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SUNDAY NOTEBOOK

TOP FUEL

SCHUMACHER SHINES IN TOP FUEL DOMINATION

In winning Sunday’s 30th annual NHRA Nationals at Reading, Pa., Tony Schumacher and his U.S. Army Dragster accomplished a number of achievements.

Schumacher used a 4.440-second pass at 291.13 mph to Brittany Force’s 4.652, 269.13 in the Castrol EDGE Dragster on the 1,000-foot Maple Grove Raceway course that probably seemed much longer because they were battling traction trouble.

With that 77th overall victory in his 700th elimination-round victory, Schumacher extended his points lead to 134 points over the resurgent No. 2-ranked Doug Kalitta – the rival he defeated on a holeshot in the semifinal round.

He said that round was “massive.” He said, “I knew getting in the car that was the run. That is very possibly going to decide the championship at that moment. He goes out and wins the race he’s only 70 points behind me. Now he’s seven rounds. Huge difference. Not that it’s a sealed deal, but big moment.

“I’ve had a lot of big moments in my career, but that was top five in absolute must-haves, have-to-win, period,” Schumacher said. “That’s Kalitta, man. We battle. We will always have a rivalry.”

The victory was Schumacher’s third of the Countdown, fifth of the year, and fifth at Maple Grove Raceway. He broke the Top Fuel class’ hex on No. 1 qualifiers. And it gave him a nearly full seven-round cushion to work with at the upcoming Las Vegas race and the season finale two weeks after that at Pomona, Calif. – where Schumacher began the year in 12th place.

Force, as eager Sunday to salvage something for John Force Racing after its Funny Car first-round face-plant as she was to record her first Top Fuel victory, said she was proud of her fourth runner-up finish this season.

“I was so ready to take Tony down and thought we had it,” she said after losing her bid to become the eighth female to win a Top Fuel NHRA national event. “It was such a bummer when my win light didn’t come on. My car went out there and shook and smoked the tires, but I pedaled it and it did hook back up for a little while. But he was way ahead of me.

“I’m so proud of my entire team. This Castrol EDGE Dragster ran great, and we had an awesome weekend. The fact we made it to the finals shows we’ve turned our luck around as we’ve been struggling quite a bit but we’re ready to head to Vegas in few weeks and do it again,” Force said.

Force did defeat Schumacher once in their five meetings. And having improved her pedaling skills, she had a 50-50 chance of winning after they left the starting line almost simultaneously and both began to lose traction. But it turned out the seven-time series champion had been honing his pedaling prowess, too.

“As soon as that happened, I went, ‘No, no-no-no-no.’ Luckily, I don’t have the give-up attitude. I got back in it, I think twice, and finally got it to hook up a little bit. Been working on that a long time. For a long time, I could win pedaling contests when our cars didn’t have as much power. Now the cars make such ungodly power, and it takes more time. It takes more patience. And you’ve got to let it stop and settle down. That’s the first one of those I’ve won in a long time. I’ve been taking a beating. You’ve got to win those. You absolutely have to win a pedaling contest. You can’t let those get away from you.”

Schumacher said it might not be long before Force defeats him again.

She had announced before the final round, “I’m ready to take Tony down.” And she told him so after he won.

“I know,” he replied. “I hope I never race you in the finals, ever. Ultimately, at some point, you’re going to do that.”

Later he said, “She’s going to beat me. She will. But not today. Today we had to win. We said it coming in: If we just win the next three races – that’s not that hard, three races - then we’re the champs, and there’s nothing they can do about it.

“We started with this first one. Good lead. It’s not over, by any means, but I’d rather be in my shoes than anybody else’s in the world right now.”

But Sunday was Schumacher’s day.

It was U.S. Army Dragster crew chief Mike Green’s day. “Mike had one of his fantastic days of tuning,” his appreciative driver said. “I’m so proud of him.”

It was team owner Don Schumacher’s day. With Tony Schumacher’s Top Fuel victory and Matt Hagan’s Funny Car triumph moments before, Don Schumacher Racing became the NHRA’s most successful organization with 238 event titles. They include five from the elder Schumacher’s Funny Car days in the 1970s. And they give DSR one more than John Force Racing, DSR’s keen competitor and headquarters neighbor down the street at Brownsburg, Ind.

It was Ronald Clark’s day. He’s the Vietnam War veteran from Winchester, Va., who asked Schumacher to carry his Purple Heart on board the U.S. Army Dragster for that run.

It was even Brittany Force’s day to shine, as well.

And it was Doug Kalitta’s day to jump back into the championship mix and to back up Schumacher’s claim that the Mac Tools Dragster driver and his team “are worthy adversaries.”

With full grandstands at Maple Grove Raceway despite the uncommonly cold temperatures and compelling story twists in every class of competition, even the facility had a memorable victory.

Shawn Langdon

OUT EARLY - Shawn Langdon and Antron Brown, the Nos. 2- and 4-ranked drivers in the Top Fuel standings and the past two series champions, were first-round losers at Maple Grove Raceway. Both dropped in the standings as a result. Langdon is fourth, and Brown is fifth.

“It was a rough day for the Al-Anabi team,” Langdon said. “It was a tough way to go down. We had a problem with the car that we need to get sorted out. This is not the way we wanted to leave Reading. We had good weather all weekend, and the track was good. We’ve been really turning the corner with the Al-Anabi car lately, and we felt like we had a great shot. It just didn’t work out. We need to get things worked out before the last two races.”

REVERSES SLIDE – With his semifinal finish, Doug Kalitta reversed his downward spiral. The Mac Tools Dragster driver led the standings virtually all season long and was the so-called “regular-season champion.” But the first three races of the Countdown didn’t go his way and he entered this race in fifth place. Despite losing by four-thousandth of a second on a holeshot Sunday to eventual winner Tony Schumacher (3.739 seconds, 326.71 mph against Kalitta’s quicker and much faster 3.718, 329.91), Kalitta barged back into contention for his first championship . He vaulted from fifth to second in the standings.

LOTS OF 3.7S – The first five winners of the opening round posted 3.7-second elapsed times. Brittany Force, running nearly the entire 1,000-foot course with a cylinder out, was the only first-round Top Fuel winner not to clock a 3.7. She was the lone John Force Racing driver to advance to the quarterfinals.

FUNNY CAR

HAGAN TAKES FC POINTS LEAD WITH READING WIN - With two races left in the 2014 NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series season, Matt Hagan is now the front runner to win the nitro Funny Car world championship.

The veteran driver took the points lead, thanks to his victory at the NHRA Nationals at Reading, Pa., Sunday.

Hagan beat his Don Schumacher Racing teammate Tommy Johnson Jr. in the finals at Maple Grove Raceway.

