World Cup Finals Wraps Up at Maryland International Raceway with Records, Upsets and Eleven Champions Crowned
The World Cup Finals Import vs. Domestic event at Maryland International Raceway is a highly anticipated event each year.
Maryland in November normally means cooler temperatures, and combined with Jason Miller’s track prep, normally results in personal bests and racing in front of packed grandstands.
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After three days of intense qualifying in eleven class, round one of eliminations got underway on Saturday afternoon for the classes that featured 32-car qualified fields.
The Warriors vs. Tres Cuarto would be the quickest class on the property with a 32-car field, and would kick off round one on Saturday. After four round of competition, number one qualifier Jamil Negron would face the second qualifier Carlos DeLeon in an all-import final round.
DeLeon came into the final on the quicker pass, and would use that same advantage to win the final pairing on a 6.39 at 215 mph over Negron’s 6.50 at 219 mph effort.
Stick Shift is always a hotly contested class, and with seven cars knocking down a 6-second run in qualifying, it was anyone’s game to win. Upsets were the name of the game in round one, as four of those 6-second cars, Devon Schultz, Jonathan Atkins, Cleetus McFarland and top qualifier Richard Rivera, all dropped out in the opening round.
Number two qualifier Nick Cole-Mann rolled his record-holding S-10 truck to the final on the strength of a trio of 6-second runs, to face good Friend Myles Kerr in his ’94 Integra. Kerr came in the underdog, but got the better reaction and produced a 7.70 at 186 mph. It wasn’t enough though, as Cole-Mann clocked a 7.01 at 203 mph to earn the victory.
A new class to the World Cup Finals line-up in 2024 is Limited Street, a smaller power-adder and naturally-aspirated mix of vehicles. Three of the top four qualifiers, including top qualifier David Duffield, made it to the semifinal round.
Louis Filippides, one of a few rides on a small 26-inch diameter x 8.5-inch width, clocked his best pass of the event, a 7.52 at 178 mph, to guide his Cutlass to the class win over Duffield.
The second new class to the 2024 event was Xtreme Front Wheel Drive, a popular class at FL2K and TX2K events. 43 competitors vied for one of the 32 qualified spots, with the top eighteen spots requiring a 7-second pass to acquire.
But by round three in Sunday’s eliminations, only four of the eight remaining competitors were from a top sixteen qualifying spot. One of them was number five qualifier Wes Spry, who guided his 1995 Honda Civic to the final again upset-minded Jean Francois Kelly.
At the green light, Kelly moved first with a better reaction time, but Spry’s 8.10 at a blistering 200 mph would rocket around for the win by a scant 26 thousandths of-a-second.
The All Motor class is a titanic battle between import and domestic vehicles, and qualifying this year had imports claiming the top seven spots, with Kenny Martinez and his 1995 Civic claiming the top spot with a 9.18 at 148 mph.
Martinez survived to the semifinal round, but lost to Scotty Duncan’s Chevrolet Camaro. Duncan would stage opposite Shaun Manyvong in the final round, and when Manyvong’s Honda had problems, Duncan singled to a 9.32 for the class accolades.
The quickest class on the property is the Mickey Thompson Outlaw vs. Extreme class, and the import versus domestic battle has bounced back and forth in this 16-car qualified field category.
In 2023, it was an all-domestic final with Mark Benston Jr. getting the win with his 2002 Camaro. This year, only two domestic rides made it to the second round, with Frank Soldridge and Cleetus McFarland bowing out that round. That left a quartet of 2JZ-powered rides, and Jomar Gomez clocked a 5.73 for the win over Jerry Fernandez.
The Renegade vs. Modified had defending champion Derick Santiago coming back to defend his title from 2023, and he would make a second-straight final. Staging opposite Santiago would be the new ‘Snot Rocket 3.0’ of Brett LaSala, and although LaSala clocked his second 6.08 pass in-a-row at 236 mph, Santiago secured the win with a 5.94 at 236 mph run.
Eric Laferriere scored the X275 vs. Hot Rod win in 2023, and he returned to Maryland with his sights set on a double-up. The ‘White Rice’ 1997 Nissan 240 SX qualified on top with a 6.31 at 233 mph, and made the final round against fellow 2JZ runner and teammate Jose Jimenez Jr. in the ‘Dirty Taco’ Toyota pick-up. Jimenez Jr. qualified third at 6.43, and scored the upset win in the final round.
With the four quickest classes all swinging to an import champ, Martin Connelley put one in the win column for domestic fans in the Street Fighter class. The former National Muscle Car Association / National Mustang Racer Association double-up season champ in 2023, Connelley qualified on top of the class list with a 6.82 at 203 mph, and rode his Fox Mustang to his second-straight WCF final round.
There, Connelley would face fellow Mustang runner Jacob Conant, and as the green lights on the Christmas tree flashed, Conant was off the mark first with a better reaction time.
But Connelley would pull around the 2014 Shelby Mustang of Conant by the finish line, 6.79 at 204 mph to the 6.84 at 194 mph from Conant, to get the win by just one hundredth of-a-second.
The Wild Street class was an all domestic final in 2023, but the imports battled back in 2024, with 2023 semifinalist David Consentino qualifying his 1990 Supra in the number two spot with a 7.14 at 196 mph. Joe Glocker put his 2016 Ford Mustang on top in qualifying with a 7.13 at 194 mph, and joined Consentino in mowing through the rounds to arrive at a final round pairing.
The final class contested is the Pro Street Bike class, which puts 6-second motorcycles on the track using a mandated street-tire format. An all 6-second field had Rodney Williford at the top of the qualifying sheet with a 6.38 at 234 mph pass, and staged opposite Justin Shakir for the final round, the third final round in four years for Williford. Shakir got the better reaction time at the start, but slowed with problems, while Williford clocked a 6.60 at 189 mph for his second win in four years.
Written by Derek Putnam. Photos courtesy of 1320 Video and Chris Simmons Photography.
If you have thoughts / feedback / ideas, please e-mail us at derek@sickthemagazine.com