Alcohol Funny Car Battle at Division 2 Points Meet
by Marvin T. SmithMarvin T. Smith PhotosIt was an alcohol funny car war this weekend at the NHRA Division 2 Points meet at South Georgia Motorsports Park. Three of the top ten cars from last year showed up to battle with four others for the valuable Lucas Oil points and cash. Coming into the event, the track record for Alcohol FC was held by Mick Snyder in his Torco sponsored car at 5.706 251.81 mph set
last month at the Eastern Spring Test Nationals. That record was repeatedly broken during the points meet this weekend.
Snyder, who finished No. 5 in NHRA points last year was on hand to defend his record and go for the win. His major opposition was NHRA World Champion Bob Newberry and number 10 in the final NHRA points Mark Billington. Also ready to contest the event if the big hitters slipped was
Bill Naves, William Fulford, Melinda Green-King, and John Sullivan in the popular Crazy Horse FC.
The Sunday one shot qualifying (Saturday was rained out) was led by Mick Snyder who lowered his track elapsed time record to 5.683 at another 251 mph speed. World Champ Newberry ran a tire shaking 6.18 249. Snyder received the round one bye in the seven car field by virtue of his number one spot, and ran a good 5.70 at 251. Newberry ran a 5.706 252 to beat both the track mph record and Mark Billington. But wait, Billington ran a fine 253.99 in his losing effort to reset the track mph record. Naves beat Fulford with a 6.29. Melinda Green-King ran a 6.03 236 to beat John Sullivan's 6.05 244.65 in a great match-up to finish out the round.
In Round two, Newberry Stepped up and ran a sensational new track record 5.632 at 258.27 to beat a broken Naves. Snyder ran a consistent 5.72 254.38 to beat a fouling Melinda Green-King to set up the big final. In the final, favored Newberry slipped to a 5.871 254.18 to lose to Mick
Snyder's 5.836 at 235.19 mph. So Snyder took the points and money while Newberry had to settle for the new track record.
Kurt Johnson Scores a Big Win in Las Vegas
Contact: Jon G. Knapp
TMG Sports Marketing
Las Vegas, Nev., April 9, 2006 - Kurt Johnson and the ACDelco Cobalt Racing team scored an exciting and important victory on Sunday, taking home the Pro Stock title at the Summitracing.com NHRA Nationals in Las Vegas, NV. Starting from the sixth position, Johnson defeated Mike Edwards, Erica Enders and Jason Line in the early rounds before facing David Connolly in the final.
Although his opponent was able to gain a slight advantage at the start, in the most tightly contested race of the day Johnson was able to chase himdown, with his 6.842-second, 202.42 mph pass crossing the line just three thousandths of a second ahead of Connolly. It was Johnson's first win of the 2006 season, 33rd of his career, second at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway; and allowed him to climb back into contention in POWERade championship chase.
"After we both had really good lights in the semis, I knew the kid (Connolly) would be hot in the final," said Johnson. "In fact, I thought there was a good possibility that one of us would go red, so we actually backed the clutch off a little bit. He did a great job, but fortunately I had a pretty good light, our ACDelco Cobalt made another great run, and we made to the finish line first.
"This was a tremendous day for the entire crew, including Kevin Horst, Justin Belfance, Mike Smith, Dad (six-time Pro Stock champion Warren Johnson) and his GM Performance Parts team, as well as everyone back at the shop. This was a total team effort.
"To come to Las Vegas for the last two races and win both times is an awesome feeling. We used the recipe from the ACDelco Nationals last fall, and it paid off. That information allowed us to make the right tuning decisions and get back on a winning track."
Johnson's well-documented struggles from earlier in the season seemed a distant memory on Sunday, as his car was one of the quickest and fastest throughout eliminations. In the first round against Edwards, who won the most recent national event in Houston just one week ago, KJ posted an impressive 6.817-second, 202.85 mph pass to claim his first elimination round win of the year. In the second round, KJ was again on his game, using a .027 reaction time and a 6.823-second, 202.33 mph run to eliminate Enders, who had qualified third and run well in the early part of the season.
The final stop between Johnson and his 62nd career final round was rival Jason Line. Using his best reaction time of the day at .019, the second-generation racer left the line almost three hundredths of a second ahead of his opponent, using a solid 6.864 second, 201.94 mph pass to defeat Line's slightly quicker 6.862-second, 202.00 mph run, setting the stage for his encounter with Connolly.
