{"id":97280,"date":"2024-11-29T17:18:44","date_gmt":"2024-11-29T17:18:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/racepages.com\/Videos\/drag-racing\/uncategorized\/jay-cox-to-make-pro-mod-return-at-di-winter-series-with-turbocharged-pumpkin-camaro\/"},"modified":"2024-11-29T17:18:44","modified_gmt":"2024-11-29T17:18:44","slug":"jay-cox-to-make-pro-mod-return-at-di-winter-series-with-turbocharged-pumpkin-camaro","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/racepages.com\/Videos\/drag-racing\/uncategorized\/jay-cox-to-make-pro-mod-return-at-di-winter-series-with-turbocharged-pumpkin-camaro\/","title":{"rendered":"Jay Cox to Make Pro Mod Return at DI Winter Series with Turbocharged \u2018Pumpkin\u2019 Camaro"},"content":{"rendered":"

Just over a year ago, PDRA Pro Nitrous star driver and tuner Jay Cox announced his retirement from driving at the end of the 2023 season. But this winter, Cox will make his return in a cameo appearance to compete in the inaugural Drag Illustrated Winter Series presented by J&A Service, a three-race outlaw Pro Modified series at Bradenton Motorsports Park. Starting at next week\u2019s Snowbird Outlaw Nationals at Motion Raceworks, Cox will drive his fan-favorite \u201cPumpkin\u201d \u201969 Camaro, though the car now sports a twin-turbocharged powerplant between the frame rails.<\/p>\n

Cox stepped away from full-time driving to spend more time with his young family, though he remained involved in the sport tuning for teammate and sponsor Marcus Butner, who competes in PDRA Pro Nitrous. Cox is adamant that he\u2019s still retired, but when his father and crew chief, Lloyd Cox, started to miss the father-son duo\u2019s racing activities, Cox decided to postpone the sale of his RJ Race Cars-built \u201969 Camaro. The inaugural DI Winter Series \u2013 featuring the Snowbirds, the U.S. Street Nationals presented by M&M Transmission in late January, and the Drag Illustrated World Series of Pro Mod in early March \u2013 gives Cox the opportunity to race a limited schedule that doesn\u2019t interfere with his son\u2019s baseball season.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not that I\u2019m coming back out. I am retired,\u201d Cox insisted. \u201cI did everything I wanted to do, and I\u2019ve done it for 15 years. My little boy was getting into baseball, and man, I\u2019ve had the time of my life with this baseball team and coaching baseball. I found my love for baseball again. I\u2019ve never really done anything in my life that I\u2019ve enjoyed as much as spending time with these kids. But when I sold my racing stuff, it kind of crushed my dad. It broke his heart. My dad has been my best friend since the day I was born.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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Jay and Lloyd Cox<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cMy main purpose for coming back is my dad,\u201d Cox continued. \u201cYou never know how much time you\u2019ve got left. He\u2019s 76 years old and however much time I\u2019ve got left, if that\u2019s where he wants to be is on a racetrack, that\u2019s where I want to be with him. We\u2019ll probably only run two or three races a year, maybe four at the most. It\u2019s strictly going to be with Wes [Buck\u2019s] deal down there in Florida. I might go to PDRA at GALOT, but that\u2019s it. It\u2019s wherever my dad wants to race, and as long as it doesn\u2019t interfere with the baseball stuff with these young kids, that\u2019s what I\u2019m going to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

The wheels started turning for Cox at the 2024 World Series of Pro Mod, where he got to talking with M&M Transmission\u2019s Mark Micke, who qualified No. 1 out of 65 cars in his twin-turbocharged \u201969 Camaro. Roger Conley from Hart\u2019s Turbos joined the conversation, and Cox started making plans to convert his nitrous-fed \u201cPumpkin\u201d over to a Hart\u2019s turbocharged, Pro Line Racing-powered combination.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cMy dad flew out to the World Series there towards the end, and we were all just sitting there talking and I could see my dad\u2019s eyes lighting up. My dad was getting excited about it,\u201d Cox said. \u201cI told Mark, I said, \u2018Let me call Rick,\u2019 and I called Rick Jones. We talked a little bit about it and Rick said he\u2019d help me out. A lot of people came together in the right places to make the deal go together. When I left the World Series of Pro Mod, we took the car up to Rick\u2019s and just took some baby steps and started converting the car over. I didn\u2019t think it was going to be that big a deal at first, but man, Rick took the whole car down to basically the bare chassis, and basically built a whole new chassis and started over with it. It\u2019s a pretty nice piece.\u201d<\/p>\n

