No. 45: Scotty Richardson

Scotty Richardson has never wrestled a 320-mph Top Fueler down the quarter-mile. And he never raced back in the days before there was smooth, prepared tracks and drivers had to be just as adept with both the clutch and gas pedals.

But what the 30-year-old Goodlettsville, Tenn., racer has done in 12 years is win 33 NHRA national events in 44 final rounds in five Sportsman eliminators - Super Stock, Stock, Super Comp, Super Gas, and Super Street. Some of his more noteworthy accomplishments include:

Five national championships - in Super Comp (1991, 1993, and 1994), Super Gas (1994), and Stock (1996).

One of only six drivers to have won two eliminators at the same NHRA national event - Super Comp and Super Street at the 1995 Checker Schuck's Kragen Nationals.

Is the only driver to win two national championships in the same year - Super Comp and Super Gas in 1994.

In 1996, won the national championship in Stock and was tied with Matt Driskell for the Super Comp national championship but lost the tie-breaker, which was decided based on who had more national event round-wins.

Has winning final-round record in divisional competition - a combined 23-7 in Super Stock, Stock, Super Comp, and Super Gas.

Between 1991 and 1998, was division champion five times in Super Comp and once in Super Gas in Divisions 1, 3, and 4.

Counting his win in Super Pro at the 1989 Division 4 Eastern Bracket Finals, Richardson has won 57 of 75 final rounds, and that doesn't include numerous big money bracket race wins, such as the Sunoco Five-Day E.T. Championships at Moroso Motorsports Park in West Palm Beach, Fla., at which he has been overall champion twice.

Drivers in the Professional categories only have to win four rounds. They also do not have to dial in e.t.s - the first to the finish line wins. Pro drivers also do not have to worry as much about their reaction times because a late launch can be made up with horsepower.

The Sportsman categories in which Richardson competes rarely require less than seven rounds of competition, and with the advent of buy-backs at bracket races, eliminations can stretch to 12 hours and take up to 10 rounds.

In all five eliminators in which Richardson earns a living, he can lose if he can't run within a hundredth or two of his dial - a number that the driver needs to skillfully predict or program into a throttle stop. He or she must also be capable of consistent 0 or teen reaction times in every round and be able to hit the Tree and run the number no matter the time of day or the conditions.

In Richardson's case, not only has he proven more skillful than any other Sportsman racer past or present - with perhaps the exception of older brother and mentor Edmond - but he often races two different cars at the same event.

For example, in 1996 when he was going for the double national championship, his Super Comp dragster required him to leave the starting line with a delay-box button on a four-tenths Pro Tree, but in his Stock car, Richardson had to leave off of the bottom bulb of a five-tenths full Tree using the footbrake.

Richardson began bracket racing his father's station wagon when he was barely a teenager, and he had two taskmasters analyzing his performance - Edmond and his father, Eddie.

"My dad and brother instilled in me that second wasn't good enough - first was the only way," said Richardson, who still has the trophy he won in his first attempt in a car at the age of 13 in 1983. "A lot of people make drag racing more complicated than it is. Basically, it's numbers. I try to run my own race. A lot of people worry about who they are racing and most of them have lost the race before they get in the car." -- Bruce Dillashaw