"We ran pretty well in qualifying, but the way things had been going so far this year, I was just glad the car started for the first round against Edwards," joked Johnson. "It's no secret that we had been struggling, but we knew what we had in this ACDelco Cobalt, and were confident that it was only a matter of time before we turned things around.
"We started to shows signs of life in Houston, but had an issue in the first round. We knew we needed to be ready to race this weekend, so we stayed an extra day and tested, with the information we gathered there playing a big role in our success today.
"We're proud of extending our streak of winning at least one race a season to twelve consecutive years, and that we were able to do it early in the season. It was a great win for the ACDelco Cobalt crew today, and awesome for Pro Stock to have five winners in the first five races. Today was fun, but now it's extremely important that we keep that positive momentum going for the rest of the year."
MELANIE TROXEL MAKES HISTORY IN LAS VEGAS, WINS SECOND TITLE OF YEAR
DON SCHUMACHER RACING
Contact: Judy Stropus
LAS VEGAS (April 9, 2006) - Melanie Troxel continued her incredible streak of final-round appearances today at the NHRA SummitRacing.com Nationals at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, by making it into her sixth straight final round, fifth of the season, and winning her second Top Fuel event of the year and her career.
Troxel became the first Top Fuel driver in NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series history to reach the final round in five consecutive events at the start of a season. She is also just one final round short of matching her teammate Tony Schumacher's record of seven straight final-round appearances.
And the list goes on for Don Schumacher Racing: A DSR Top Fuel team (and there are only two) has been to 12 consecutive final rounds, dating back to Tony Schumacher's five finals at the end of 2005, to Troxel's five straight in 2006.
Troxel now leads Dave Grubnic by 156 points in the Top Fuel standings.
Troxel's victory over Grubnic in the final did not come easy, however, as a failed cylinder dropped her winning elapsed time to 4.837 seconds at 285.65 mph, while Grubnic lost traction to finish with a 4.987/319.60.
En route to her triumph, the Colorado native put together another set of consistent passes, first dismissing David Baca with a 4.577/328.14, then Morgan Lucas with a 4.542/323.12 and, in the semifinal, her 4.547/327.35 easily took care of Doug Kalitta.
"I just can't believe that we are going to this many final rounds," she said in the winner's circle. "It feels like a dream; it is just so incredible.
"You feel like you're being a little greedy by being so disappointed when you don't get the win," she said of "only" her second win in six finals. "We just wanted one more to go with that first win. Not that we needed to prove to anybody that it wasn't a fluke, but just one win is not enough. You want to be a multiple-event champion.
"I don't think we've quite been flawless," she added. "We struggled at times to qualify, we lost 25 points in Phoenix for oildowns, so we've had our problems, but when the chips are down the Skull Gear guys make it happen. It's a rare occurrence when we smoke the tires anymore.
"We thought that we would come out and win races this year, but to go to this many straight final rounds even when you're dominating - which I'm not sure we are - but even when you're dominating that's hard to do. It just seems right now like we can do no wrong.
"It's also a lot about the incredible group of people we have working on our team. Richard Hogan adapts to whatever race conditions are out there - cool weather, hot track. It doesn't seem to bother him any and my guys are just doing a great job of getting that car back together consistently without any mistakes, any errors, every pass we go up there.
"I keep waiting to wake up from this. Each week you think, OK, we can't keep this string going, and that has nothing to do with my confidence in the team. No matter how good you are, it's unlikely that you'll keep doing this. We keep thinking, All right, we're not going to be disappointed when this string ends and it surprises us as much as anybody every time we end up in the final.
"We've just got a great group of guys over here. Don Schumacher gives us incredible resources to work from. He gives you everything you need to get the job done, and it motivates you to go out and do well. Especially being teammates with the U.S. Army team. They definitely set the standard high. Last year we worked really hard trying to live up to that and we have finally seen that pay off this season."
On the final round: "Not every round is going to be picture perfect. It was a little ugly, but it was a win. Even at that, we dropped a cylinder, but we didn't go out and smoke the tires on any single pass today and I think you're going to have those fluke deals happen here and there with the tune-up. It wasn't running real well down there and blew up just past the finish line."
"It's been an unbelievable ride," said team owner Don Schumacher, "for all 12 of those (consecutive DSR final rounds) - and some of those were double-ups when Melanie was runner-up to Tony in the final. It's just been an incredible operation that this team, which includes the Army team and the Skull Gear team, has put together. They share a lot of information and they
run a lot of the same parts, and I'm really thankful to Alan Johnson who has created this for me."
