John Force didn’t do much celebrating in the days following his NHRA Winternationals victory last weekend in Pomona, Ca. Instead, the 14-time champion took the few remaining crew members still in Yorba Linda, Ca, out to a celebratory dinner. Many of their co-workers had already headed to Firebird Raceway for this weekend’s NHRA Arizona Nationals outside of Phoenix.

As the group dined, offering up a toast or two, a new crewman showed his confidence saying, “We can win Phoenix.”

Vinnie Deceglie admitted before he had the opportunity to react to his errant Pro Stocker, he was already on his roof. In almost a carbon copy of Gordie Rivera’s Friday afternoon crash, Deceglie lost control at about the 1,000 foot mark, the car flipped over on its roof and slid to a halt in the shutdown area in flames.

“It just happened so fast,” said Deceglie, who extracted himself from the car in the midst of the engine fire. “I didn’t even know what was going on.”

For Deceglie, this particular run was no different from the average run until he reached the 1,000 foot mark.

John Force continued to show that he’s back to his old form Saturday at the NHRA Arizona Nationals as the 14-time NHRA Funny Car world champion raced to his first No. 1 qualifying position in more than two years.

Tony Schumacher (Top Fuel) and Mike Edwards (Pro Stock) also earned No. 1 positions in their respective categories at the NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series event. Due to rainy weather conditions throughout the day, NHRA officials were forced to cancel one of the two scheduled qualifying sessions.

The 60-year-old Force sped to a 4.063-second run at 308.78 mph in his Castrol GTX High-Mileage Ford Mustang to claim his 132nd No. 1 of his career, seventh at Firebird International Raceway and his first since Sept. 2006. He will meet arch-rival Cruz Pedregon, a two-time series champ, in the opening round of Sunday’s 11 a.m. (MT) eliminations.

Sunday's first-round pairings for professional eliminations at the 26th annual NHRA Arizona Nationals at Firebird International Raceway, the second of 23 events in the NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series.  Pairings based on results in qualifying, which ended Saturday. DNQs listed below pairings.

Alan Johnson, owner of Alan Johnson Performance Engineering, issued the following statement regarding the current NHRA investigation of AJPE Superchargers provided to NHRA teams during last weekend's NHRA event in Pomona, Ca., and this weekend in Chandler Az:

“All Alan Johnson Performance Engineering parts are manufactured to meet NHRA specifications. NHRA is currently examining an AJPE Supercharger that was used by six teams in Pomona (Calif.) last weekend. Four of the six teams used the same supercharger during the 2009 NHRA Full Throttle Drag season, including the Al-Anabi Racing Top Fuel team."

A second fiery explosion in as many 2010 events was enough cause for NHRA officials to disqualify Funny Car racer Terry Haddock from the NHRA Arizona Nationals.

Sitting in his cozy new motorcoach at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway three weeks ago, Roger Brogdon was smiling, despite some minor grumbling. It must have been one of those sly types of grins.

The Pro Stock Showdown at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway was quickly turning into a veritable waste of time and resources. Or at least it was the picture Brogdon was painting.

“Nothing impressive,” said Brogdon of his first two days of testing and qualifying in Vegas. “We had to abort two out of four runs, we chipped a tire so bad. Track's not that good, matter of fact it's terrible. They sprayed it one time this morning and haven't done nothing to it all day long. The two runs we did make it down, my car spins from the time I go to third gear to the finish line. So it's nothing to write home about.”

Jim Head almost made a big mistake at the Racer’s for Christ chapel service last weekend in Pomona. The parishioner seated in front of him wore a jacket which he deemed offensive. The average person wouldn’t have been bothered.

Head’s internal anger made him see the display of First Amendment right as more than he could handle.

Head is very glad today that he didn’t throw in his two-cents worth.

So what did the jacket advertise that was so offensive to the Funny Car driver?

Top Fuel Doug Kalitta wondered if the NHRA still held press conferences after qualifying. Friday night in Phoenix, his questions were answered.

For the drag racing veteran, the last time he’d been to one was in November 2006, when he qualified on the pole for the NHRA Finals in Pomona, Ca. This weekend, he has the quickest Top Fuel dragster at Phoenix with a 3.825, 317.05.

Admittedly, Kalitta and his crew, led by Jim Oberhofer, have stumbled on to something that is working. Based on their runner-up finish last weekend in the season-opening Winternationals, it’s working well.

When the NHRA announced Thursday evening the temporary suspension of mandatory use of the Electrimotion Shutoff Receiver, Ron Capps was pleased.

While not the only driver to experience issues with the device, Capps, driver of the NAPA Dodge, was one of the more vocal after suffering damage to not one, but two, blowers.

The system is not being used on the NAPA Dodge this weekend. In between first and second round qualifying the California native took the time to describe his experience with the device at Pomona.