The move from turbos will be a significant adjustment for Cox, who has exclusively driven nitrous cars over the course of his career, from his early days at small-town tracks in the Carolinas to his 10 wins in PDRA Pro Nitrous competition.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cAs far as the turbos, man, I\u2019m a duck out of water when it comes to that deal,\u201d Cox said. \u201cI\u2019m a nitrous guy. You give me a nitrous car and at three runs, I\u2019ll go out there and run with anybody in the world. With a turbo car, man, I don\u2019t know. I\u2019m just hoping I can stage the thing.\u201d<\/p>\n

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From a tuning standpoint, Cox will focus on chassis setup while Micke handles the power management on the Pro Line Racing engine.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t want to put all the pressure on him, but it\u2019s a hundred percent Mark Micke\u2019s deal,\u201d Cox added. \u201cI\u2019ll do the shocks, 4-link, stuff like that, the car stuff. But as far as the turbo deal, it\u2019s a hundred percent his deal.\u201d<\/p>\n

The inaugural Winter Series came around at just the right time for Cox, who still wants to compete at a high level but has too many commitments at home to run a full touring series. Beyond the Snowbirds on Dec. 5-8, the Winter Series will include the U.S. Street Nationals presented by M&M Transmission on Jan. 23-26, 2025; and the World Series of Pro Mod Feb. 27-March 1, 2025.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is the coolest racing deal out there right now,\u201d Cox said. \u201cI love the PDRA. I\u2019m diehard, through-and-through PDRA, but man, eight races stretched out over seven months, and all these different places you\u2019ve got to go, that\u2019s a lot on people, especially a younger working person that\u2019s got a family. I think it\u2019s a very cool deal what they\u2019ve done \u2013 three races basically in a two-month period, all in the same location in the wintertime, when there\u2019s really nothing else to do. I think it\u2019s a very, very good deal. I think it\u2019s going to be the next hottest thing in drag racing. I think it\u2019s going to bring out a lot of new people, and I\u2019m very excited about it. If Wes [Buck] and Victor [Alvarez, track owner] hadn\u2019t done this, I probably wouldn\u2019t have been as excited or as gung-ho about putting the car together.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cox, who will continue to tune Butner\u2019s Musi-powered \u201cHeartbreaker\u201d \u201869 Camaro, admits he didn\u2019t plan or expect to bring a car back out so soon after his retirement from full-time driving. But everything came together, and working in secret for the last several months with several manufacturers, Cox prepared for the biggest three-race stretch of his career.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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\u201cI\u2019ve had a lot of people ask me about racing, if I was coming back, and I\u2019ve told them I\u2019ve enjoyed being retired, and I am retired,\u201d Cox said. \u201cAnd I didn\u2019t lie to nobody, but I just wanted it to be a secret. It took a lot of special people. Ultimately, Mark Micke, number one. Without him, and believing in him and knowing he\u2019s going to help me, I wouldn\u2019t even have ventured it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cNumber two, Marcus Butner and Matthew Butner have been with me for five or six years with the nitrous car,\u201d continued Cox, who also thanked Hart\u2019s Turbos, Eric Dillard at Pro Line Racing, and Blake Houseley at Mayberry Motorsports. \u201cI guess they saw me, the way I was, and my dad, and [Butner] put his arm around me and he\u2019s like, \u2018Bubba, whatever you want to do, I got your back.\u2019 He said, \u2018Don\u2019t be scared to pull the trigger on something.\u2019 Without those people in my corner, and a hundred percent believing in them and knowing them, and being as friends as long as we have, and trusting in them, I\u2019d have never done it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Each race of the DI Winter Series will feature a 32-car qualified field. The driver who earns the most points across all three races will be crowned the DI Winter Series champion. Across three races and the championship, the Winter Series will pay out more than $300,000.\u00a0For more info and to purchase tickets, visit\u00a0www.TheWinterSeries.com<\/a>\u00a0or\u00a0www.RaceBMP.com<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The post Jay Cox to Make Pro Mod Return at DI Winter Series with Turbocharged \u2018Pumpkin\u2019 Camaro<\/a> first appeared on Drag Illustrated<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Just over a year ago, PDRA Pro Nitrous star driver and tuner Jay Cox announced his retirement from driving at the end of the 2023 season. But this winter, Cox will make his return in a cameo appearance to compete in the inaugural Drag Illustrated Winter Series presented by J&A Service, a three-race outlaw Pro […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-97280","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/racepages.com\/Videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97280","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/racepages.com\/Videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/racepages.com\/Videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racepages.com\/Videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=97280"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/racepages.com\/Videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97280\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/racepages.com\/Videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=97280"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racepages.com\/Videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=97280"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racepages.com\/Videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=97280"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}