Hagan clocked a 4.333-second time at 215.00 mph as his engine exploded just before the finish line. Johnson Jr. nearly crossed the center line early in his run and then tried to get back on the gas but couldn’t catch Hagan as he had a 5.456-second elapsed time.

“The point lead has changed and the points change,” said Hagan, who pilots the Mopar/Rocky Boots Charger. “We showed up here to win a race and get a Wally. The points change, these Wallys that you put on your shelf don’t. We set out what we wanted to do (Sunday morning) and that’s turn the ‘W’ on four times. My guys did a great job.”

This was Hagan’s third win of the season to go along with his victories at Chicago and the fall race in Charlotte, N.C. This also was Hagan’s 13th win of his career and his first at Reading.

Hagan, the 2011 world champion, has a 2423-point total and leads second-place John Force by 36 points and Courtney Force by 72 points.

The 2014 season concludes with races at Las Vegas (Oct. 30-Nov. 1) and Pomona, Calif. (Nov. 13-16).

“You always think points, you are human, and there’s no way around it,” Hagan said. “But, to be honest, I’ve really taken approach that you just have to chill. Let stuff come to you, don’t push stuff away from you. Sometimes you can really push things away from you by trying to do too much or try too hard. I think we look at points at Pomona. I’ve left here 20 points ahead of John and he’s come back and spanked me. Points are great and we are glad to have them and we wouldn’t trade them for the world, but Wallys are even better. As long as we can go out here and get a couple of more Wallys along this deal we are going to have the points lead.”

On Sunday, Hagan ousted Tony Pedregon, Jack Beckman, Alexi DeJoria and then Johnson Jr.

“The biggest thing I saw there is just the consistency that my guys have and the desire,” Hagan said. “Dickie Venables (Hagan’s crew chief) you can tell he’s confident in himself as far as making the calls up there.”

Hagan admitted he wasn’t sure what prompted his engine to blow up in the finals.

“I don’t what happened,” Hagan said. “Probably a part broke. It didn’t give any warning. It just said kaboom. It is such a crazy feeling, you look over and the thing is on fire and T.J. is not there and you are waiting on it to go to the finish line before you hit the brakes or you pull the fire bottles and stuff. It was like come on finish line, come on finish line, where are you at? Then, it finally got across there on you see the win light come on and you start trying to put the fire out and everything else that’s going on to get the car stopped.”

The win by Hagan against DeJoria came via a holeshot. Hagan’s reaction time was .064 and DeJoria’s was .078.

“That was a really tight race and the thing I told her is she is so good for this sport,” Hagan said. “She’s a great racer and she’s come a long way.” - Tracy Renck

JFR TAKES BIG FIRST-ROUND HIT – Four of the top five Funny Car drivers in the standings – John Force, Courtney Force, Robert Hight, and Ron Capps – and No. 8 Del Worsham fell in the first round.

Matt Hagan was the only top-five survivor.

The Rocky Boots / Mopar Dodge driver entered this event in third place, 42 points off leader John Force’s pace and 12 behind No. 2 Courtney Force. With the John Force Racing implosion, Hagan passed Courtney Force. So he went up against fellow Don Schumacher Racing driver Jack Beckman in the quarterfinals as the No. 2-ranked Funny Car driver, a mere 24 points behind John Force. He defeated Alexis DeJoria to complete his rise to the Funny Car lead, and he leaves with a 36-point advantage over No. 2 John Force.

This was the first time since the 2011 Dallas event that all three JFR Funny Cars lost in the first round. The trio then consisted of John Force, Hight, and Mike Neff (who serves as Hight’s crew chief today).

FORCE-HAGAN POINTS-LEAD HISTORY – Sunday’s Funny Car shake-up at Maple Grove marked the first time since last fall that someone other than JFR drivers John Force or Robert Hight was atop the standings. More specifically, the last time a JFR Ford didn't have the points lead was Oct. 3, 2013, the day before the start of last year's Reading race. Matt Hagan led John Force by six points going into the weekend. Force got six bonus points that Friday to tie Hagan and took the lead outright Saturday with the conclusion of qualifying. He left Reading with a 65-point lead that he never lost. When Force lost in the first round in 2010, Hagan left Reading with a 64-point lead.

So the momentum swing down the stretch in 2010 was more dramatic between the two racers.
 
When the tour left Dallas in 2010, Force had a 25-point margin on No. 2 Hagan. Leaving Reading, Hagan had the advantage by 64 points. The Countdown shifted to Las Vegas for the penultimate race of the playoffs. Hagan maintained his lead, but Force had sliced it to 37 points as the NHRA Finals opened at Pomona, Calif. After Hagan lost in the opening round to Bob Tasca, Force claimed the championship by 42 points.
 
THESE ROCKY BOOTS ARE MADE FOR WALKIN’ – And Funny Car contender Matt Hagan, driver of the Rocky Boots / Mopar Dodge easily walked all over the John Force Racing team Sunday.

Hagan marched from the No. 3 spot to the No. 2 spot. The way he did it had to irk the Forces even more. He advanced past Tony Pedregon (for the 16th time) with a solo pass because Pedregon’s car wouldn’t start. That allowed him to leapfrog Courtney Force, bumping her down to No. 3 in the standings.

Then, with his second-round victory against DSR colleague Jack Beckman, Hagan pulled within four points of leader John Force – with a chance to assume the points lead in the semifinals. All that stood in the way were Alexis DeJoria and Tommy DeLago, his own former crew chief who tuned him to the 2011 championship.

Hagan and new crew chief Dickie Venables found the right combination to beat DeJoria and DeLago by three-thousandth of a second on a holeshot (4.043 vs. DeJoria’s quicker 4.039). With that, Hagan seized the points lead and advanced to his third final in four races.

Make-A-Wish Dodge driver Tommy Johnson dismissed Jeff Arend in the other semifinal. That victory – which set up a rematch of the Joliet final that Hagan won – guaranteed DSR a Funny Car trophy. Tony Schumacher already had reached the Top Fuel final against Brittany Force.

Since his keenly disappointing experience of losing the 2010 title on the last day of the season, Hagan has tried to control his focus and not get too worked up by the momentum swings so frequent in drag racing. But he said he found himself getting a little bit too wound up Sunday morning on his way to the racetrack.

“I was late in traffic, all spun out,” Hagan said after his first-round freebie. Then he decided, “It’s going to be what it’s going to be.” He said he calmed down and decided to “turn it over to the Man Above.”

MAJOR ATTRITION - By the end of the quarterfinals, only three Funny Car championship contenders were still in the mix.  By the end of the event, finalists Matt Hagan and Tommy Johnson Jr. each gained two spots in the standings. The three JFR drivers and Ron Capps each fell one place.

FORCES STUMBLE - Courtney Force said her early exit to tire-shake-troubled Jeff Arend was “definitely hard to swallow. I tried to pedal, but by then he was long gone.” Grime Boss Dodge Charger owner Jim Dunn, Arend’s boss, assessed the results of that match-up bluntly: “She screwed up worse than we did. We won.”

