's meeting on Jan 6. Rich Lash sent out an email summing up the changes, and here's what he reported.

Let me start with the general rules. The rules that were discussed in the meeting are as follows:

• The engine diaper rule will remain the same as last year. Any car running 9.99 or faster requires an engine containment device.

• Window nets will now have a 2-year expiration. If you are required to run a window net it MUST have a date on it and again it will expire after 2 years (same as seat belts).

• Advanced ET (7.49 and quicker) will require a -15 driver suit and head & neck restraint (i.e. Hans device).

These three items were the only general rules that were discussed at the operators meeting. Chuck & Hal will be attending the Tech seminar on 1/7. If any further changes come out of the tech seminar I will pass them on in another e-mail

Summit Series: Sportsman guys are you sitting down? Staring this season you will no longer be able to run a Trans Brake or two step in the Sportsman Class. You can only use a single side rev limiter. There was much – often heated – debate over this proposed change and it ultimately was passed. This rule change will now put the Division 7 Sportsman class in line with the other six divisions and the national event rules. I know this change will have very mixed emotions. Let me know if you have any questions.

The ET finals are being held at Bakersfield this year. The dates are September 28th – 30th. There are a bunch of changes to the ET finals format for this year as well. They are as follows:

• The Race of Champions is being renamed to the Summit Super Star Shootout. The class winners of this race will represent Division 7 at the finals in Pomona.

• Each track will be allowed five entries (up from four) in each class of the Summit Super Star Shootout. The requirements for entry into the Summit Super Star Shootout will remain the same. All entries MUST have finished in the top 10 of their team points and raced in at least 50% of the team events.

• The Summit Super Star Shootout portion of the event will now be run on Sunday and the team portion of the event will run on Saturday.

• Because we will run the team portion of the event prior to the Summit Super Star Shootout, the winner in each class of the team race on Saturday will be invited to run in the Summit Super Star Shootout. If the winner of the Team event was already on the roster as a Summit Super Star Shootout participant they will get the potential 1st round bye. This change in essence gives everyone that comes and races at the ET finals a shot at Pomona.

• Last but not least the number of members per team is being reduced to 40 but each track can bring up to two team. This has a twofold benefit. The first is it allows each track to bring up to 80 cars (Up from 64). The second is it levels the playing field for the smaller tracks that cannot fill a 64 car team. The way this will work is the first 40 cars from each track will make up the first team and any additional cars (up to 40) will make up the second team. The teams will run independent of each other. This means that Team A and Team B from the same track could end up facing each other early on. It also mean that one track could potentially take 1st & 2nd place in the team event. Let me know if you have any questions.