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After procuring another
1985 T-Top car to match the Hot Street entry, and burning weeks of
midnight oil at a time, the team finally got the two cars together, in
time to debut in Georgia. Chris enlisted Ed Curtis to drive the new
RS car, and on its second pass ever, the "Evil Twin" cracked off a 10
second pass, the first in Real Street! After this success for the
Real Street car, the team took the engine out of the "Hottie", and
delivered it to one Ed Curtis of Flowtech Induction , and Ronnie
Manchester of R&D Manchester Racing Engines in Rhode Island. With a
few tweaks, namely a new manifold and camshaft, they replaced the
engine in the car and came out storming for the Motorsport Nationals,
again in the team's backyard. This time, they qualified number one
with the Hot Street car and also won the race. On the flip side, the
Real Street car was not faring so well. It was difficult for Ed to
get seat time in the car, as he lived in Rhode Island, and the car was
stored at Chris's house in Pennsylvania. As a result, the team spent
the remainder of the season with the RS car simply working out the
bugs in the tune, and set their sights on 2002 for Real Street.
However, Billy was
still set on kill with the HS entry. He had a total of two event
wins, with the second coming at Mid-Michigan, two runner-ups, and two
first round exits. The last race, in Bowling Green, saw Billy again
have some troubles with the Hot Street car. He hit the wall with the
left side of the car on Friday during test and tune, but recovered
enough to qualify for the race. By accumulating enough points
throughout the season, he managed to not only win two races, but the
Hot Street Championship! This win, coupled with the relative success
of the Real Street car, earned Chris Beningo the "Crew Chief of the
Year" award from the NMRA. |