John Force seemed stung a bit by Tasca’s victory over him earlier in the round. “Tasca struggled all weekend,” he said, quickly adding, “But we know that game.” He said good-bye to the spectators and set about doing the only thing left to do Sunday (besides cheer on daughter Brittany in Top Fuel).

“The fans here have been unbelievable – great crowds,” he said. “John Force Racing will go to the next race, at Las Vegas.” Force’s consolation prize: he broke his own year-old track speed record with the 323.97 mph he ran in qualifying.

ANOTHER BUM DEAL FOR DIEHL - Jeff Diehl long ago had stopped stewing about the timing-system malfunction at Sonoma that cost him a qualifying run and left him with a failure to qualify. But another unfortunate rule brought the same results Saturday for the tight-budgeted “Surfer Dude” who came all the way here from California to race his JDR Toyota Solara.

Provisional qualifiers Friday must rank in the top 12 in order for their best elapsed times to carry over to Saturday’s final day of qualifying; E.T.s for those not in the top 12 are tossed out and those drivers start Saturday qualifying with no recorded times. Diehl missed the top-12 advantage by .012 of a second, so his best time, 4.120 seconds, was erased. He had a 7.769-second pass Saturday but improved significantly to 5.377 in his last chance.

John Bojec made the field in his NHRA Funny Car debut, setting the bump spot at 5.029. Diehl missed out by .113 seconds. Diehl’s 4.120-second E.T. would have qualified if the “12” rule weren’t in effect.

PRO STOCK

BROGDON SURPRISE WINNER AT READING - This season has been one of constant frustration for Rodger Brogdon.

The Pro Stock driver put all those memories to rest – at least for one day – Oct. 5.

Brogdon drove his Owens Corning Camaro to the victory over Allen Johnson in the finals of the NHRA Nationals at Reading, Pa.

Brogdon clocked a 6.516-second time at 212.13 mph to beat Johnson, who slowed to 10.270 seconds when his Team Mopar Dart shook the tires at Maple Grove Raceway.

“Q3 we made a really good run and Q4 we would have went even faster if I had not rolled my foot up off the clutch pedal,” Brogdon said. “I have to have a sponsor to race next year to be honest with you I have to have some help. Hopefully this Owens Corning deal, we are hopefully working on a three-year deal, but nothing is etched in stone yet. This win definitely had to help.”

This was Brogdon’s second career Pro Stock win to go along with his inaugural victory at Bristol, Tenn., last season against Erica Enders-Stevens.

Brogdon came to Reading 13th in the point standings and had a 3-15 round record this season.  He qualified No. 11 at Reading at 6.540 seconds, and proceeded to defeat Richie Stevens, points leader Jason Line, Greg Anderson and then Johnson. The final three all are former world champions.

“I would have been looking past me,” Brogdon said. “We had not been running that good.”

At the U.S. Nationals in Indianapolis Aug. 27-Sept. 1, Brogdon switched from his own in-house engine program to leasing motors from Richard Freeman at Elite Motorsports.

“When I got Owens Corning onboard for the last few races I figured I needed to spend money to hopefully get some money,” Brogdon said. “I called Richard and we made a deal to run the last few races because I knew I needed some more power. I figured it was my duty to do everything I could, so I cut a deal with Richard at Elite. It didn’t show right off at Indy. We struggled bad and we just got it figured out Q3 this weekend. We knew we had power. It is definitely something I’m looking to do next year, Elite power. I’m going to do something different with my machine shop. I also want to say Steve Kent is still going to be a big part of this. If it wasn’t for him I would have never got to do this in the first place. I’m very, very thankful to him for giving me the original opportunity to do this.”

NOT DISAPPOINTED - Erica Enders-Stevens didn’t win and didn’t set a national elapsed-time record for 20 extra points Sunday.  But she plowed her way to the semifinals and improved to the No. 2 spot in the Pro Stock standings.  She’s just 35 points behind Jason Line, who exited in the quarterfinals.
 
"I have such an awesome team," Enders-Stevens said. "They gave me a great race car all weekend, from qualifying No. 1 to going to the semifinals today. I wanted to give them more -- I wanted to get to the finals and win -- but to close the gap on Jason to less than two rounds is really exciting.
 
"It's going to be a dogfight to the end and we're ready for it. Having the quickest car here has given us so much confidence. Now we've got a couple weeks off to get back to the shop and regroup. The last two races will be incredible," she said.
 
Enders-Stevens explained her semifinal loss to Allen Johnson (6.759, 210.87 mph to Johnson's 6.499, 212.69) by saying, "The car just shook the tires really hard down low. I pedaled it and got back on the gas as fast as possible, but when you lose all of that early momentum there's not much you can do. I stayed after it just in case Allen had trouble, but I saw him all the way down the track. That round was a bummer, but we're still smiling over here."
The NHRA tour will takes a three-week break, then will resume with the Toyota Nationals at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. And that’s a prospect that excites Enders-Stevens.

"We were undefeated in the spring race in Vegas, so we'll try to keep that streak alive. We won both the K&N Horsepower Challenge and the regular national event, so we have nothing but good thoughts going through our heads.”
 
But she said she’ll enjoy the time off: "It'll be good to get home, catch up on our rest, and have time to service the car and the motors. Having four races in a row was pretty taxing for everyone. Even so, we've put ourselves in an incredible position to challenge for the title. I've dreamt of this my whole life, and it's so cool to be living in the moment right now."

NOW WHO’S SICK? – Rodger Brogdon started this race with a nasty case of the flu, then he made Richie Stevens and points leader Jason Line sick, sending them to the sidelines. Brogdon is not eligible to chase the series championship. He advanced to the final round on a solo pass because something in semifinal opponent Greg Anderson’s engine broke during his burnout. Then he picked up his second career victory, defeating Allen Johnson.

PRO STOCK MOTORCYCLE

WORK-HAPPY KRAWIEC EARNS FIFTH PRO STOCK BIKE TROPHY - Eddie Krawiec doesn’t mind keeping his nose to the grindstone.

And that’s a wonderful quality in him that makes the folks at Vance & Hines appreciate him so much.

Oh, they certainly are proud of him for the 27 Pro Stock Motorcycle Wally trophies he has won aboard their Vance & Hines Screamin’ Eagle Harley-Davidson and the three series championships with which he has enhanced their already sterling reputation. They’re especially enjoying this latest one he earned Sunday at Maple Grove Raceway, near Reading, Pa., when he defeated Scotty Pollacheck in the final round of the NHRA Nationals.

It was his fifth of the season in seven final rounds, capped by his 6.793-second, 197.13-mph against Pollacheck’s 6.853, 193.92 on the Petrolhead Apparel Buell. And it marked his third at Maple Grove Raceway.      

