Courtesy Peter Biondo

Bristol, TN — Moser Engineering $100,000 main event Friday was slated to be the most action-packed day of the week at the RAD Torque Systems Fall Fling presented by Optima Batteries at Bristol Dragway where 425 drivers battled head to head for the biggest payout of the weekend.

At round seven, ten cars remained including Dustin Smiley, John Labbous, Steve Dunn, Joe Meece, Shelley Elrod, Josh Baker, Noah Lewis, Cory Gulitti, Stephen McCrory, and Steve Witherow. Labbous was behind Smiley by .003 on the tree but put it dead-on five for the win, while Dunn was perfect to the .004 redlight of Meece. Elrod earned the door car bye and Witherow had the bye on the dragster side. Baker was .014 to knock out Lewis, while McCrory fouled out by eight thousandths to Gulitti.

As racers gathered at the trackside Laris Motorsports Insurance steak dinner, the six remaining drivers agreed on the split and rolled into the quarterfinals. Baker won on a double red after being -.003 to the five red of Labbous, while Witherow also turned it five thousandths red to the .008 of Elrod. Dunn and Gulitti were separated by just two thousandths and Dunn ran dead-on eight getting to the stripe by .010 to earn the bye to the final round.


In a door car versus door car final round, Dunn laid down .016 total taking .010 for the win over Elrod to win his first ever Fling event on Moser Engineering $100,000 Friday in his ‘67 vinyl top Camaro that received the 2022 Fall Fling Best Appearing Award.


After the conclusion of the $100,000 main event, the 18 remaining drivers in the Advanced Product Design 15K event pulled into the lanes to wrap up the Warm-Up race that previously rained out on Wednesday. The last six standing included Matt Cooke, Jesse York, Paul Moore, Jeremy York, Todd Barton, and Brian Thompson.


In the semifinals, Jesse York had a three thousandths advantage on the tree and took .006 to run dead-on nine over Cooke to meet his brother Jeremy in the final round. The all-York final saw Jesse redlight by two thousandths, and Jeremy scored his third Fling event win for the APD $15,000 just two weeks after a $30,000 win at the Summer Fling in Ohio where he also earned the MVP award.


Racers will head straight into the first round on JEGS Performance $30,000 Saturday, where the final winner of the event – and the year – will be determined. The driver that earns the most points Thursday through Saturday will receive the Fall Fling Points Champion trophy, $5,000 bonus, and a Todd’s Extreme custom-painted Impact helmet.

Everything will be streamed live as it happens on the MotorManiaTV YouTube channel free to the viewer courtesy of JEGS Performance and Mickey Thompson with new exclusive content produced by the Fling Team.