NHRA - National Hot Rod Association

In a sport where timing is everything, Russ “Bubba” Linke’s timing could not have been better. Thrust in the middle of a multiway battle for the Stock world championship at midseason, Linke took the ball and ran with it, finishing his season with a win, a runner-up, and a semifinal to clinch his first NHRA Lucas Oil Drag Racing Series title. At the end of a long and grueling season, Linke posted a 677-point score, 22 better than runner-up and two-time world champion Jeff Strickland.

“Honestly, [winning a championship] is something that never crossed my mind, at least for most of the season,” said Linke. “I usually hit whatever races I can and just see how that works out. This time, it just worked out for me.”

Late in the season, with his scorecard complete, Linke could have headed west to Las Vegas and Pomona in order to act as a blocker, but he elected to remain at his home in New Jersey, waiting not-so-patiently to learn his fate. At the Dodge NHRA Nevada Nationals powered by Direct Connection in Las Vegas, Linke was able to hold off an 11th-hour charge by Parker Theobald and Kyle Rizzoli, both of whom lost early.

“I was out on a tractor, moving dirt, while they were racing in Las Vegas,” Linke said. “I tried to watch the race as it was progressing, but I never saw an updated schedule. All of a sudden, I started getting all these phone calls and text messages, and I still wasn’t sure, but then someone sent me a screenshot of the live timing, and that’s when I knew it was over. I can’t even repeat the words that came out of my mouth. I’ll just say it was a cool feeling.”

Linke, who previously posted a seventh-place finish during the 2008 season, hardly felt like a title contender after a round-one loss at his first race of the season, the Baby Gators Division 2 NHRA Lucas Oil Series event in Gainesville. A few weeks later, Linke’s fortunes improved dramatically as he wheeled his B/SA ’97 Camaro to a victory at the American Rebel Light NHRA 4-Wide Nationals in Charlotte.

Asked during a post-race interview if winning was easy, Linke was quick to offer his thoughts on the state of NHRA class racing.

“Absolutely not; it’s never easy, but we just keep trying,” said Linke. “I got my butt kicked in Gainesville, so I just told myself to come here and be aggressive. To me, if you make it to the final round, it doesn’t get any worse no matter what, so why not go for it?”

Linke did just that with a great light in his final-round win over Dennis Bargeron, but at that point, winning a championship was one of the furthest things from his mind.

That mentality began to change as the longtime Division 1 racer continued to rack up one strong finish after another. A quarterfinal at the Reading divisional was followed by a semifinal at the NHRA New England Nationals in Epping, and that was followed by a runner-up and a round-three finish at the Division 1 doubleheader at Numidia Dragway in August.

By the time the calendar turned to September, Linke found himself embroiled in a multiway battle for the title, and his competition included some of the best class racers NHRA has to offer, including former champs Jeff Strickland, Jimmy Hidalgo Jr., Joe Santangelo, Jerry Emmons, and Jody Lang, all former world champs who held on for a Top 10 finish.

Linke was a runner-up in the first leg of the Division 1 doubleheader in Richmond, but the second race got delayed by rain, with the final rounds moved to Maple Grove Raceway during the Dutch Classic National Open. At the time, Linke expected to have a difficult heads-up run, and with several weeks to prepare, he pulled out all the stops in order to give himself the best shot at a victory.

“That was 100% pressure. I thought I was going to have a heads-up run against Jeff Longhany, and I didn’t know if I could beat him,” Linke said. “I did a lot of testing and spent a lot of money to prepare for it. I even put a roll cage in the car just in case it ran in the nines. I wanted to make sure everything was legal. Stephen Smyth from Port-A-Tree took my car and had the cage installed, so I actually drove to Maple Grove without a car in the trailer. I had no idea if the car would drive differently, and I’m not exactly a guy who fits easily inside a roll cage.”

Once he arrived in Reading, Linke was able to brush aside whatever nerves he had and finished the job with a clutch victory over Victor Cagnazzi in the final round.

“I still wasn’t sure I had it, but the next closest races were 30 hours away, and I wasn’t about to make that trip, so I just had to wait and hope it worked out, which it did,” he said.

Linke has a lot of support, including his parents, stepmother, uncle Doug and aunt Jeanne, son Blake, girlfriend Ashlee, and the Donhauser family, as well as Kritter, Mike, Killie, and Riley. He also thanked Dan and Jeanne Northrop, Shane and Sara Oakes, Bryan Valentine, Russ Ghent, Craig Trabucco, the Warren family, Jason Line, Dead Bolt Dan, Jack and Katie Sepanek, Steve and Jenna Ficacci, Pat Glade, Kevin Fogerty, Steve Smyth, Allison and Doug Doll, Mark Young and family, the Koretsky family, Jeff Strickland, Victor Cagnazzi, Kevin Cooke, Coan Converters, Lucas Oil, GM Parts Now, Rich Fetch of Zep Products, and the NHRA Division 1 crew.