The folks at the huge headquarters at Brownsburg, Ind., don’t even mind that Krawiec sliced class leader Andrew Hines’ advantage to 25 points with two more events left to decide the Mello Yello Drag Racing Series championship.  

That’s all gravy.

They value Krawiec because of his cheerful work ethic. After all, he won’t be vacationing with his family or dusting off his statues as he adds this freshest one to the shelf at home in Avon, Ind. He won’t have time.

“My flight gets in at 11:15,” Krawiec said of his Monday-morning agenda. “I’ll be at the shop by 1.”

He spoke of it not as drudgery but actually as fun and purposeful.

“I’ll be back at the shop. It’s one of those things that never stops,” he said. “We’re sort of behind on our regular maintenance, not just on our own stuff, but we also work on some of the other customers. So we’ll be getting engines back from them and having to service them. It’ll definitely be a busy couple of weeks, but I’m looking forward to it.”

One reason is the pressure has lifted from his shoulders.

“My stress level has dropped quite a bit, knowing Andrew and I are going to those final two races basically competing against each other,” Krawiec said. “It’s going to be a battle now.”

Referring to their Harley-Davidsons and the brand’s nickname, he said, “It looks like it’s coming down to a two-hog race rather than a two-horse race.”

Hector Arana Jr., the top qualifier at Reading who lost in the second round to Matt Smith, is third in the standings. However, he’s a distant 168 points off Hines’ pace. And No. 4 Steve Johnson, the independent Suzuki banner-carrier, is an all-but-mathematically-eliminated 200 points off the lead.

He said of shifting from the sweltering heat to the teeth-chattering cold in a week’s time, “That’s the complicated part, because it’s really hard with chassis set-up. You have to figure out the happy point of a really tight track versus a really slick track. My bike works well in the hotter conditions.”

It didn’t perform badly Sunday, either, with temperatures dipping dramatically.

“Today the great thing about it was the more we picked at it the more we learned,” Krawiec said. “The key thing is to leave here with good data you can apply next time.”

And he knows he has to keep grinding away because of the caliber of competition he faces every race, beyond his teammate.

“When you factor in Jerry [Savoie] and Chaz [Kennedy] . . . and Matt Smith and Scotty Pollacheck . . . Scotty is one of the best – I think the best – on the tree out here. Anytime you race Scott Pollacheck [you have to be prepared]. He hasn’t won yet so he’s hungry. He’s a great racer. When you go out there and you’re winning races and you know you have to drive well to win that race, it makes you feel that much better [to win].”

Once again, that work ethic is serving Eddie Krawiec well.

HALL GLAD SAMPEY BACK – Not everybody welcomed Angelle Sampey to the Pro Stock Motorcycle class the first time she burst on the scene with Star Racing. But it’s a different, more tolerant climate these days for the class that has seen Karen Stoffer, then Peggy Llewellyn and Angie Smith, achieve success and several other female riders (Valerie Thompson, Katie Sullivan, Connie Cohen, and Dawn Minturn) compete on a bike.

Two-time Pro Stock Motorcycle winner John Hall, a former Star Racing rider who races under the Matt Smith Racing banner on the Nitro Fish Buell, said he’s happy Sampey is back on the track.

“It’s good that Angelle is back. By her coming back, the class has gotten good exposure. She’s got a big fan base. She’s won 41 Wallys. She’s won three championships,” Hall said.

“What she has accomplished and the time she’s been in the sport is unmatched, really. It’s unmatchable,” he said. “I’m not looking that far. I’m looking for three victories. You can’t even think of success like that. I guarantee you she didn’t think she was going to come in and race x-amount of years and win 41 Wallys and three championships. She might have hoped. We all hope. You hope for that kind of success, but it would never come out of your mouth because that’s a pretty big goal. My goal, if you asked me: I want to win this race. If you asked me at the next race. I’d want to win that one. That’s my goal.”

It’ll have to wait until the Oct. 30-Nov. 2 Toyota NHRA Nationals at Las Vegas. Jerry Savoie defeated Hall in the opening round Sunday.

Winner Eddie Krawiec agreed with Hall about Sampey’s return. “I think it’s great. It’s good for the sport in general. She was a great competitor, and I don’t think she lost what she had from years ago. She rides a bike very well. Heck, she knocked out an .86 there in qualifying. I’d expect to see her battling with everybody else in no time.”

YEAH, RAH, ANGIE! - As Angie Smith lined up to race Chaz Kennedy in the first round Sunday and her Kandy Girls cheerleaders rooted her on nearby, public-address announcer Brian Lohnes said a phrase maybe never before uttered at a drag race: “pom-poms ablaze on the starting line.”

Then Vance & Hines Harley-Davidson rider Eddie Krawiec channeled a little Jerry Lee Lewis and “Great Balls of Fire” after clocking a 197.59-mph, 6.806-second pass in his first-round victory over Shawn Gann. “You shake my nerves and you rattle my brain . . .” the song goes. Well, actually, Krawiec said of that quarter-mile blast, “It rattled my brain.” Maybe Krawiec should have had some pom-poms.

His speed was fastest of the meet, and that elapsed time that was quickest of the round.a smith

FASTER BUGGIES - Two groups of Burks County Amish residents totaling nearly 20 men and women, gathered late Sunday afternoon on the hillside across Bowmanville Road from Maple Grove Raceway to watch the final rounds of the race.

 

 

 

 

 

SATURDAY NOTEBOOK

TOP FUEL
 

JINX? WHAT JINX? - Tony Schumacher is well aware that no one this year in Top Fuel has won from the No. 1 starting spot. And he doesn’t care.

“So what?” the U.S. Army Dragster driver said confidently after blasting to the top starting position in Saturday’s final qualifying session for the NHRA Nationals at Reading, Pa.’s Maple Grove Raceway. Schumacher covered the 1,000-foot course in a career-best 3.733 seconds at 327.51 mph. “I haven’t won from a lot of spots this year,” he said.

Schumacher was up in smoke right away in his third overall attempt Saturday, but crew chief Mike Green said after the last pass that “we didn’t change one thing” before bringing the car back to the starting line. “The track kind of came around.”

Schumacher’s take? “I expected it to go fast,” he said.

Despite gaining the No. 1 position, and an historic one at that, Green said he had been hoping for a quicker elapsed time. It was enough to tap Schumacher to lead the field for the fourth time this season and 76th in all. This also is his seventh No. 1 start here, giving him the NHRA Top Fuel record for the most No. 1 positions at the same venue.

Schumacher said his car “has more left in there,” not especially cheerful news for No. 16 qualifier Bob Vandergriff, his first-round race-day opponent, and “Mike [Green] will have an excellent baseline.” But he said Vandergriff “has done some serious damage to a lot of cars.”        