Next up is the O'Reilly NHRA Thunder Valley Nationals at Bristol (Tenn.) Dragway, April 28-30.
TOP FUEL POINT STANDINGS:
1. Melanie Troxel, 483
2. Dave Grubnic, 327
3. Larry Dixon, 297
4. Brandon Bernstein, 289
5. Morgan Lucas, 281
6. Doug Kalitta, 273
7. Rod Fuller, 268
8. Doug Herbert, 263
9. Tony Schumacher, 247
10. Cory McClenathan, 226
BAZEMORE GAINS GROUND, GOES TO SEMIS IN VEGAS
DON SCHUMACHER RACING
Contact: Judy Stropus
LAS VEGAS (April 9, 2006) - Whit Bazemore and the Matco Tools Iron Eagle Dodge Charger Funny Car team are getting their groove back after making it into the semifinal round of the NHRA SummitRacing.com Nationals at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway today, defeating 13-time Funny Car champion John Force along the way.
The defending event champion, who qualified No. 10, first disposed of Phil Burkart Jr. with a 4.833-second elapsed time at 321.73 mph, then ousted Force in the quarterfinal by a close margin of six feet (.0132 of a second), posting a 4.832/324.36 versus Force's losing 4.839/323.58.
The semifinal round saw Bazemore square off against his Don Schumacher Racing teammate Ron Capps. Bazemore had the luxury of lane choice, but a loss of traction following a solid .069 (of a second) reaction time (.070 for Capps) determined the outcome, as Capps took the win with a 4.888/317.05 to Bazemore's 4.969/300.40.
Capps went on to earn runner-up in the final round to Cruz Pedregon today.
"The thing we're happy about," said Bazemore, "is when you go back to yesterday afternoon, when in the last qualifying session we ran a 4.79, and you put that with the two runs we made today that were good, that's three good, strong runs in a row, where the car responded to Brian (Corradi, crew chief) and Todd's (Okuhara, assistant crew chief) input.
"The Matco Tools Dodge is starting to show a little bit of consistency and a little bit of tunability. When it goes down the track it generally has run pretty quickly. The problem has been that it's been so inconsistent and so hard to tune for Brian and Todd, that it just wouldn't ever repeat.
"I feel we made tremendous headway this weekend on the consistency issue and the car responded to their input and doing what they wanted it to do, and that's key.
"I'm excited that we ran a bunch of runs in a row that were competitive. We won two rounds. Unfortunately, we dropped a cylinder against Capps in the semis; otherwise we would have looked pretty strong there. That's what's frustrating.
"We have a race in two weeks. We're going to go through our stuff and it's all good."
On his win against Force: "Everyone in this class is tough," said Bazemore. "What's important is when you're fighting for a championship and you're running against the guy that you're fighting with, that's when you pay attention to who is in the other lane. Other times, it's just another guy to race."
Bazemore moved into 10th in the Funny Car point standings.
Next up is the O'Reilly NHRA Thunder Valley Nationals at Bristol (Tenn.) Dragway, April 28-30.
FUNNY CAR POINTS:
1. Ron Capps, 489
2. John Force, 384
3. Tommy Johnson Jr., 288
4. Robert Hight, 286
5. Cruz Pedregon, 284
6. Phil Burkart Jr., 282
7. Eric Medlen, 276
8. Del Worsham, 269
9. Bob Gilbertson, 236
10. Whit Bazemore, 207
SGMP's NHRA Division 2 Lucas Oil Drag Racing Series Goes to Allen, Snyder, Butner, Nelson, Puzycki, Strickland, Kenny, Hughes and Davis.
Troxel, Cruz and KJ Win the NHRA POWERade SummitRacing.com Nationals
VANDERGRIFF STARTS IN No. 14 POSITION
LAS VEGAS, Nev. (April 8)- Bob Vandergriff Jr. will take his UPS Top Fuel dragster to the starting line on Sunday morning to meet the Houston event champion Brandon Bernstein in the opening round of this weekends NHRA Summitracing.com Nationals at the Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. The UPS team posted a qualifying best run of 4.608 seconds at 326.16 mph to land in the No. 14 spot. The high altitude desert air of Las Vegas has not been kind to the Jim Dupuy-tuned racecar on Saturday's qualifying attempts. The engine dropped a cylinder early on the first run, torching a head gasket and ultimately destroying the engine. The team came back after dropping in a new bullet for the last session, only to push the rods out as Vandergriff got to the stripe.
