Christmas Trees, 6-Second E.T.s and Big Wheelies – Bradenton Motorsports Park and Cleetus McFarland Host 5th Annual Christmas Tree Drag Racing World Championship
Christmas traditions might include egg nog, listening to your favorite songs around a fire, and exchanging presents with family and friends.
But instead of trimming the tree with ornaments, 32 racers trimmed their tree to fit on cars and trucks at the fifth annual Christmas Tree Drag Racing World Championship at Bradenton Motorsports Park.
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The brainchild of Cleetus McFarland and good friend Victor Alvarez, owner of Bradenton Motorsports Park, the annual event draws some solid racing action, as well as thousands of spectators.
In addition to five rounds of Christmas Tree racing, the Larson Motorsports jet dragsters piloted by Elaine Larson and Josette Roach, as well as the ‘Bone Shaker’ Semi Jet Truck, would light up the sky for fans.
The premise to be one of the accepted 32 competitors is simple: a traditional Christmas Tree is required on each vehicle, minimum six-foot tall, and can be real or fake.
The tree must be attached to each vehicle, it must be lit, and it must remain attached the entire length of the run, or the competitor risks disqualification.
Multi-time drag-and-drive class winner Rick Prospero won the first two titles in 2020 and 2021, but the race cars have made their mark since.
For the 2024 event, a slew of street-legal rides, including Matt Lamphier, CJ Durbin, Justin Keith, ‘Jackstand Jimmy’ Taal, Tye Braun and Daniel Rosner, showed up to defend their side against some serious race rides, including Travis Akins, Kyle Wade, Alex Nusz, Nick Plewniak, and former Christmas Tree champ Ricardo Diniz.
One of the best runs in early competition would be between Jim Braun in his drag-and-drive ready 2012 Ford Mustang, and well-known no-prep runner Billy Hoskinson and his ’70 Chevy Nova.
At the start the two left a mere thousandth of-a-second apart, and at half-track, Braun was mere inches in front of Hoskinson. But the big block Chevrolet would navigate the back half to nose out a close victory for Hoskinson, 6.933 at 201 mph to a 6.96 at 200 mph for Braun!!
Hoskinson rolled to the semifinal round to face Cleetus in the stick shift Corvette known as ‘Leroy.’ At the start Hoskinson grabbed a huge holeshot lead, and although Cleet banged the gears hard in his efforts to try and catch up, Hoskinson would get the win light and advance to the final via a 7.16 at 188 mph to the 8.14 at just 108 mph lap of Cleetus.
The other pairing had local runner and drag-and-drive veteran Richard ‘RC’ Flint looking to upset the quickest car on the property, Jason Terrell and the nitrous-fed ’79 Malibu.
As the lone 7-second car remaining, Flint knew he needed to tune up the LS-swapped Honda and grab the holeshot, and as the green light flashed, he did just that.
But the tune-up proved too spicy, as Flint’s ‘sleigh’ rocketed skyward, forcing him to pedal and giving Terrell the room he needed to get around for the win light, 6.72 at 187 mph to Flint’s 7.58 at 186 mph, his slowest lap of the event.
Thus, the final round staged up a couple of first-time event participants, as the pair of small tire rides rolled out of the water box ready to possible show the crowd another side-by-side 6-second thriller for the final.
Unfortunately, Hoskinson’s Nova would succumb to an oil leak, ending his chances before he could stage up opposite Terrell. This gave the Malibu a single run for the title, but Terrell made a hammer down run anyways, clocking a 6.68 at 208 mph.
This backed up his 6.65 at 206 mph run from earlier, a new Christmas Tree Drag Racing World Championship record run, and earned Terrell the unique Christmas Tree trophy, and the surrounding crew a big blast of nitrous into the nighttime air.
Cleetus McFarland just released his video on the event, check it out below:
You can also watch all the action on Freedom Plus HERE!
Written by Derek Putnam. Photos courtesy of Kevin DiOssi and Jim Braun.
If you have thoughts / feedback / ideas, please e-mail us at derek@sickthemagazine.com