When the NMCA announced the creation of a new NMCA Pro Stock category lots of people around the sport of drag racing perked up and took notice. With a rather unique rules package that allows for a maximum engine displacement of 400ci, a maximum RPM of 11,000, and the ability to put the engine in whatever body style you want, so long as it has a stick behind it, there’s lots of participant opportunity here. Lots of competition eliminator cars fall under the auspices of this class and frankly, it is similar (body rules non-withstanding) to Australian pro stock racing which has been a hot bed of small block performance for decades. Guys like Bob Book and Leonard Long were some of the forces behind the class and that makes sense as they both do a lot of business with racers in Australia and saw the opportunity to introduce a modified model oft he Aussie rules here. Like all new classes at the heads up level, time is needed to build car counts but we’re expecting to see upwards of eight competitors at the NMCA/NMRA Super Bowl this weekend.
One of those competitors is Australian Nino Cavallo. Nino is the defending Australian pro stock champion and he will be competing in Joliet! He purchased an old V. Gaines car, had Jerry Haas touch it up and then had Bob Book whip up an engine for it. One of the first guys to go into the 6s in Australia, the car has already shown bottom of the barrel seven second numbers and those will likely drop as the tune up and suspension are lined out and improved.
The video below shows Cavallo getting after it and busting into the six second zone down in Australia a couple of years back. We wanted to show you this so that you’d have a good idea about what to expect from the new NMCA pro stock class and how these guys are as hardcore as any pro stock competitors you’ll see no matter the engine size or the sanctioning body.
This is one 400ci hemi that can really sing!
This is what the NHRA should have done, when it went to a EFI rules set. Limited the cars to 400ci, with real shifters, making them more interesting to the manufacturers. With the eventual ending point being, a 300-310ci turbo charged engine, with EFI. This would have excited the OEMS.
300-310ci turbo charged engines with EFI?
Are you trying to make Pro Stock as boring as F1?
Sorry not feeling it. Unless they make the body more “stock” looking, it just a Pro Mod with a small engine.
I agree – surely Pro Stock should have more than just stock head and tail lights? A factory steel roof and window/door apertures would make the cars closer to the real thing?
Have had the pleasure of dealing with Nino and his family/team as an Australian race day official over the past few years; top outfit and I really wish them all the best.
And for what it’s worth, it wouldn’t be hard to get the 300-310ci turbo engine formula to work…