“I started racing when I was in my early twenties, and I held the NHRA A//Modified Production record for a number of years,” Mike Valerio said. “My partner at that time was Ron Hutter, who built our engines and introduced me to the NHRA. My involvement in the sport back then set the direction for the rest of my life, leading to the creation of Competition Engineering. I started out building Pro Stock chassis in the early 1970s and then added an expanded product line. I eventually sold the business to Dick Moroso in 1982.

“Of course, once I started Competition Engineering my racing career ended because I was just too busy taking care of business to race. It wasn’t until 2008 that I finally got involved with racing again, running a 10.5 car in ADRL. I guess you could say that I had a relapse!”

It’s pretty obvious that Mike was doing a lot more than just driving a race car in his younger days. His keen mind was always working.

“During the time I raced regularly I was always thinking of ways to improve race car performance, and over the years I have invented or improved a number of products that changed the sport of drag racing in what I like to think was a positive manner,” Valerio said. “I built wheelie bars back in the early 70s that were spring-loaded, for example, and I also developed an adjustable ladder bar that was called a ladder link. As they say, necessity is the mother of invention, and that’s what has always kept me going, designing and building innovative products that addressed a particular need when it came to improving performance. Another of my designs was the Slide-a-Link traction bar system that Competition Engineering still offers today, and they have proven to be a terrific aid to getting cars to hook up and get down the track. My background as a racer led me to develop products racers had a need for.”

And that pioneering spirit still motivates Mike Valerio.

“These days my son Frank and I operate Mike Valerio Motorsports Products in Bradenton, Florida. Frank, who is an amazing craftsman, and I are the only two people who work in our company; we do all of the work ourselves. We find it difficult to have any employees helping us. We’d rather take a little extra time and be sure that everything that leaves our shop has our personal stamp of approval on it.”

MVM produces a top-quality, precision-engineered product, the result of three years of R&D.

“The carbon fiber tubing we use in our wheelie bars is unique because we use aerospace-quality ribbon. I spent three years researching carbon fiber before coming out with the first bars,” Valerio said. “The racers get a tremendous weight savings by using carbon fiber wheelie bars, and there are a lot of other benefits as well, some of which the racers are keeping close to their vests. In other words, there are other reasons they’re being purchased other than weight-savings, and it’s interesting to see how secretive some of the top competitors are about this. It’s just like anything that improves winning performance, once you find something it’s up to the other guys to figure it out on their own. The bottom line is that the racers who have learned to use them are having great success.

“I’m proud of the fact that all the fastest cars in the PDRA are using our wheelie bars now, including those of Pro Nitrous hitters Jason Harris and Lizzy Musi,” Valerio added. “In fact, pretty much all of the Pro Nitrous cars use them. I would estimate that of 16 cars in a field at least 12 would have our wheelie bars. They do such a good job of stabilizing the car and the results are proof of the advantage of using our wheelie bars.

“I had a lot of help during the developmental process, and I was blessed to have some of the best drivers in the country test the bars on some very fast cars,” Valerio said. “Todd Tutterow was involved from the very beginning, and he was the first guy to put them on a supercharged car. I sure am thankful for everyone else who helped me in the beginning with my research and development, including Stevie Jackson, Robert Mathis and Pat Musi.”

Because of the success of MVM’s line of wheelie bars for fast doorslammer cars, Valerio was pleased to announce that the company’s product line was set to expand. In the next month they will be introducing new carbon fiber wheelie bars for Top Dragster cars.

This veteran racer and industry icon knows quality when he sees it, and he sees it in the PDRA.

“We’ve been involved with PDRA as a contingency sponsor this season, and we are proud to support the racers as well as the organization,” Valerio said. “I really believe the PDRA is an up and coming organization and we’re thrilled to be associated with them. I got involved with PDRA because it’s my kind of racing – it’s family oriented and there are no rules basically except for safety rules. That’s a great thing for a person like me and a lot of others because it gives you an opportunity to use your brain and experience and do things. Other associations limit you and that takes a lot of the fun out of the sport. PDRA is a great organization and they’re really going to go places. I really want to thank all the racers who support us and buy our products.”



Photo Credits: Gary Rowe / RaceWorks.com / PDRA66.com
Article: Brian Wood