Bubba Stanton Rockets to 3.47-Second Unlimited Pro Modified Blast in War With John Sullivan
Outlaw Pro Modified Eliminator star Bubba Stanton became the third quickest doorslammer driver in eighth-mile history while waging all-out war with veteran Tennessee driver John Sullivan in a two-day battle at Xtreme Raceway Park in Ferris, Texas – the all-concrete eighth-mile showplace owned by champion racing families Clyde and Amanda Scott and Gaylen and Celeste Smith, track operators.
Stanton and Sullivan were clashing in the best conditions of the season at the Dallas-area facility which hosts the last monthly true “no rules” series in which four wheels, a roof and operating doors are the only restrictions outside of safety mandates. Hailing from Pott’s Camp, Mississippi, Stanton drives 526 miles one way to each of the Larry Jeffers Race Cars-backed series programs while arch rival Sullivan tows 510 miles to get from his Macon, Tennessee, home to the track.
Stanton, a two-time world champion in the now defunct Pro Extreme category (2006 in the ADRL and 2014 in the PDRA), carried career-bests of 3.51 seconds and 218.54 mph from a full decade ago but held the XRP track Pro Mod record at 3.53 seconds. John Sullivan, a known threat in the south for most of this century, has always been a solid 3.5-second contender.
While Drag Illustrated has covered Stanton’s previous exploits in the series at XRP, his weapon of choice changed in mid-2024 to a new bright red Jerry Bickel-built 1969 Camaro SS powered by a Joe Hornick-tweaked 525 cubic inch Hemi featuring a Brad Anderson block and cylinder heads with a PSI screw compressor with a Neal Chance automatic transmission sending over five thousand horsepower to a Chrisman rearend. The car is campaigned solely by Bubba, his father Danny Sullivan, and crew members Brian Mosby and Leonard Pate.
Sullivan’s ride is an equally red Chevy but with major differences. The Sullivan Farms ’63 Stingray from Garrett Race Cars is powered by a 536-inch 4.9-inch bore space PJS Hemi with a screw supercharger using a FuelTech EFI system and a Mark Micke TurboHydro 400, a drivetrain run under the scrutiny of Pro Mod veterans Brandon and Cole Pesz. The car also uses experimental Afterworks shocks.
Stanton and Sullivan compete against each other regularly at XRP and at select big-money outlaw events. However, the two-day Jeffers Series race at XRP on the nights of October 18-19 was special. The first day of racing on Friday included only the top eight point earners in the year’s series in a winner-take-all contest for the 2024 season championship. The Saturday portion was a separate qualified eight-car show which would award the first points for the 2025 championship to compensate for several rainouts in 2024.
Coming into the championship battle, the top eight point earners (out of twenty-two different drivers!), found a near dead-heat between leader Frankie “Mad Man” Taylor, Stanton, and Sullivan, all within a spread of nine points even though each race awarded a maximum of sixty-four points! The drivers qualified for position and pairings for the championship battle.
The XRP track rarely sees a corrected elevation of less than three thousand feet above sea level and temperatures often soar into three digits. For once, the “air” was closer to two thousand feet when qualifying began and only got better as the weekend continued. It was Sullivan who fired the first shot with a track record and personal best 3.526 blast but he was quickly eclipsed by another track mark, (and a personal best by one thousandth of a second), of 3.513 from Stanton for the pole position. The quickest nitrous-oxide injected outlaw was the 2023 and 2024 series champion, Doug Reisterer, (who has gone as quick as 3.58 at XRP), was third at 3.61 while Taylor languished in seventh.
Sullivan ripped through Taylor and Reisterer in the first two rounds with fabulous runs of 3.53 and 3.52 while Stanton destroyed anyone in the other lane in the first two rounds with back-to-back 3.51s. The two entered the final round one hundredth apart with no advantage in lanes. While everyone on the premises anticipated an epic battle, Stanton shocked everybody…including himself…by redlighting away a career-best 3.501 at 219.73 to hand Sullivan the 2024 “Iron Man” Championship who clocked his third 3.52 of the event at 3.524 at 211.17 mph.
The following day featured even better weather and an entirely new event and season. In qualifying, the new series champ Sullivan opened with yet another 3.52 but was quickly overshadowed by Stanton’s Camaro which became the ninth passenger car under 3.50 seconds in the eighth-mile with a staggering 3.491 at 217.81 mph. Sullivan defeated first-round opponent Louisianan Brandon Caples’ centrifugally-blown Camaro handily enough but Bubba Stanton positively brought the house down with the third-quickest eighth-mile pass in any kind of doorslammer at 3.475 with a speed of 219.41 to obliterate home state favorite Frankie Taylor. In the semi-finals, Stanton took out Gaylen Smith’s screw-blown ’69 Camaro with another bit of history by clocking a third consecutive 3.4-second run, unseen before this meet, of 3.491 at 217.81. The other half of the semi-finals, however, was a different kind of “spectacular”.
John Sullivan was paired against Reisterer’s lightweight nitrous machine which had earlier run as quick as 3.60. Sullivan made the most of the race with a career-best 3.523 at 217.08 but the thrills weren’t over with the illumination of John’s win light. As he recounted later, “After I pulled the chutes and let off of throttle, nothing stopped. The throttle hung. I put the car in neutral and hit the kill switch about the time the blower lifted and the front right tire blew out. Things got very interesting for a bit. I was able to keep the car in the middle of the track and got it stopped right before the sand trap. The butterfly in the injector hat came completely out. I don’t know if that caused the throttle to hang or if that happened after the fact”.
John was fine but the damage to the Stingray was extensive albeit repairable. Sullivan was unable to appear for the final round and Stanton took the event win and the 2025 point lead. Sullivan will miss a few weeks of racing while repairing the car but John promises he and Bubba will meet again on November 15-16 when the American Drag Racing League brings its annual Dragpalooza to Xtreme Raceway Park.
Shane Farris, of the blown fuel “War Wagon” ’63 Stingray Pro Mod driven by Kebin Kinsley, has already publicly offered Sullivan the use of a twin-mag, supercharged nitro Chrysler Hemi if John still needs a powerplant.
This story was originally published on October 24, 2024.
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