(Photos by Dyan Lover, Frank L. Smith & Jim Doyle) It took a couple of record setting performances, but the Bucky Austin-Mike O’Brien “Northwest Hitter” Bardahl-backed Camaro driven by Bobby Cottrell, let the entire Heritage nitro funny car world know they’ll be a factor for the rest of the year by sweeping to victory in the second leg of the United Nitro Funny Car Invitational series held at Pacific Raceways in Kent, Washington over the July 7-8 weekend.

Twice, funny car newcomer Bobby Cottrell, driving the Bucky Austin-tuned machine broke the track record on Saturday after a massive fire during his explosive Friday night qualifying attempt, due to a broken lifter and causing some damage to the brand new Camaro body.

During Saturday’s eliminations, Cottrell posted back-to-back elapsed times of 5.658 and 5.641 for the record in defeating Danny Gerber and Stephen Densham on his way to the finals.

The championship round pitted Cottrell, who failed to qualify a month earlier in the UNFC Spokane event, against former 7.0 Pro Champ Mike Peck driving Don Nelson’s “California Hustler” Firebird under Crew Chief Ronnie Swearingen.

Both Cottrell and Peck experienced mid-track tire shake and lost traction and Cottrell peddled it through the lights at 6.350 to Peck’s up in smoke 8.018 for the overall win, trophy and $7,500 in cash.

The Peck-Nelson team won $5,000 for the runner-up effort and once again UNFC paid the non-qualifiers $1000 just for showing up.

At the beginning of the two-night event last weekend, Cottrell’s bad luck, since taking over the driving duties of The Hitter two races back, seemed likely to continue at the scenic Kent facility when he limped to a fireball 6.223 qualifying effort good for only sixth position in the 10-car field (below).

Hometown favorite Mike Peck from nearby Redmond, Washington led Friday night qualifying with an elapsed time of 5.833, Steven Densham second at 5.927, John Weaver at 5.936 and the winner of the Spokane first leg of the two-race series Danny Gerber at 5.941 in the 4^th position.

One of the highlights of the first night came from Spokane, Washington’s Chris Davis, the first nitro car down the track. Davis lifted the front wheels three feet off the ground when he hit the throttle and carried the front end nearly to half-track before setting down and being forced to shut off.

Saturday’s qualifying took an entirely different turn.

Under brilliant sunny skies another local racer, “Mr. Explosive” Mark Sanders of Maple Valley, Washington, made his first pass of the 2017 season one to remember as he laid down a track record ET run of 5.677 at 224.81 miles per hour the final qualifying session.

Bobby Cottrell then gave an indication of things to come with a 5.694 qualifying effort on Saturday afternoon, establishing a track record of 257.38 miles per hour for the second position.

The rest of final qualifying found Geoff Monise (above) third with a career-best 5.784 ET in Keith Clark’s “Quarter Pounder” Monza, John Weaver fourth at 5.810 ET in Rick Akers’ “Dream Weaver” funny car, first round leader Mike Peck slid down to fifth at 5.818 ET, Densham sixth at 5.821 ET, Gerber seventh at 5.831 ET and Spokane’s Chris Davis’ “Old School Nitro” Arrow eighth at 5.875.

Canadian Tim Boychuk’s “Happy Hour” Camaro (above), out of Edmonton failed to make one of the quickest eight-car fields in history with his 5.927 ET effort. Also on the outside looking in was Bill Windham in his “Shakedown” Camaro (below) who ran 6.180 ET during qualifying and then came back with a 5.91 effort during an early evening test pass.

In eliminations, the first round saw Sanders (5.829) defeat Davis (5.957), Peck (5.724) win over Weaver (5.793), Cottrell (5.658) then set the track record in beating an up in smoke Gerber (14.131) and Densham (5.824) edging out Monise (5.899).

In the semifinals, Peck (5.683) (above) laid down his best effort of the year to beat Sanders (5.71) in the quickest two-car side-by-side race of the event and then Cottrell (5.641) broke his own track record in beating Densham (6.20).

The final, which came at 10:30 p.m. and a big temperature drop, was a smoky conclusion with both Cottrell and Peck losing traction at mid-track. Cottrell was able to peddle his sleek green Camaro to a 6.350 second win over Peck’s 8.018.

The first ever UNFC Invitational Series goes into the record books, which could not have been contested without Bucky Austin and his son Dennis backing the two events and making certain the cash payouts took place.

Four weeks ago in Spokane, Danny Gerber’s “Wasn’t Easy” Firebird took the UNFC cash in a tough 8-car field. After the success of these two Invitationals, the United Nitro Funny Cars is expecting to expand their schedule for the 2018 season farther into the Southwest and possibly Texas or Oklahoma.

Joe Walla and Da Kings were imported all the way from California, playing Rock & Roll sets in the funny car pits between rounds.