Bracket and index racing have never been known as spectator sports, but they’re often dismissed as a lower form of motorsport by those who only enjoy heads-up racing, when in fact, nothing could be further from the truth. While it may not be as exciting to watch from the stands as two cars go all-out against one another, from a driver skill perspective, it is one of the most demanding forms of racing you’ll ever encounter. Races are very often won by less than one thousandth of a second.Of course, when you pull a 5.8-second Pro Mod up to the line beside a 7.6-second ProCharged NMRA Renegade Mustang and slap an “index” on both of them, that’s a handicap-start race even the most die-hard heads-up fan can get behind. That’s exactly what happened at the NMRA/NMCA Super Bowl of Drag Racing when NMCA Pro Mod winner Steve Summers lined up his twin-turbo Pro Mod Camaro against NMRA Renegade winner Alton Clements in his Mustang in the annual Race for the Rings in a special race-within-a-race featuring all the class champions going head-to-head in a handicapped, heads-up contest for bragging rights.

The video tells the story well, but we’ll set it up for you: Summers, representing the NMCA’s Pro Mod class, had his index set at 5.84, based on his quickest previou run during the weekend. His opponent was set at 7.66, meaning he would get almost two full seconds head start before Summers tried to run him down! The camera stays on Summers, but at two seconds it’s safe to say Clements was well out past the 60-foot timers before Summers got the nod to pursue, and he doesn’t even re-enter the frame until the twin-turbo Pro Mod is at the 1/8-mile mark! At that point though, Summers is reeling him in big time, but Clements appears to still be a couple hundred feet out front.

However, Summers’ twin-turbo powerplant does manage to slip past just at the finish line, taking the win with a 5.85 on his 5.84 index, just edging out Alton’s 7.68 on his 7.66 prediction. The most mind-warping number of the race, though: Summers’ closing speed! He was going 255 mph to Clements’ 179, giving him a closing rate of nearly EIGHTY miles per hour. We think it’s safe to say Clements has never been passed like that on the track!

Video credit: VictoryRedColorado