![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Elite-Motorsports-Million-min-1024x576.jpg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
What do racers do when their seasons are complete? Some go on vacation, others start planning for an upcoming season and, if they\u2019re Pro Mod competitors, they start making plans to take part in Drag Illustrated\u2019s <\/i>Winter Series at Bradenton Motorsports Park in Florida.<\/p>\n
To make this three-race excursion profitable for Pro Mod racers, the magazine is partnering with Elite Motorsports and Bradenton Motorsports Park to offer a $1 million bonus award for any Pro Modified racer who can win all three contests of the 2025-2026 Drag Illustrated Winter Series and earn the Elite Motorsports Million.<\/p>\n
This offering marks the largest single-performance-based payout in drag racing history. As such it raises the stakes for this December 5-7 and the Snowbird Outlaw Nationals, the U.S. Street Nationals on January 23-25, 2026 and the World Series of Pro Mod, scheduled February 26-28, 2026. All three races are held at Bradenton Motorsports Park, a partner with Elite Motorsports and Drag Illustrated <\/i>for the Elite Motorsports Million.<\/p>\n
At a time of year when most in the Northern Hemisphere are freeing their knees, the Drag Illustrated Winter Series has become a premier attraction in straight-line racing. Global participants and a huge fan interest draws both racers and their fans to central Florida each winter to participate and watch. With the Elite Motorsports Million as part of the program for the 2025-2026 series, these three races promise to be impactful.<\/p>\n
Richard Freeman, who is the owner of Elite Motorsports, one of the preeminent NHRA Mission Foods Drag Racing Series Pro Stock squads, is proud to be able to support this series. \u201cDrag racing has given me everything and I believe in giving back,\u201d he declared.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThis is the kind of moment our sport needs – something big, bold and damn near unbelievable. If putting up a million bucks helps one racer change their life, if it pushes a team to take their program to the next level, then it\u2019s worth every penny! This isn\u2019t,\u201d he reminded, \u201cfor the faint of heart. You\u2019re going to have to eat the rest, on the biggest stage, under the brightest lights. But somebody out there is going to do it – and I can\u2019t wait to shake their hand when they do!\u201d<\/p>\n The Winter Series is the brainchild of Wes Buck, founder of Drag Illustrated <\/i>magazine. The originator of the Winter Series is always looking for another great way to support straight-line racing, including roles in the big-money PRO Superstar Shootout that\u2019s been held twice on Bradenton\u2019s drag strip. \u201cThis is about changing the trajectory of our sport,\u201d he said. \u201cFor too long, drag racers – legends and champions – have had to downplay their winnings when talking to peers in other forms of motorsports. That ends now!<\/p>\n \u201cDrag racing deserves big numbers, and a million-dollar prize does more than get attention; it gets results,\u201d Buck stated. \u201cIt motivates teams. It inspires dreams. And it tells the world we mean business. This isn\u2019t the last move we\u2019ll make,\u201d Buck said of the Winter Series. \u201cBut it might be the most important one yet.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" What do racers do when their seasons are complete? Some go on vacation, others start planning for an upcoming season and, if they\u2019re Pro Mod competitors, they start making plans to take part in Drag Illustrated\u2019s Winter Series at Bradenton Motorsports Park in Florida.<\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":65,"featured_media":101709,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3465,3470,5029],"tags":[407,3810,11254,9945,2675,12351,6483,6463],"class_list":["post-101708","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-drag-racing","category-news","category-racing","tag-bradenton-motorsports-park","tag-drag-illustrated-magazine","tag-drag-illustrated-winter-series","tag-drag-illustrated-world-series-of-pro-mod","tag-elite-motorsports-llc","tag-elite-motorsports-million","tag-richard-freeman","tag-wes-buck"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Elite-Motorsports-Million-min-e1753141323653.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p42YSK-qss","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101708","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/65"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=101708"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101708\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":101722,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101708\/revisions\/101722"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/101709"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=101708"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=101708"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=101708"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Richard-Freeman-min-300x279.jpg\")