The February rain that delayed the NHRA’s K&N Winternationals may have been a metaphor for something much larger.  Like a flood that starts with one drop, the weekend’s Pro Stock debut of Mopar Sport Compact star Shaun Carlson should trigger a flood of respect as we move toward drag racing’s future.

Ten days after receiving his NHRA Pro Stock license, Carlson qualified 14th in the 16-car Winternationals field and won a round before being nipped in the lights by The Professor Warren Johnson, a perennial Pro Stock champion and not one to submit passing grades to Sport Compact drag racing or its racers and fans.

Carlson was handed the chance when Mopar regular Darrell Alderman needed a few days to recover from a back injury sustained in a construction accident about a week before the Winternationals.  Since Carlson and Alderman both get dressed in the same Mopar clubhouse, it was a bold but easy roster switch for the people at Dodge.

Carlson is one of the star innovators in Sport Compact drag racing but he admits being beaten by The Professor was a schooling he won’t soon forget.

"I really got caught up in the moment," Carlson told me afterwards.  He’d left Johnson at the start and was ahead at halftrack against one of the most successful drivers in the history of the NHRA.

"It was like a dream.  I was beating Warren Johnson until he passed me going into the lights."  The margin of victory: .058 of a second.  Heads Up.  Equal gear.  Equal conditions.  A sport compact racer nearly toppled one of the best Pro Stock drivers to ever strap on a championship.

Shaun said he will forever remember Johnson calling out his name and a verbal pat on the back as the two passed at the top end where the cars are cooled before they’re returned to their pits.

Floods can start after just such a drop falls into history.

Carlson’s Sport Compact pedigree is pure.  He built the cars that put Steph Papadakis into the record books.  He became a World Rally Championship nut chasing Ford rally cars around Great Britain in a helicopter.  And none other than Sport Compact Ringmaster Michael Myers, the buck stopper in the NOPI Fast and Furious XBOX Cup, pegged much of his promo power around Carlson when he changed Shaun’s name to Slash three years ago then trotted him in front of as many cameras and microphones as possible.

"A lot of the (Slash personae) and WWF style of racing are not necessarily in our past right now, but with major corporate sponsors and TV coverage we’re trying to get the sport to grow.  We’re really striving to be as professional as possible and emulate the POWERade (domestic NHRA drag racing) series and see what we can be.  We’re just trying our best."

Slash may be on the shelf but it certainly isn’t hidden especially when you look at the hardware that slashes Carlson’s face.

And that might be the point here.

If Carlson would have failed, the whole Sport Compact business might have been dismissed in a fast and furious Internet jokefest.  Instead, Shaun made the field forcing that crowd to choke on its jokes.  Then he followed that with a round win and a near upset of The Professor causing the fast and furious launch of a few jokes at the expense of the graying POWERade world, none of whom are laughing now!!

Hidden, though, is this: Carlson spent so much time with the Pro Stock experiment that he fell behind preparing his own 1000 horsepower Pro FWD Dodge Neon SRT-4.  During a long conversation at the Anaheim Supercross opener in January, we talked about the importance of a great 2004 season as Shaun crafts plans to expand his racing empire.  In addition to being one of the most respected fabricators in Sport Compact racing, Carlson is also founder and president of a 10-year-old aftermarket parts company called Nuformz.  His relationship with Dodge is B2B in addition to being Slash and burn rubber!

And I haven’t mentioned the several conversations I’ve had with drag racing legend and team owner Don "The Snake" Prudhomme who is on the sidelines calculating when the time is right for Snake Racing to slither into the Sport Compact wars.

Chew on that a moment!

Their crossover, however, will be delayed until there’s enough money and support to warrant the professional environment and commitments that insure everyone can be ready when the tree is lit every year.

Like I said, Carlson’s Winternationals trip, seen by many including Prudhomme, Anderson, Coughlin, Jenkins and Martin, may be the drop that triggers a flood of respect for Sport Compact drag racing.  But those flood waters will need to be a raging torrent.  The dams built against the sport are deep and wide but after the 2004 Winternationals, at least now they’re cracked.