Following a season that would to this point be considered, by his own very high standards, abysmal, three-time and reigning Street Outlaws No Prep Kings champion Ryan Martin returned to victory lane Sunday evening at the Maple Grove Raceway near Reading, Pennsylvania. 

Photo by Richard Rowe

Martin defeated Jim Howe in the final round, in a matchup of two perennial favorite drivers who had won multiple invitational events in 2022 but had thus far not appeared in a single final round between them in a highly-competitive sixth season of No Prep Kings.

Martin entered the weekend with a 12-9 round record, fresh off a quarterfinal appearance last weekend at Dragway 42 in Ohio, where he had reintroduced his repaired 2018 ZL1 Camaro — sans its camouflage scheme and back in the familiar grey colors — following a crash in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Martin opened the invitational, postponed a day by inclement weather, by drawing the seasons’ number one overall draft selection, Jerry Bird, in round one. He then defeated Clay Cole in round two, Ellington in the quarters, and last weekend’s winner, Nate Sayler, in the semis, to break through to his first main event final round of the season. With 21 career No Prep Kings wins, Martin’s season-long drought had been uncharacteristic, to say the least.

Howe, for his part, scored a huge upset of Kye Kelley in round one, then rode that momentum to wins over Lizzy Musi, Rich Bruder, and “Daddy Dave” Comstock to make his way into the final round.

In the final, Martin left well ahead of Howe – who also had crashed earlier this season and only recently returned to the tour with a fresh and improved Camaro — and drove away from the screw-blown machine, taking the win by several car lengths as his ProCharger-boosted, Pro Line Hemi-powered mount thundered off into the Pennsylvania darkness.

Martin’s only other highlight in an otherwise tumultuous season was a Great 8 victory in Virginia, that was shortly followed by the accident in Tulsa. Martin had also crashed his small-tire Camaro in Australia in February, adding to what has undoubtedly been he and his team’s most challenging season to date.

On Saturday evening, Robin Roberts powered to his first Great 8 victory of the season in a final round defeat of Larry “Axman” Roach. Roberts had ousted Lizzy Musi and a surging Shawn “Murder Nova” Ellington in the subsequent rounds, while Roach used wins over Damon Merchant and Kye Kelley to punch his ticket into the finale.

With the win, Ryan Martin moved up into seventh in the overall individual standings, qualifying him for the Great 8 next weekend in Martin, Michigan. He currently sits tied for 10th with David Gates in the Great 8 standings, and paired with Bruders’ late-round showing, jumped two spots in the team standings, inching closer to Kelley’s and Comstock’s teams, who sit atop the leaderboard (Kelley leads with 1,200 points, Comstock is second with 960, Martin third at 880).

Despite being without his primary car for a number of events, Howe sits two spots out of a Great 8 appearance, but his Justin Swanstrom-led team finds itself mired back in sixth in the team rankings.