Adopting a defensive strategy as the points leader is not Schumacher’s style. He said his posture will be “offensive” for sure. His mission, he said, is to “leave nothing on the table. We’ll go as fast as the racetrack will allow.” He’s going for his fifth Maple Grove victory.

BETTER AND BETTER - With exactly 16 Top Fuel racers entered and with her breezy observation that “Right now, we’re No. 10 and you can’t kick us out of the Countdown,” an unpressured Brittany Force just got better and better performance from her Castrol EDGE Dragster this weekend.

She raised eyebrows with her 3.765-second pass at 322.81 mph during Friday’s second qualifying session to jump from 14th to second in the order. “It’s a great confidence-builder for the whole team,” crew chief Todd Smith said. She built on that confidence early Saturday afternoon and took over the No. 1 spot with a 3.737-second elapsed time at 328.78 mph. Tony Schumacher topped her at the last minute with a 3.733-second blast at 327.51 mph, but she countered immediately after in the class’ last pairing of qualifying with top speed of the meet at 329.50 mph.

Force’s performance Saturday was a shiny moment for her crew, for they had some work to do late into the night. Her BOSS 500 engine exploded as she crossed the finish line Friday, capping what she characterized as “definitely a crazy run.”

She said, “I watched it on the screen when NHRA replayed it, and I no idea there was a fireball that big right behind me. My Castrol EDGE Dragster went right down the track, and it felt like it left hard and was on a smooth straight run. Then it started to rattle about six or seven hundred feet out. It shook a little, but I drove right through it. Right as I crossed the finish line I felt an explosion behind me. I knew it was a big one but not as big until I saw the footage later on.”

Putting up her best numbers since the August Sonoma event (five races ago) might have seemed unlikely when she smoked her tires at about 300 feet into her first run. “I decided to get out of the throttle and not risk doing more damage. There are only 16 Top Fuel dragsters here, so we didn’t see the need to pedal it and get it down there, as it would only hurt the car,” Force said. “I knew we’d have another session later in the afternoon and the conditions would be a lot cooler, we wanted to put a good number on the board and it did.”

She’s still seeking her first victory and trying not to rattle herself with Countdown scenarios. “I try not to focus too much on the Countdown,” she said. “I know there’s that added pressure as you want to do good for the team and you want to work your way up the ladder. We can only go up, so that’s our plan.”

Terry McMillen, owner-driver of the Amalie Oil/UNOH Dragster, has other plans for her. He’s the No. 15 qualifier and Force’s Round 1 opponent in Sunday’s eliminations.   

GOING FOR THREE STRAIGHT- In each of the past two visits to Maple Grove Raceway, Antron Brown has advanced to the final round of Top Fuel competition. He lost to Khalid alBalooshi in 2012 and Shawn Langdon last year. 

Brown, the No. 5 qualifier, will start his quest for a third consecutive final-round appearance against alBalooshi, the 12th qualifier in the Al-Anabi Racing Dragster.

WANTS, NEEDS THAT VICTORY - Friday leader Doug Kalitta, denied his seventh top-qualifying position Saturday, knows he needs to storm back Sunday with a third victory to leap back into the championship mix. 

That would be the only statistic that ultimately would matter to him. But just for the record, he has victories at Gainesville and Seattle among his nine final-round appearances. Also this season, he has posted top speed of the meet nine times and low elapsed time on seven occasions. 

He entered this race with more critical qualifying bonus points than any other Top Fuel driver (83, with Steve Torrence closest behind him with 69 and points leader Tony Schumacher third with 64). 

Kalitta ended up No. 4 in the order and will race No. 13 Clay Millican in Round 1 Sunday.

HARD TO BEAT AT MAPLE GROVE - No. 7 starter Shawn Langdon – the No. 2-ranked Top Fuel driver, reigning class champion, and last year’s winner here – has been hard to stop at Reading. Translation: That’ll be a challenge for No. 10 Richie Crampton when they meet in the first round Sunday morning. Langdon also recorded the fastest speed at 1,000 feet two years ago here. That same weekend, Langdon ran a 3.712-second elapsed time that was the national standard until Antron Brown made a quicker pass after that. Langdon’s run still stands as the second-quickest 1,000-foot run in NHRA history, and he owns the second, fourth and fifth-quickest E.T.s in NHRA history.

He’s not leaning on those laurels for eliminations, though.

“The competition level in Top Fuel is so tough. You’re scratching and clawing to gain an advantage every time you make a run down the track,” Langdon said. “The Al-Anabi team found and fixed a couple of problems in the last couple of weeks. The car really just wasn’t quite right, and we were able to fix a major problem early last weekend. The car showed great results after that. We made seven really good runs down the race track. It was a top-five car every time it went down the track last weekend with the exception of the final when we were a little too aggressive.
 
“Now I feel like we have a race car like we had at the end of last year when we won the NHRA Mello Yello Top Fuel championship. We didn’t get the win in St. Louis last weekend, but I think we got a little bit of a win, because now we have our car back, and we are back in the Mello Yello championship hunt again. Our motto is still ‘We just need a chance.’  Nobody else is going to dictate our championship hopes. We just have to go out there, win rounds, win races and keep it in our hands.”

WANTS TO MAKE STATEMENT - Odyssey Batteries Dragster driver Spencer Massey, the No. 6 qualifier, will take on No. 11 Leah Pritchett in the Gumout/Dote Racing Dragster in the first round of eliminations. 

“Honestly, we have nothing to lose. We are more than 100 points back from the top spot in points with only three races left in the Countdown to the Championship, so we just have to go out there and give it all we have. I really feel good about this weekend and feel like we can turn it around and make a statement."

WORKING ON SET-UP - After two planned early-shutoff runs Friday, Clay Millican posted a 3.835-second elapsed time and 316.15-mph speed. He hopped from 15th place Friday to 14th and then 13th Saturday. No. 4 Doug Kalitta will be his first hurdle Sunday as he pursues his first NHRA victory.

Steve Torrence

THEY’RE 8TH AND 9TH?! – Sometimes the crazy world of drag racing will find the Nos. 8 and 9 starting spots, and first-round match-ups, going to a three-time series champion and one of the most determined young shoes who has no title but a valuable slew of fresh parts and pieces. 

That’s the case this Sunday with No. 8 veteran and current part-timer Larry Dixon and No. 9 grinder Steve Torrence, who entered this race fourth in the standings.

GOOFY END TO QUALIFYING - Richie Crampton’s GEICO/Lucas Oil Dragster lurched and jumped at the first hit of the throttle in the final session Saturday, and he settled for a best E.T. and speed of 3.814 seconds and 317.49 mph for a No. 10 start. He’ll give lane choice to No. 7 Shawn Langdon in the Al-Anabi Racing Dragster in the opening round Sunday. 

As for the snafu at the starting line, Crampton said, “I don’t know what happened. It looked like we were leaking gas. I think we used up a lot of our good luck at Indy.” 

