Andrew Hines will have a wonderful story to tell son Declan one of these days.
 
Declan joined brother Rion with his birth during the break between Hines’ victory at Denver and his No. 1 qualifying position at Brainerd.
 
“It’s a great way to bring our new baby boy into the world, winning the Denver race right before he’s born, qualifying No. 1 right after he’s born,” Hines said after recording his first top spot of the season but 27th of his career.
 
The Screamin’ Eagle Vance & Hines Harley-Davidson rider used a track-record 6.915 elapsed time to erase Hector Arana’s year-old 6.944. It also cemented his No. 1 spot, improving his own performance by six-hundredths of a second. He was the provisional No, 1 qualifier Friday.
 
But Saturday afternoon’s speed - an eye-opening 193.40 mph - woke up even Hines.

Jeff Arend and the Kalitta Motorsports Funny Car team pulled out all of the stops headed into this weekend’s NHRA Lucas Oil Nationals in Brainerd, Minn.

Arend, along with brothers Cruz and Tony Pedregon, all have mathematical chances of qualifying for the NHRA’s Countdown to 1. Only one will leave this weekend’s event with the berth.

The Kalitta Motorsports team wants the spot so bad they were willing to make wholesale changes to the car following the Summit Raceway Park Night Under Fire match race event two weeks ago.

“We made the decision to front half the car after the event,” said Arend, who ran a pair of 4.19 elapsed times before smoking the tires twice. “The car had a lot of runs on it. We brought it to [chassis builder] Murf [McKinney] on Tuesday and it was ready to go by Friday.”

Ashley Force Hood heads into Sunday’s final eliminations as the No. 1 seed in the Funny Car division. Her Friday night provisional No. 1 qualifying pass of 4.102 seconds stood throughout a warmer second day of qualifying at the NHRA Lucas Oil Nationals in Brainerd, Minn.

Force Hood, who won last season’s final event of the regular season in Indianapolis, was looking at an even brighter side of her good fortunes headed into Sunday.

“We don’t have to run any of our teammates in the first round,” said Force Hood, who claimed eight of the nine available bonus qualifying points. “That is a different way to start the race. It seems like almost every race this season we have raced either my dad (John Force), Robert (Hight) or (Tim) Wilkerson in the first round. I don’t know who I have but I don’t have a teammate and that is all that matters. We are just going to go up there and try to go some rounds.”

Surging Top Fuel driver Doug Kalitta earned his second No. 1 in the last four races Saturday at the 29th annual Lucas Oil NHRA Nationals at Brainerd International Raceway.

The other No. 1 qualifiers at the 17th of 23 events in the NHRA Full Throttle Series season – and final race in the Countdown to 10 regular season – were Ashley Force Hood (Funny Car), Mike Edwards (Pro Stock) and Andrew Hines (Pro Stock Motorcycle).

Also on Saturday, Top Fuel driver Steve Torrence, Pro Stock driver Johnny Gray and Pro Stock Motorcycle riders Eddie Krawiec, LE Tonglet and David Hope secured their berths in the Countdown to 1. That leaves only five positions left to be decided on the final Sunday of the Countdown to 10 regular season – one each in Top Fuel, Funny Car and Pro Stock and two in Pro Stock Motorcycle.

American drag racer Melanie Troxel had a busy Saturday at the 25th annual FIA Nitrolympx at the historic Hockenheimring, qualifying No. 1 in Pro Mod with a track-record pass and cruising to a first-round victory over Robert Joosten.

"It's nice to know the car can go down the track and consistently run a good number," Troxel said. "We're excited about the handle we have on the race car, and I'm real comfortable in it. We're ready to go for Sunday."

Troxel blazed past Joosten in their elimination matchup with a run of 6.045 seconds at 241.14 mph, which tied the ET record she had set earlier in the day. Joosten had problems off the start and crossed the center line at half track, resulting in a disqualification.

When Kurt Johnson races this weekend in his native Land of 1000 Lakes, he won't be driving a Chevy to the levy.

That Cobalt, that aero package, was designed back in 2005, and the GXP was new in 2008. So you know, it’s time to step up a little bit,” Johnson said Friday as he took aim at the 10th Pro Stock spot in the standings in his final weekend to become part of the Countdown.

Andrew Hines finds it hard to believe he’s on the cusp of his first pole position of the 2010 NHRA Full Throttle Series tour. His 6.977 elapsed time at 191.46, if it holds through Saturday’s qualifications at the NHRA Lucas Oil Nationals in Brainerd, Minn., will indeed mark the first time he’s been the No. 1 seed headed into race day.
 
“It has been a while,” Hines admitted. “I don’t think I’ve had a number one since St. Louis last year. Everybody’s tough out here. The Suzuki’s are tough out here. Hector [Arana] has been showing us all how to do it out here. It’s nice to have a provisional out here on Friday and hopefully it will stick. We have a couple of things up our sleeves and we might be able to pick up a bit. I’m proud of our team. We did a lot of hard work. It’s paying off.”
 
The hard work for the Screamin’ Eagle Vance & Hines team included an extensive tear down and rebuild of the team’s V-Rod engines prior to this weekend’s final event of the regular season.

A week or two ago, Ashley Force Hood was perturbed, saying she and her Castrol GTX Ford Mustang team “for some reason . . . are just having a crappy year.”

But it’s looking happy, not crappy, right now at Brainerd International Raceway.

Already in the Countdown field with the No. 8 berth and a chance to leapfrog both No. 6 Tim Wilkerson and No. 7 Bob Tasca, Force Hood took the provisional top qualifying position Friday for the Lucas Oil Nationals.