Aspiring and talented Canadian nitro nostalgia funny car driver Nathan Sitko earned his most impressive career win yet recently when he prevailed during one of drag racing’s most tradition rich events — the Napa Auto Parts Ignitor Nitro Open held at Idaho’s Firebird Raceway.

Driving the highly formidable Hodgson Racing/Pacemaker Firebird (based from Edmonton AB) Sitko won the 53rd edition of that prestigious NHRA regional race which throughout most of it’s history has included and showcased the nitro Nostalgia Funny Car class.

Sitko’s win (on May 20th) was both a speedy and convincing one indeed and came in just his 4th event start driving for the team after being named as the replacement driver for Ryan Hodgson, last December.

In fact Nathan and his talented group were credited with the quickest run ever recorded within the NHRA Hot Rod Heritage Series/Legends Nitro series — for funny cars. Together they clocked an astounding 5.510 secs which came up on the scoreboard during a round one win over fellow Canadian Jeff Arend.

Sitko then topped two more of the most prominent machines within North America’s NFC circuit — the Kris Krabil (Bartone & Lebor) and Bobby Cottrell (Bucky’s Bardahl) cars – to take the event title, carding consecutive passes of 5.608 secs and 5.554 secs.

“It still hasn’t completely sunk in what we accomplished that weekend,” Nathan reflected on his FB page. “The event was an absolute TON of hard work by everyone involved. I’m so grateful to work with all these stellar people and to get to drive their Hot Rod.”

“And hats off to the whole staff and the New family at Firebird Raceway — who did a fantastic job all weekend giving us a great track and put on such a wonderful event!”

Posted by Bruce Biegler
Photos courtesy of Carl Bredl