He won the U.S. Nationals there to close the so-called “regular season.”

Dom Lagana

TODD VS. LAGANA - JR Todd, the No. 3 starter in the Optima Batteries Dragster, and Dom Lagana, who placed his family-owned dragster in the 14th slot, will face off in the first round.

FUNNY CAR

CRUZER STILL THE MAN – Cruz Pedregon will start his 470th NHRA Funny Car race from the No. 1 qualifying position, leading a field in which he and John Force dipped into the three-second range and the top six clocked a 4.01 or better. He withstood the jaw-dropping challenge from Force and held onto his lead from Friday for his third No. 1 spot of the year and his 57th total.

“We need the points and all the help we can get,” Pedregon said.

He does, for the two-time series champion brings into Sunday’s eliminations an uncharacteristic 17-20 elimination-round record and first round losses in each of the past five events.

“But I feel good,” he said as he prepared for his Sunday meeting with first-time Funny Car starter John Bojec, the No. 16 qualifier.

HE CALLED IT - John Force made good on his prediction that he and his Castrol GTX High Mileage Ford Mustang will join Cruz Pedregon and the Snap-on Toyota in the sub-four-second range this weekend at Maple Grove Raceway.

“We know what’s in that car,” Force had said late Friday. “It’ll run in the threes. And if it runs, it’ll set the record again.” He was a little bit off there. But he lit up the scoreboard in Saturday’s last Funny Car qualifying session with a 3.997-second elapsed time that was more than adequate to leapfrog strong-running Matt Hagan for the No. 2 starting position.

Top qualifier Cruz Pedregon said the racing surface Saturday was “tricky,” adding, “It was either chicken or feathers. Force almost got all the chicken.”

Jimmy Prock, Force’s crew chief, said right after the Castrol car’s run, “It’s always fun when you come to Reading and you can make the car go as fast as you want.”

Force, one of 13 drivers to clock a 4.0 or better in time trials, is the points leader. He’ll face fellow Ford racer Bob Tasca, the No. 15 qualifier, in Sunday’s first round. In their 19 Funny Car match-ups, Force has won nine times. Force is 3-1 in their 2014 meetings.

“Tasca’s a good racer, but we’ll just go up there and do what we know what to do,” Force said. “What we tried to accomplish is to eat up all the points. [Matt] Hagan got them yesterday, but we got them back today [with the maximum Saturday of six]. We extended our lead on him. Courtney [Force] also moved up. And the key is to put all my drivers qualified one through four or even five and then you don’t run into each other in the early rounds of eliminations.”

BOJEC SQUEEZES IN - National Tractor Puller’s Association fans might be more familiar with the name “John Bojec” than National Hot Rod Association Funny Car fans. After all, he was the 1998 national champion.

The affable Mentor, Ohio, businessman and driver of the Speed City Toyota has a diverse portfolio, as well as an intriguing personal history here at Maple Grove Raceway. He’s Vice-President at Speed City, a fabrication and machine shop that caters to alcohol, nitro, and nostalgia racers throughout the U.S. and in Australia, Sweden, and New Zealand.

He’s making his Funny Car debut this weekend, and he aced out both Mike Smith and Jeff Diehl to make the field as the16th and final qualifier. For his accomplishment, he has the dubious honor of lining up against top qualifier Cruz Pedregon, who happens to be a close friend and associate of Bojec’s crew chief’s Johnny West.

Bojec, curiously, won the Toyo Tires Nationals here in 2010 in the Top Alcohol Funny Car class when fellow finalist Steve Harker rolled the beams and fouled out. His link to Harker didn’t end there. Today Harker is Bojec’s father-in-law, for Bojec met Diana Harker here at that 2010 event.

“It was the best day of my life,” Bojec said. This one might rank high up there, too.

Bojec also works away from the racetrack with his wife, one of two racing sisters. Kate Harker is back in her native Australia these days. Diana Harker is owner of Speed City.

UNLUCKY AT MAPLE GROVE, LUCKY IN LOVE? - Ron Capps, driver of the NAPA Dodge Charger, said he loves Maple Grove Raceway. But this might be a case of unrequited love. This is one of only two NHRA national-event tracks where he has yet to win a race. He advanced to the finals here twice but not since 2000.

"I wish I could explain it, because then we could change our outcome there," the 43-time winner and No. 5-ranked driver said. "We just can't close the deal. [Crew chief Rahn] Tobler has run good in the past here, so hopefully we can go there and make some magic and get a win."

Capps will get another crack at it Sunday, this time as the No. 8 starter. He faces his Don Schumacher Racing mate Tommy Johnson Jr., driver of the Make-A-Wish Dodge, in the opening round. Johnson qualified No. 9.

Even if Maple Grove Raceway doesn’t love Capps, one person is enamored of him – DSR colleague Antron Brown’s grandmother. “My grandmom says Ron Capps is handsome like Clark Gable,” Brown tweeted Saturday, referring to the actor from decades ago who was a Hollywood heartthrob and star in the classic “Gone With The Wind.”

Capps did NOT reply, “Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.” Instead, he replied, “I’m blushing.” But “Gone With The Wind” is marking the 75th anniversary of its filming this year, and Maple Grove Raceway is celebrating 30 years of this event. So maybe Antron’s grandmother’s endorsement will be his lucky charm.  

FORCING THE ISSUE - Matt Hagan said of his Don Scumacher Racing-owned Rocky Boots/Mopar Dodge Charger, “I think we have a good race car." And he wants it to be on its best behavior Sunday, when he starts his bid for a third victory this season and a move toward the points lead against first-round foe Tony Pedregon.

Hagan, who will start from the No. 3 spot on the grid, said, "We have to go rounds on Sunday. There’s no other way around it. We have to turn on win lights and go more rounds than those Force cars. That's the only way we can get around them."

He said, “The track is really good out there. We made some great laps on Friday but struggled a little bit on Saturday after the rain we had this morning. It definitely made the track a little bit tougher on us today.”

Just 42 points separated the third-place Hagan from leader Force when this event began, and a first victory here at Reading would be a huge bonus for him. Hagan was runner-up in 2010.

The forecasted high for Sunday's eliminations is 59 degrees and sunny.

"It's been cool, fast conditions all weekend and Sunday will be no different. It's going to be killer conditions on Sunday, no doubt. I can't wait to get in this Rocky car tomorrow and see if we can get the job done and turn on four win lights here at Maple Grove.”

LOTS ON HER PLATE - Courtney Force, the No. 4 starter, has a chance to earn yet another “female racer” distinction by winning three consecutive events. She is trying to become the first woman since Angelle Sampey in 2002 and the first in a four-wheel class since Shirley Muldowney in 1977 to win three races in a row. She recently became the only female to earn back-to-back Funny Car victories. But she is more adamant about wanting to win the Mello Yello Funny Car championship. And she will have to knock aside her father to do that. Her 16-time champion dad John Force is the points leader. Courtney Force, the youngest of his four daughters, came into this event 30 points behind him.

