Fresh Off Strong Testing, Glidden Ready For Topeka

A year ago at Heartland Park Topeka, Billy Glidden thought he was done for the season.

The Extreme 10.5 legend had a nasty wreck at the track that’s the site of this weekend’s Kansas National Guard Independence Drags V, which he thought would end his 2010 season.

But that’s not even on his mind as Glidden, currently the points leader in XTF, returns to the track.

“That’s obviously where we crashed, but I’ve got no reservations or thoughts about it,” Glidden said. “It’s just something that happened. I don’t think about it, honestly.

“We’re still racing the same car and, in the end, there’s more positives that came from it.”

There were some amazing positives that came from it.

Remarkably, Glidden returned to racing just three weeks later in Baytown, winning a double-race weekend at Royal Purple Raceway.

It ended up being an incredible moment and display of adversity, carrying Glidden to No. 2 in the points race in 2010.

But like Glidden said, he’s only focused on the now and that means working on constant improvements with his car.

He has one win and one runner-up finish this year, but he struggled at Maple Grove Raceway in May.

Since then, Glidden has worked hard on a number of items and the end result was a solid test session in Indianapolis.

He hopes that carries over to Topeka this weekend.

“We’ve made some significant changes. It’s nothing visually you see with your eyes, but we’ve made quite a few changes,” Glidden said. “We only made two runs at Indy, but we’re very pleased with how the car acted.

“It seems like our consistency could get a little better now.”

(Photos by ADRL/Richards)