"We'll be ready for Sunday morning," Vandergriff said. "It's part of our growing pains and the challenges of the new tire. We're on the right track. Jim (Dupuy) has the car ready to do battle."
Ken Sklute
Vandergriff Motorsports Public Relations
www.RacersEdgePhotography.com
WJ Sets Top Speed Mark, Qualifies Second in Las Vegas
Contact: Jon Knapp
TMG Sports Marketing, Inc.
Warren Johnson found the right combination to tame the tricky surface at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway on Saturday, and, as a result, his GM Performance Parts GTO made the quickest and fastest Pro Stock run of the day. Running in the left hand lane, Johnson powered through the quarter-mile in 6.790 seconds with a track record top speed of 203.49 mph, claiming the second starting position for Sunday's final eliminations of the Summitracing.com Nationals in Las Vegas, NV.
"This morning we went back over our notes, as we always do, and looked at what has been effective in the past, paying particular attention to what we did when we tested here in late January. Back then, we had made some unusual changes, things we had never done before at this facility.
"We took than direction again this morning, making the necessary corrections based on the different track and weather conditions, as well as some changes based on what we did in Pomona, sewing it all together, and coming up with a set-up that our GM Performance Parts GTO responded quite well to.
"Knowing that no one would improve on our time in the afternoon session due to the heat, we tried to find out what we couldn't get away with tomorrow, because the conditions will be similar if not worse. As a result, we were able to obtain some valuable information that we hope to put to good use tomorrow. Heading into Sunday, I would say we are as confident as we were before the last race we won."
KJ Will Roll Off Sixth in Las Vegas
Contact: Jon Knapp
TMG Sports Marketing, Inc.
On the strength of a 6.795-second, 203.34 mph pass made on his third attempt, Kurt Johnson qualified his ACDelco Cobalt sixth for Sunday's final eliminations of the Summitracing.com NHRA Nationals in Las Vegas, NV. After a solid effort on Friday, which saw Johnson post two of the quickest elapsed times, the second-generation racer completed another strong qualifying effort on Saturday by showing the consistency necessary to contend on race day.
"Our ACDelco Cobalt has been good so far this weekend. It's been strong in low gear, second gear, third gear, going down the track on every run. In addition, I've been pretty good on the tree, so there isn't any reason we can't win this race tomorrow.
"After making three good runs, we tried a different engine combination for the last session, and the only thing that upset me about it was that the car went left, so it really wasn't a valid test run. However, we'll put our known combination back in for tomorrow, which is based on what we won with last October, and make a few adjustments for the conditions. I'd like to pick it up a little more in the first 60 feet, but so far we're pretty pleased, and feel we're definitely in the hunt."
BAZEMORE TAKES NO. 10 IN VEGAS QUALIFYING
DON SCHUMACHER RACING
Contact: Judy Stropus
LAS VEGAS (April 8, 2006) - Whit Bazemore posted the second quickest elapsed time of the final qualifying round today for the NHRA SummitRacing.com Nationals at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway to place the Matco Tools Iron Eagle Dodge Charger R/T Funny Car solidly in No. 10.
Defending event champion Bazemore and crew chief Brian Corradi know they have more work ahead of them to bring the Matco Tools Dodge back as a top contender, but are pleased with this weekend's results so far, especially the 4.799/327.19 on the last lap.
His other strong pass came in the Friday night session, when he delivered a 4.812-second pass at 327.03 mph. The two remaining rounds, in the heat of the day, produced a 15.422/76.73 (loss of traction at the hit of the throttle) and a 13.248/73.86.
"It's good," he said of the final pass. "We're still battling a consistency issue over here. Todd (Okuhara, assistant crew chief) and Brian are working extremely hard, as is the whole Matco Tools Dodge team. The attitude of the team is pretty amazing considering the struggles we had and the expectations that we we put on ourselves and the fact that we haven't met those at all.
"Everyone is fired up and really set on kill. We're here to annihilate our competition the best way we can, and we're working hard to get ourselves to where we can do that.
"I don't feel like we're really quite there yet, but, when it goes down the track, the Matco Tools Dodge runs really quickly normally, and it's a good-running race car. The thing that we're working on is trying to get it to go down the race track often, and we're making progress there.
"I think we are starting to turn the corner."
Bazemore faces Phil Burkart Jr. in first round of eliminations on Sunday.
