Meents took home his second Double Down trophy of this season last Saturday night when he drove Maximum Destruction to the racing and freestyle victories in front of a standing room only crowd in Houston's Reliant Stadium. The Double Down trophy, named for the ultimate Monster Jam fan experience at the World Finals in Las Vegas, can only be won when the same driver sweeps both the racing and freestyle at a Speed televised Monster Jam. Meents also won a Double Down trophy in the season opening event in Minneapolis. No other driver has won a Double Down award.

For the record Meents has piloted Maximum Destruction in five venues where the Speed TV cameras have been on hand for the new season of televised Monster Jam events. In racing he has won three of the five events, and he has been the fast qualifier in three of those racing events. Breaking the racing down even further and looking at the results round by round Meents has won 12 rounds of racing on Speed this season and has lost only once, when Pablo Huffaker drove his Grave Digger to victory over Max D in the first round of racing at Detroit's Ford Field. The only driver even close to Meents' near perfect racng record this season is Tony Farrell, who has powered his Blue Thunder Ford to an 8 and 3 record at this year's Speed shows. Of all the competitors who have been in more than one televised Monster Jam this season the only drivers with less than two defeats are Meents and John Seasock who has only been beaten once on TV this campaign driving Batman. And that one loss came to Meents in the first Houston stop of 2007.

Tom has been even better in freestyle where he has outright won three of those five freestyles and finished tied for the top score in a fourth. The only televised freestyle where he has been out pointed was back in the first weekend of January during the first trip to Houston this season where he finished second, two points behind Adam Anderson in Grave Digger. One of the biggest factors in Meents' current roll is the consistency of the equipment. Driving a truck that is an amazing 8 years old Tom and his crew have kept Maximum Destruction running at peak performance for the mostpart this season, and even when mechanical issues crop up he's been able to overcome them. His winning freestyle in the most recent Houston battle was accomplished with thick white smoke pouring out of the truck when he actually broke the oil filter off the truck halfway through the performance, yet Meents continued on and filled the clock in spectacular fashion to gain the Reliant Stadium triumph.

2Xtreme racing again had it's full line-up competing in Houston, Dawn Creten's brand new Scarlet Bandit was in action along with husband Jimmy's Bounty Hunter and Linsey Weenk's Iron Outlaw. Bounty Hunter made it to the racing finals against Maximum Destruction but in the final turn of the championship race the transmission broke. The team was able to make the tranny change in time to get the 2005 World Champion out for freestyle, and like his teammates did before him, Creten turned in an excellent run and finished in a three-way tie for third with Weenk and T-Maxx driver Carl Van Horn.

Jimmy told me that from the team perspective his priority is to help get Outlaw and Scarlet into the World Finals field. As a former freestyle champ and a driver who has put his Bounty Hunter into the final four of the World Finals racing bracket for a record five consecutive years, and made it to the championship round three times, it would seem to be a foregone conclusion that Bounty will be among the 24 trucks earning a berth in WF8. Creten's focus now is to help his teammates make the field as well, but they have to earn it on the track. Jimmy proved that point when he eliminated Linsey from the racing bracket in the Houston semifinals.

Not only did Allen Pezo bring his new truck, Pouncer, driven by Dale Mitchell, to Houston, the veteran of more than two decades in a monster also brought out a Predator that's brand new. Both trucks look great and were big hits at the huge Reliant Stadium "Built Ford Tough Party in the Pits". So were the Texas based trucks King Krunch and El Matador. No one takes more pride in their trucks apperance than David Smith and Daron Basl, and both machines have been running great in recent weeks.

Most of the sport's biggest stars step away from the stadium circuit this coming weekend to compete in some of the tradition rich arena events in major markets like New York and Philadelphia as well as Roanoke, VA, the home of major Monster Jam sponsor Advance Auto Parts. It's a great weekend for fans to live it live and see first hand how amazing today's trucks and drivers are in venues of almost any size.
BlackBerry service provided by Nextel