This past week, Larry Dixon was presented with the 2002 Driver of the Year Award for the season's second quarter. It was just another in the long line of awards and achievements that have been bestowed upon those who now race together under the Snake Racing banner.

Don "The Snake" Prudhomme, the team's owner, is the man most responsible for building a Top Fuel and Funny Car racing organization that, man-for-man, boasts some of the sport's most respected and renowned drivers and tuners.

Dixon's phenomenal 2002 season, which has resulted in new personal and overall milestones in the Top Fuel category, has been highlighted by his outstanding driving and remarkable consistency. He has driven to seven wins in 12 races and now leads the POWERade points standings by 157 points.

His tuner, Dick Lahaie, has won three Top Fuel titles in his brilliant career, landing him at No. 31 on the list of the 50 Greatest Drivers in NHRA history. Lahaie won as a driver in his own dragster in 1987, and then tuned Scott Kalitta to two consecutive championships in 1994 and 1995.

Ed "The Ace" McCulloch, who tunes the Prudhomme-owned Skoal Camaro Funny Car driven by Ron Capps, has won the most prestigious drag race on the NHRA schedule, the U.S. Nationals, six times and did it in both Top Fuel and Funny Car. He is 19th on the 50 Greatest Drivers list and tuned Doug Kalitta to his first national event victory in Top Fuel as a rookie in 1998.

Capps, now in his fifth season with Prudhomme, was the 1997 NHRA "Road To the Future" award winner and joins an elite list of drivers who have won national events in both Top Fuel and Funny Car. He is only one of two drivers who have won the $100,000 Budweiser Shootout in Indianapolis back-to-back and was the first driver to eclipse the 315 mph mark in a Funny Car.

Of course, Prudhomme's accomplishments in professional drag racing are of legend. He was voted No. 3 on the list of the NHRA's 50 Greatest Drivers and, along with being the first driver in history to win four consecutive Funny Car championships (1975 to 1978), has won the U.S Nationals seven times. He won 49 national events as a driver in both Top Fuel and Funny Car and was the first Funny Car driver to run in the 5's. He was also the first to run over 250 mph in F/C.

Perhaps the greatest indication of his tremendous influence and importance to the sport is the award which is given annually to the individual who has made a profound impact on the growth and positive image of NHRA Drag Racing. It bears his name, "The Don Prudhomme Award."

With an enormous amount of experience, skill, and dedication, Snake Racing has truly become one of the premier racing teams in the NHRA, if not in all of motorsports. Dixon's 2nd quarter Driver of the Year award, based on balloting cast by both racing journalists and fans, was impressive in that he out-tallied NASCAR wunderkind Jimmie Johnson and IRL superstar and two-time Indy 500 winner Helio Castroneves.

As 1995's NHRA Rookie of the Year and the current frontrunner for the 2002 NHRA POWERade Top Fuel Championship, Dixon has already shown that he is right at home in an organization which is built upon personal achievement.