2004 Mustang Cobra Crash

Year One/ORSCA racer Jeremy Martorella's '04 Cobra went for a wild ride at the November season finale in Commerce, Georgia. After looking at the sequence, the first thing you'll ask is probably the same thing we asked him: "Why didn't you lift?!"

"It's a clutchless five-speed; if you lift, it automatically pops back into Neutral. I did the same wheelstand in Orlando and lifted. It came down and destroyed the front wheels, both strut towers, oil pan, oil pump, the K-member, and headers. I'd been through a bunch of wheelstands before, so I was thinking as long as I was going straight, I'd be okay. When it didn't come down after I put it in Fifth, I thought, 'Uh-oh.'"

This time, he bent four wheels, the driver-side strut tower, the driver-side inner tie rod, and he crunched the driver-side sheetmetal. So tipping the car over on its door was actually cheaper. "After the run, I loaded the car up and drowned my sorrow at Outback before heading home to Florida. On the way out of town, I called my friend Brad Brandt at Atlanta Chassis Dyno in Covington, and he said to come over-he's next to Sheppard Race Cars, which also runs ORSCA. I borrowed a set of wheels for the front, had a set of spare rears, and Sheppard and Brandt welded the strut towers, replaced the tie rod, and aligned the frontend. It took us 2 1/2 hours to fix it," Martorella told us.

"The next morning, the tech guys' jaws dropped. They inspected everything and gave me a bye run to make sure everything was all right. It went 6.03 for qualifying, 5.99 in eliminations, and we made it to the semifinals."

The car is powered by a Billy Glidden-built, normally aspirated, 308ci small-block and typically runs 5.95 at 116 in the eighth-mile and 9.42 at 144 in the quarter with a UPR Products rear suspension and 26x10 M/T tires. (Most cars in the class run 33x10.5s.) "In Atlanta, it felt like it wanted to lift the front end, so we added weight. We normally run 15 pounds on the nose to keep it under control but kept adding until we had 47 pounds in the nose, and it still did that."