IHRA: Unique entry takes home the big prize at Summit SuperSeries

The 71-car entry list for the Mod category at the IHRA Summit SuperSeries at Memphis International Raceway last weekend looked pretty typical: Camaro, Camaro, Camaro, Mustang, Camaro, Firebird, Mustang, Camaro, Volvo...

Volvo?

Victor Ellinger, who likes to be different, entered his 1980 Volvo Bertone, the luxury model that came with all the bells and whistles.

Ellinger, of Cleveland, Ohio, promptly removed the bells and whistles and installed a roll cage, a big wing on the back, massive Mickey Thompson slicks, and an engine no one in Sweden could have imagined would ever fit beneath the hood: A 440-cubic-inch Chrysler.

Which wasn't easy. "There are no installation kits for a Chrysler-to-Volvo," he said. Plenty of parts, like the headers, had to be fabricated.

The Summit SuperSeries draws racers from all over the U.S. and Canada, and those not from the Cleveland area might have taken the black and red Volvo as nothing more than a curiosity. Until Ellinger started winning.

And he didn't stop – right to the final round where he faced Bobby Paul Arnett's beautiful 1970 Chevrolet Chevelle. While Arnett, of Winchester, Ky., clipped Ellinger by a few thousandths off the line –.015 to .018 – Ellinger pulled it out in the end, with a run of 6.383 seconds at 108.50 mph in the eighth-mile.

And the next thing you know, there's a Volvo in the winner's circle, and Ellinger is holding up the big trophy.

And there was a lot more than a trophy at stake for being the IHRA Summit SuperSeries World Champion: Ellinger gets $10,000 from Summit; a 28-foot enclosed Performax trailer; a $2,500 TrickFlow gift certificate; a two-post Gemini Auto Lift; a Jones Transmission Cooling System; an IHRA Gold Card; a World Champion Ironman trophy, and a World Champion diamond ring. Oh, and a seven-night, eight-day trip to Aruba including car rental, airfare and hotel, sponsored by AroundAruba.com, El Gaucho Restaurant, Tropicana Resorts, More 4 Less car rentals and the crew of Don Flip Racing Team. And it gets cold in Cleveland during the winter...

"I still can't believe it," Ellinger said, and that begs a question: How many more Volvos will we see on the entry list next year?