Ted Barnes
Ted Barnes explains the Explosive TNT series.
If
Story by Robert Michaelson • Photography by: Mike Goodwin - MG Digital Media
you are a devotee of drag racing in southern Ontario and western New York, you have probably attended one of the TNT Hot Rod Super Series events. These races are extremely competitive and very entertaining. We thought you might like to find out about the series and its creator Ted Barnes. Ted, his dad Bill (the Clapper) and their Datsun drag car are very familiar in the southern Ontario area, having won a number of championships over the last few years. We caught up with series creator Ted Barnes and asked him how TNT came to life. Here’s his story…
“I’d been
bracket racing for a long time, something on the order of 15 years, and was looking for new challenges, something different. IHRA’s Hot Rod (10.90) class looked interesting. (In this class, you have to run as close as you can to 10.90 without going too fast and leave on a 5/10th’s pro tree.) In early 2002, I took my ten-second racecar and tried to set it up to be competitive in the Hot Rod class. This meant not only being able to run a consistent 10.90 in a variety of weather conditions, but also being able to get a decent reaction time on the .500 pro tree. Not as easy as I thought.” “Running 10.90 wasn’t the problem, since my car had been running in the low 10’s for a long time. I quickly learned that the reaction time issue was going to need outside help. I had been running a nearly stock Power-
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October/November 2007 • P|M
glide with a trans brake for years, along with a run of the mill 8” converter. It soon became apparent that this was not the right combination for a 10.90 class. After talking with a number of other racers, and incorporating some of their suggestion in the car…I was able to go red on the pro tree!” “The reason that 10.90 racing looked so interesting was a local series called the Carl McQuillen Series that had a half dozen or so 10.90 races in the area, add to these the two IHRA national events within a 3-hour drive of Grand Bend and Cayuga and these races would offer a good chance to hone the skills necessary to be a competitive 10.90 racer. Unfortunately, the McQuillen series came to an end in 2003 leaving only National and Pro-Am events at which to practice. This would mean a lot of time on the road trave. ling to and from races.”
“Early in 2006, I came up with an idea. Why not create a local series for Hot Rodtype cars that would provide a reasonable payout and was self-funding. After much consultation with other racers and the track promoters, the TNT Super Series was born.” “I wanted round money – so racers who won rounds would get rewarded – and I wanted both the winner and runner-up to be paid fairly well” said Ted. Here’s how it works. A racer pays $50 to run the class. All of that goes into the payout pool. For every round won, the racer receives $25 back. Then the winner/runner-up split what’s left 2/3 to 1/3. For example, with a 22-car field, the winner receives $500 and runner-up receives $250. The only people who get nothing are those who lose in the first round.” “Jim Reid and Sharon Hughes at Lancaster Raceway Park were the first track to give the