“We've made a big move up to the No. 2 spot in points and have started to create the gap we need between us and the other competitors on our tail. We need to keep our consistency going and finish off the four-week stretch on a high note,” she said.

Courtney Force will race No. 13 Jeff Arend in the first round of Sunday’s action.

CLUTCH TROUBLES – Mike Smith’s “New Englander” ’08 Dodge Stratus had problems following the burnout in the opening session Friday – even with help from John Bojek’s experienced crew chief, Johnny West, and a supply of clutch discs from Don Schumacher Racing. A clutch problem forced him to abandon the run before it started. “It got dangerous, and I shut it off,” Smith said. The journeyman racer from Boynton Beach, Fla., son of legendary tuner Paul Smith and brother to former Top Fuel driver John “Bodie” Smith, had the problem fixed for the Friday evening run. But his 4.667-second, 197.31-mph clocking left him last among the 18 entrants overnight. Smith missed the cut Saturday.   

TROUBLE FOR TASCA - The best Bob Tasca could coax from his Motorcraft/QuickLane Ford Mustang Friday was a 4.473-second elapsed time at 246.21 mph. It was enough to give him the early No. 15 spot, but when he couldn’t improve in the night session, he fell back to 17th. “We went for it in Q2 and came up short,” he said afterward. It was monumentally frustrating, for not only did it come on the heels of a nasty explosion in the final qualifying session the previous Saturday that he said “damned near knocked me out” but it also came at one of his all-time favorite racetracks, where one of the strongest Friday crowds had packed the grandstands early but sadly left in droves before the second session was complete.

Just the same, Tasca, from nearby Hope, Rhode Island, said he loves Maple Grove Raceway. “It’s the first track that I ever raced in a national event, back in 2006 in my alcohol car. It’s one of my top five favorite tracks to drive. It’s one of the biggest crowds of the year. It’s set in Amish country, literally in the middle of nowhere. There’s lot of trees and oxygen. The cars run really well there. It’s a great surface to race on, and I’ve won there twice [in 2009 in Funny Car and earlier in Top Alcohol Funny Car].”

Tasca, a four-time Funny Car winner in his career, is looking for his first victory since the 2010 Dallas race. If he did, he’d break a 49-event winless streak. His first challenge will come against fellow Ford racer, No. 2 qualifier, and points leader John Force in the opening round of eliminations Sunday.

OTHER PAIRINGS – Robert Hight (No. 5) will go against Tim Wilkerson (No. 12), Del Worsham (7) will meet Kalitta Motorsports teammate Alexis DeJoria (10), and Jack Beckman (6) will face Chad Head (11).

PRO STOCK

ENDERS LEAVES NO DOUBT WHO’S NO. 1 – No. 1 Pro Stock qualifier Erica Enders-Stevens said her Elite Motorsports Camaro “has been flying this weekend.” It flew to new heights Saturday as she recaptured the top spot she had claimed Friday. She did it Saturday with a stunning 6.465-second elapsed time that narrowly missed her won national record from earlier this year at Englishtown, N.J. It will serve as her back-up as she tries tomorrow for the 20-point bonus it would bring as she chases points leader Jason Line with this race and two more remaining.

“We knew conditions were conducive for that,” she said. “It blew our minds a little bit.”

"Every point matters in this championship countdown and if we can run just a little bit quicker tomorrow and reset the national record one more time than we'd get 20 bonus points, which would be huge," said Enders-Stevens, who held the points lead for a class-leading 13 races this year. "No matter what, we gained some ground with all the qualifying bonus points we've already picked up so we're already pretty happy.”
 
Enders-Stevens, the only Pro Stock racer this year to win from the No. 1 position, has earned more qualifying bonus points than anyone in the class. She started this race 67 points, or about three rounds of racing, behind Line. Her Chevy was the quickest car in three of the four qualifying sessions and second quickest in the other, so she earned 11 bonus points while Line earned just one.
 
"We're less than three rounds behind him now and with a national record pending we could be even closer," Enders-Stevens said. "My team owner (Richard Freeman) reminded me right after the run that we already have the back-up run in place to set a national record so now all we have to do is go out there and do it.”

‘TIRED’ OF PROBLEM - Allen Johnson started his weekend in 17th place in the lineup – it got worse. He was 18th at the end of Friday qualifying. Evidently he was missing something in the set-up on his Mopar/Magneti Marelli Dodge Dart that was related to what he called a “virus” he has been battling the past couple of weeks.

Following his much-more-satisfying 6.526-second, 211.83-mph blast in the third overall session – just one-hundredth of a second slower than Erica Enders-Stevens’ low E.T. of the weekend – Johnson said, “We just wanted it to go straight. It went straight as an arrow.”

It turned out the problem was tires, he said: “We actually had some problems, we think, with tires. We went through a couple of sets yesterday.” Both sets behaved differently. Johnson said that after his crew “nitpicked every little thing,” they just put on a completely fresh set of tires.

“The car went straight as an arrow, didn’t act funny at all,” he said. “We’re just chalking it up to tires.”

He’s hoping the car will run right down the middle of the track Sunday, when he (as the N. 4 qualifier) starts eliminations against No. 13 Larry Morgan.

SO THERE - Veteran Pro Stock owner-driver Larry Morgan, driver of the Lucas Oil Ford Mustang, made his way into the top 12 Friday, at No. 12, a small victory but welcome one just the same. He has had his share of struggles competing against the multi-car teams, bringing 18 first-round exits, two DNQs, and a 1-18 win-loss record into Maple Grove. Although he hasn’t won since 2009 at Sonoma (for his first triumph since the 2002 Sonoma race – which was his first since 1994), Morgan warned his fellow drivers not to count him out.
   
"I've won [here] before, just not in Pro Stock," Morgan said, referring to his 1985 Competition Eliminator victory. "I could do it again this time. You never know. Anything can happen in these Pro Stock races. We've seen that many times. The field is so close together that it's anyone's race to win, even ours. We may not seem like likely candidates, but we could surprise everyone. I have the other guys right where I want them, not suspecting a thing."
 
Allen Johnson, his first-round opponent, never takes Larry Morgan lightly.  
 
Morgan did say, though, "We may not have had any problems in St. Louis, but we still have a lot of work to do. [But] we'll be all right. We always are."
 
Anyone who doubts Morgan is a threat might recall that he was the one who ended Bob Glidden’s streak at Indianapolis, in 1989. Morgan won the race and the $50,000 winner’s share of the Pro Stock bonus race.

