Terry Haddock has good reason to wonder just how conservative he is going to have to be to keep NHRA officials happy. Once he figures it out, then he’ll be able to better describe the manner in which plans to race this weekend at the NHRA Springnationals at Houston Raceway Park.

Haddock suffered two catastrophic engine explosions in the first two events this season forcing NHRA officials to banish him from the series with the added requirement of clean testing passes in a supervised environment before he could return. On the same weekend of the NHRA’s 4-Wide Nationals, the veteran independent nitro racer made six consecutive clean passes ranging from a 4.22 elapsed time to 4.32.

At $5,000 per run, Haddock has paid his tribute to the NHRA for a return.

Terry Haddock has good reason to wonder just how conservative he is going to have to be to keep NHRA officials happy. Once he figures it out, then he’ll be able to better describe the manner in which plans to race this weekend at the NHRA Springnationals at Houston Raceway Park.

Haddock suffered two catastrophic engine explosions in the first two events this season forcing NHRA officials to banish him from the series with the added requirement of clean testing passes in a supervised environment before he could return. On the same weekend of the NHRA’s 4-Wide Nationals, the veteran independent nitro racer made six consecutive clean passes ranging from a 4.22 elapsed time to 4.32.

At $5,000 per run, Haddock has paid his tribute to the NHRA for a return.

“We’re back out here for now and hopefully we’ll do our best to stay out here,” said Haddock. “It was nice of the Houston Raceway Park family to let us come down here and test on a bracket weekend. We understand that this is their [NHRA’s] playground, so we have to do our best to make sure nothing stupid happens, so we can come back racing (past this weekend).”

Haddock wouldn’t say he returned to the basics to find where he got lost considering his test session was conducted in conditions diametrically opposite to what he’d see at an NHRA event.

“We had the car backed down for bracket racing conditions … it was backed down to go down the track,” Haddock said. “It wasn’t fast but it went down the track. Everyone seems to forget the last run this car made was a 3.95 elapsed time at 300 miles per hour.”

The testing behind him, Haddock admits, he’s still unsure where his team went wrong.

“I don’t know if the issue was with the car or me because of the stuff with the Funny Car,” Haddock said. “The dragster has run well since the first time we brought it out here. Last year it made 66 clean runs and 4 bad ones. If you look at the overall picture, it’s not so bad. I am going to do what it takes to keep the NHRA happy.”

Haddock knows what’s on the line this weekend.

“I guess I am on triple-secret, big quadruple – don’t do anything stupid probation,” Haddock admitted. “I’m on like scared-to-death to step on the throttle probation. This is how we make a living and when we can’t come to the races, we can’t eat.”

That’s why Haddock isn’t gambling on the first day of qualifying.

“The first run, I plan to run 300 – 400 feet to make everyone happy,” Haddock said. “Tonight we will try to step it up if everything looks good. I have to be careful because this is how I take care of my family.”