SAN ANTONIO, TX – Terry McMillen and his Amalie Oil InstiGator Funny Car, powered by Torco Race Fuels, showed up earlier for his partners race and the season opening Knoll-Gas Nitro Jam Drag Racing series event.
“This is always one of my most favorite races of the year,” McMillen said. The Hoosier Thunder Motorsports team headed into the San Antonio area a week earlier to make appearances at area NAPA stores. “We gave our InstiGator car a total makeover, from inside out, so we wanted to get there early and show it off a little. Everyone seemed to love the new look.”
“A lot of what racing is about happens before we ever get to the track,” added McMillen. After making NAPA appearances on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, McMillen did an in-studio interviewed with Chuck Miketinac, Sports Director for FOX 29 News in San Antonio. “Chuck was a great guy to talk with. It was fun reminiscing about my first race car.” Several area newspaper articles also feature Terry and the Amalie Oil InstiGator Funny Car.
Once the pre-race festivities were finished, it was time to go racing.
McMillen took his new look InstiGator out of the transporter and made noise right away. The second best pass of first round qualifying would be disallowed since the car crossed the center line. “It’s hard to steer when the front wheels aren’t on the ground,” McMillen said. “We were making a lot of horsepower and we carried the front end a long way down the track. If I could have kept it between the stripes and not lifted, we might have had the number one spot early Friday.”
McMillen would go on to claim the seventh spot in qualifying and bow out in the first round of eliminations with a tire shaking loss.
During the race weekend, McMillen also unveiled the Nitro Pit Party, where guests attend a special, behind the scenes event in the Hoosier Thunder Motorsports pits. Guests were part of a Freedom Grill commercial that was filmed on location and two lucky guests took home a brand new FG-50 Freedom Grill.
McMillen and fellow drivers, Dale Creasy, Jr., Doug Foley and competitive cook Ed Rivas also showed off their grilling skills in a segment filmed for The Ultimate Tailgating Chef. “If you’ve ever been around our pits, you know we like to eat,” said McMillen. “We had a lot of fun with the Nitro Pit Party, it’s something that we’re going to do at all of the Nitro Jam national events.”
The weekend was also packed with racing for McMillen. He successfully qualified both his alcohol Funny Car and the Torco Nitro Top Fuel team car for the Foley and Lewis team. McMillen plans to give up his funny car seat in the near future. “We got some plans for the InstiGator,” said McMillen. “We had planned to get my son Andy and crew-chief Tad Heflick licensed on Monday, but that all got rained out.” Licensing attempts for both Andy McMillen and Tad Heflick will be rescheduled.
“Our plan is to have another driver for the Amalie Oil InstiGator Funny Car soon,” McMillen said. “That car will always be a part of the Hoosier Thunder team and the Amalie Oil marketing program.”
The InstiGator team partners with high quality and high performance companies like; Amalie Oil, Torco Race Fuels, eRaceFuels, Flatout Gaskets, NGK Spark Plugs, MSD, GO Graphix, eMax, Crane Cams, Freedom Grill and No Limit Custom Coach.
