It was almost like magic. Frank Gugliotta, a close friend of Justin Humphreys and his parents, accompanied their RaceRedi Motorsports Pro Stock team to Commerce, Ga., to provide chassis tuning advice in the NHRA national event.

He did, and the Pontiac GXP responded better than it ever had.  Humphreys turned in four solid qualifying runs at Atlanta Dragway and qualified third.  And then he tacked on three more good runs during Sunday’s eliminations en route to a semifinal finish – his best outing of the season.   He was so pleased that a minus .003-second red-light start in the semifinals against Jason Line didn’t alter his mood.

It was almost like magic. Frank Gugliotta, a close friend of Justin Humphreys and his parents, accompanied their RaceRedi Motorsports Pro Stock team to Commerce, Ga., to provide chassis tuning advice in the NHRA national event.

He did, and the Pontiac GXP responded better than it ever had.  Humphreys turned in four solid qualifying runs at Atlanta Dragway and qualified third.  And then he tacked on three more good runs during Sunday’s eliminations en route to a semifinal finish – his best outing of the season.   He was so pleased that a minus .003-second red-light start in the semifinals against Jason Line didn’t alter his mood.

“The car was awesome all weekend,” said a smiling Humphreys.  “We’ve now made nine good back-to-back runs. The credit goes to Frank and Bob Glidden.  Bob decided to leave the team after the Las Vegas race and Frank stepped in to help out. He drives a Ford Mustang at IHRA races.”

Humphreys, who climbed into ninth place in NHRA POWERade Series points with 276, on the strength of a semi-final finish.