Napierville Dragway’s final feature race of the season has helped to build further momentum for a GTA-based racing team…..
Team owner Ralph Andreaachi and his driver Raymond Commisso (both from Toronto) ventured to the “La belle Province” last weekend and came away with the top prize for Napierville Dragway’s 2020 season-capping independent Pro Mod feature race.
Commisso, who is one half of a new 2-car Pro Mod team equation which is being developed for the 2021 racing season – took the Andreaachi-owned supercharged Camaro to victory in the 1/8th mile eliminator. The event win came “hot on the heels” of the team’s quick performances (including a 3.77 secs ET) during Grand Bend Motorplex’s Pro Mod feature a couple weeks before.
Raymond Commisso and Ralph Andreaachi mixed it up with some of Quebec’s best in the Pro Mod class last weekend — and came away victorious.
At Napierville, Raymond and a couple more invading teams from Ontario (Jay Santos and Eric Latino) mixed it up with Quebec’s best Pro Mod racers from within that province’s creative home-brewed UDRA circuit . A total of 13 cars made qualifying attempts.
Ontario based cars qualified at the top 1-2-3 — with Raymond’s 3.845 secs setting the pace. But in the final round it was an appropriate and as advertised Quebec Vs Ontario matchup — with Commisso facing off against Magog PQ-based driver Luc Trepanier who had qualified 6th.
That match produced a win-light in Commisso’s lane by some convincing math — a 3.844 secs 201.79 mph to 3.971 feds 185.85 mph count.
Canadian Drag Racing Hall of Fame member — Al Billes once again parlayed his tuning expertise.
The finale was however not without some dispute. A mild controversy did surface post race because Raymond’s car had to be pushed back to the starting line after it’s burnout before it could stage up (reverser was struck). There was some post race discussion as to the legality of doing that. But shortly thereafter Napierville’s track management stepped in and determined that the win was legal because of the “Outlaw nature” inherent for all their Pro Mod feature races. (ie: not NHRA class rules).
“We pulled in on Thursday and tested on a track we knew nothing about really,” said car owner Ralph Andreacchi. “But Al Billes (ABR Superchargers) found the way with his tuning expertise to get us down the surface — and every pass got better and better. We qualified on top and we ran our quickest and fastest in the final. As a driver Raymond remained focused with each run — he had this fire in his eyes!”
Ralph went on to credit his sponsors and great supporting crew. “A sincere thank you to Totera Foods, Performance Tire, Scott Jahren, BASF, BODYSHOPMALL, Dimmi Trattoria and CARSTAR Millwick Collision,” he emphasized. “And of course to our dedicated crew led by Harry Hibbs and including Cole, Jerimia, Claudio, Dylan, Remo and Joseph.”
Luc Trepanier had a very strong season ending effort – placing runner-up with his Quebec based Firebird.
For class runner-up Luc Trepanier the final round placing and performance was his strongest showing yet driving his popular and ever improving “The Undertaker” supercharged car which he co-owns with Andrea Ballabey. This Vanishing Point-built Firebird was formally raced by both Bruce Boland and Derek Hawker before they imported it to Quebec a couple years ago.
Posted by Bruce Biegler
Photos by Mike Lacelle and courtesy of Carstar Millwick Racing 
