BARBEGALLO DRIVES TO PROVISIONAL NO. 1 AT AUSSIE WINTERNATS

John Barnegallo showed no ill-effects of taking a year off.

The engine builder from Queensland, during Friday Pro Stock qualifying at the FUCH’s ANDRA Winternationals, showed no rust in his driving abilities as he claimed the provisional No. 1 qualifying position.

Barnegallo came out of the box swinging with a 7.018, 195.11 run, which put him .029 ahead of Peter Ridgeway, the current world elapsed time record holder. For his part, Ridgeway missed establishing the speed world record with a 195.19 mile per hour speed. The current record is 195.22.

“This feels good, everything went pretty good today,” said Barnegallo. “This was my first pass in a long time. My last race was the Winternationals last year. I needed to take a year off because I had a lot of customers and not enough time to get the work done.”

Barnegallo used his time wisely, using the break from following the ANDRA tour to expand his search for horsepower. The result showed during Friday’s lone session.

“The air here (900-feet above sea level) is a lot better than we had back at home on the dyno – it’s usually 2500 above sea level,” Barnegallo explained. “This was really good for us tonight.”

Barnegallo was the best of a number of performances in the first session with Dennis Whiting (7.042, 190.22), Dave Newcombe (7.050, 193.79), Aeron Tremayne (7.066, 194.04), Michael Ali (7.079, 193.79) And Lee Bektash (7.091, 193.16) rounded out a plethora of 7.0-second passes.

Barnegallo was confident on Friday evening that his top qualifying run would hold through Saturday’s two sessions.

“We have more … had a few things go wrong and I clicked the car early,” said Barnegallo. “It might go a 7.00, but would be really good if I could go a 6.99 so [my friend] Peter Ridgeway wouldn’t be gloating all of the time.”

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