Jason Collins Wins NHRA Pro Mod in Second Start
Jason Collins won the JBS Equipment NHRA Pro Mod Drag Racing Series event at the NHRA Southern Nationals at South Georgia Motorsports Park in only his second career start, beating Mike Thielen on Sunday. The result turned a long regional drag-racing career into a national-level breakthrough almost immediately.
Jason Collins at South Georgia Motorsports Park
Collins backed up the win with a 5.731-second pass at 252.99 mph in the final round and a.009 reaction time. He qualified second and then worked through Mason Wright, Sidnei Frigo and Lyle Barnett before lining up against Thielen for the final run.
The final round was the sharpest answer to the weekend. Collins needed the launch and the lane speed to hold up, and he delivered both while keeping the car in the 5.7-second range that carried him through eliminations.
Scott Tidwell and the opening
That run came after years of work outside the spotlight. Collins said he had been doing drag racing-related work for more than 30 years, moving through the Southeastern outlaw scene in Mountain Motor Pro Stock, Local Pro Mod, racetrack operations, Drag Radial racing, test sessions and match races.
His path into Pro Mod ran through Scott Tidwell, who had previously given him opportunities to test and drive cars. Collins said, "I started driving and testing some cars for Scott," and added, "He actually bought one of my old Outlaw 10.5 cars from me, which was the red car that they ran in Pro 275 for a while. And I don’t know, I started just doing some driving for him, just testing really."
From radial racing to Pro Mod
Collins also drove Tidwell's blue Camaro during the radial racing boom, and he said, "For whatever reason, it all worked," before describing the first race in that car: "The very first race, we didn’t even test before we got it going and run it up at the first race. And then went on to, I think we won every race but one that year in the Radial stuff."
For Collins, the win at South Georgia Motorsports Park was not a one-off lucky run. It was the latest result from a racer who had spent 30-something years building the kind of experience that finally translated when the Pro Mod chance arrived.
