Cayuga Dragway’s most recent Pro Mod class gathering produced both fast and fate….
Toronto Motorsports Park’s Labour Day Spectacular event included yet another resounding Canadian soil performance from Halton Hills-based Santos Motorsports.
Driver Jay Santos and his talented group once again upped the bar for Canada’s quickest ever 1/8th mile Pro Mod runs – with another record breaking and victorious weekend.
Santos, racing his supercharged ’69 Camaro, was the class of the field this weekend by a pretty wide margin and set that tone early by recording an all time Canada quick 3.588 secs at 208.84 mph to take the pole for the 8-car field.
Santos, then on Sunday carded impressive consecutive winning runs of 3.654 – 3.637 and finally a 3.603 secs at 209.04 mph to out run cross town GTA rival Raymond Commisso, in the Al Billes Camaro, which was credited with a very competitive 3.690 secs at 215.57 mph in the final.
Toronto-area Santos Motorsports continued with their speedy winning ways at Toronto Motorsports Park.
The race victory was in fact Santos’ 4th straight at TMP/Cayuga Dragway – dating back to 2024.
“We had been running good before — but this summer we brought Mark Savage on board,” Jay stated. “Mark is helping us with our whole program and to get us to the next level — which as you can see he did just that. He brings in a ton of knowledge and expertise from chassis setup to just everything else running the car.”
“We already did have a great team but was just in need of that extra knowledge — and Mark Savage was at the top of his game,” Jay added. “We love racing at Cayuga — it’s become so familiar for us and the track prep is always spot on. It’s also fun racing in front of family, friends and fans — which seems to help push us to another level”
The formidable racing duo of Raymond Commisso and Al Billes placed R/UP at the Labour Day Spectacular event.
The Pro Mod class program at Cayuga was marred by a significant incident – unfortunately involving the ’58 Corvette fielded by Lowdown Hot Rods (Cambridge ON) and which was driven by Austin Vandergeld this weekend.
Austin had qualified the car #3 with a 3.972 secs but was forced to withdraw from competition after making some heavy impact in that unique all-Canadian built machine. The Corvette seemed to get into some centre marbles — tuned hard right & then left – striking both walls — before rolling to a stop. Austin was not injured.
The dedicated “Lowdown Hot Rods” race team suffered a major set back with their Pro Mod program at the Cayuga event.
According to builder/owner Tom Vandergeld, “Most importantly, the car did its job and protected our son,” he stated. “Unfortunately it is not repairable. The chassis took significant damage to the front and underneath. It was an accident to which could be from a number of things. We are stripping and savaging parts, motor/transmission, electronics, etc. We’ll be back out eventually with a new car.”
Posted with files by Bruce Biegler & Rob Potter
Photos courtesy of Blake Farnan – Steve Lowry – Sam Newell
