The Battle for the Richest Payout – Mid-West Drag Racing Series Offers a Staggering $150,000 To the Pro Mod Winner at the New Flying H Drag Strip in September 2024
‘Put up or shut up’ has been applied in nearly ever facet of the world we know. Whether it’s getting good grades in the hopes of appeasing your parents to get into college, or merely shutting down who has the best burger, actions speak louder than words.
In 2024, the actions have matched the words in a lot of arenas, and in the drag racing world, the Mid-West Drag Racing Series (MWDRS) just took center stage with a monumental purse announcement.
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Racers can talk about fairness of class rules, track conditions, even the atmosphere of the event they attend. But money talks, and for classes where tens of thousands of dollars can disappear in expenses over a single weekend, those competitors listen.
First, it happened at the World Series of Pro Mod, where Wes Buck and crew handed out $100,000 to the winner of the class since its inception in 2017.
Then, at the PRO Superstar Shootout just a month ago, Top Fuel and Funny Car classes ran for a quarter-million-dollar payout to the winner, while Pro Stock also got paid handsomely at $125,000 to win.
Less than two weeks ago, Donald ‘Duck’ Long vowed to pay the winner of Radial Versus the World $50,100, the richest radial-tire purse ever.
Thursday night, March 7th, the MWDRS decided to up the payout ante for their 2024 season, specifically the Smack Down event on September 19th through the 21st, 2024 at the brand-new Flying H Drag Strip in Odessa, Missouri.
The track gained a good bit of traction, as Scott Higgs and Blake Housley provided the motivation to bring the newest quarter-mile track to the United States, with over 700 feet of concrete surface in place for ample traction.
The MWDRS event in September will feature a purse just north of a quarter-million dollars for just the Pro Mod classes, with the Main Event winner getting a $150,000 payday, and another $58,000 for runner-up through second round finishers available.
In what promises to be a stellar field of entries, the MWDRS will allow Pro Mod entries that participate in four of their first six events in 2024 FREE admission! If a Pro Mod team doesn’t qualify for that option, MWDRS will allow just 45 entries to pre-register for a chance to run for the monster payout.
In total, the MWDRS Smack Down event will host eleven classes, including Alcohol Funny Car, Top Dragster, Top Sportsman and even Junior Dragsters for a combined payout of nearly $310,000.
Written by Derek Putnam. Photos courtesy of Sick the Magazine and E3Xtreme.
If you have thoughts / feedback / ideas, please e-mail us at derek@sickthemagazine.com