PRO STOCK MOTORCYCLE

STORYTELLER EXTRAORDINAIRE – Pro Stock Motorcycle rider Steve Johnson proved once again that, as he put it, “John Force is the face of our sport, but he isn’t the only one who can tell the story of how wonderful our sport is.” His appearance earlier this week on WPMT-TV (FOX43, serving York and South Central Pennsylvania) would be an excellent addition to the sales-pitch materials for any NHRA pro racer in any class.

He explained to the studio host what a quarter-mile ride at nearly 200 mph on a Pro Stock Motorcycle feels like: “First of all, you have to imagine maybe the fastest roller coaster on the planet, then get rid of your seat belts and all safety equipment. Throw that away – that’s for the cars. Then it’s like hanging onto a bullet as it’s getting fired out of a gun. It’s 3Gs, so if you’re 150 pounds, it’s like 450 pounds slamming against you. And you’re going to leave the starting line at 10,000 rpm. The front wheel comes up into the air. You can’t steer with the handlebars, so you’re leaning back and forth on the motorcycle with your feet on the foot pegs. And hopefully the front wheel comes down. And as you go through the quarter-of-a-mile after pushing the shifter five times, hopefully your eyes are closed. Oh – and you have to be on the motorcycle when it crosses the finish line.”

Johnson’s seemingly boundless energy and tireless effort to secure marketing partnerships is paying off. He has picked up associate sponsorships with both Velocity Business Innovators/YourVelocity.com (who also helps sponsor Larry Dixon on the Top Fuel side of NHRA) and Robert A. Tull Plumbing, of Gaithersburg, Md. (whose clever “business card” is a cellophane-wrapped chocolate plunger bearing his contact information). Johnson said Tull “called from out of the blue” just before the Countdown to the Championship started and “said he wanted to help.”

So things are looking up for Johnson, who despite battling the bigger teams as an independent owner-rider landed among the top 12 qualifiers Friday. He still couldn’t help fretting about his drive to post more impressive results.

He sat in the staging lanes, studying the screen on his laptop computer as it balanced on his gas tank for a last-second tweak to his ignition system. Plenty of racers go through last-second adjustments before a run, but Johnson was a bit chagrined that he was seen “cramming for a test,” as it were – a task he said he should have completed in the pit.

After his first run Friday, he sighed and beat himself up: “I’m trying to figure out why I make such bad decisions.” His decisions could have landed him higher on the grid than 13th, where he began the qualifying process. However, he cracked the desired top-12 at No. 11 – something seasoned riders, even champions, Matt Smith and Angelle Sampey, along with Joe DeSantis and Brian Pretzel, would have liked to claim Friday. Shawn Gann took the final spot Friday (No. 12) that guaranteed a qualifying time would carry over to Saturday.

 

 

 

 

 

 

FRIDAY NOTEBOOK

TOP FUEL

‘I’M STILL HERE AND IN CONTENTION’ – Doug Kalitta entered the Countdown as the Top Fuel points leader but has dropped in the standings to second, third, and now fifth as this fourth of six playoff races got under way Friday.

He sent a 3.747-second, 326.95-mph message to the rest of the class in the evening session of the NHRA Nationals at Maple Grove Raceway, near Reading, Pa., that they shouldn’t count out him and his Mac Tools Dragster.

“This is definitely the time to get going if we’re going to make something happen,” Kalitta said, poised to secure his seventh top-qualifying position of the season.

He said his dragster “didn’t seem like it was going to make it” down the track without an incident, but it did and Kalitta called that “a relief.” He said crew chief Jim Oberhofer told him before that run – which vaulted Kalitta from 12th place to first with two more sessions scheduled for a possibly rainy Saturday – that he was “really going after it.” Deadpanned Kalitta, “You can never tell what that means.”  

His rivals know what that means, and they know what a rain-cooled October day at Maple Grove means. It means they all will be swinging for the fence. Kalitta said he imagines he’ll be among those seeking to rewrite the national elapsed-time record for 20 valuable points if conditions permit.

“I think we will,” he said, adding that he hopes Oberhofer “gets it figured out what he needs to do to make that happen.”

Talk turned to a possible first sub-3.7-second run Saturday, and Kalitta addressed whether that is possible. “I think it is,” he said. “If a car is going to do it, I hope my car will be the first one to do it.”  

REMEMBERING THAT RUN - Matco Tools Dragster driver Antron Brown owns the Maple Grove Raceway elapsed-time record at 3.701 seconds, which happens to be the quickest run in NHRA history. Along with that 2012 feat that weekend, he clocked his career-best speed of 328.78 mph.

“Going that fast, no way I thought we’d be able to do that,” Brown said, remembering that “the weekend was kind of odd with it being warmer Friday night, but Saturday it was overcast and cool. We went out in those second two qualifying sessions and the runs just kept getting faster. By Sunday, there was a threat of rain and it was actually cold. I know at one point they weren’t sure they could get the track warm enough for us to run, but once they did we won a couple of rounds with some low 3.70s before it rained us out. Coming back Monday morning, the conditions were just perfect and we made that run of 3.701. I just wish we could have come back and won the race.”

He has won more events this season than any other Top Fuel racer (six), most recently last weekend at St. Louis. (Incidentally, that makes the fourth time in six years Brown has won six races. During that span, no other Top Fuel racer has won six races more than once.)  Brown is two victories away from tying drag-racing icon Don “The Snake” Prudhomme for 10th on the all-time list.

All those accolades are ones he’ll think about later. Right now he has a second series championship on his mind.

After he lost in the opening round at Indianapolis then began with Countdown with the same results at Charlotte and Dallas, Brown said his Gateway Motorsports Park victory “was really our only hope of contending for the championship. We had some struggles, but we just kept pressing and we got it figured out. We got ourselves back in position with three races left. It’s still anybody’s championship.”

FRESH PARTS, FRESH CHANCE - If Steve Torrence should earn the Top Fuel title, he would become the first driver to win NHRA titles in the Top Fuel and the Top Alcohol Dragster classes. If he is to have any chance, the No. 4-ranked driver will have to make his big move this weekend. It’s hard to make headway with this caliber of competition.

Said Torrence as proof, “We went to the semis last week and lost two spots. That’s how tough it is out here, but for us to be racing with the big dogs for the big prize, that’s very gratifying for a family operation and a great to credit to Hogan and all my guys. They’ve worked their tails off this year, and, so far, there hasn’t been much to show for it. We’re going to try to change that this week, though.”

 The owner-driver of the family-backed team from Kilgore, Texas, has a special weapon in his arsenal this weekend: a fresh supply of proven and pristine parts and pieces that crew chief Richard Hogan had set aside specifically for the final three events (Reading, Las Vegas, Pomona). “We held back some of our inventory, especially clutch discs and stuff we know runs well, for the Countdown,” Torrence said. He said a lack of inventory is what “burned us the last couple years. We learned from it. Hopefully it’ll pay off.”

So far so good. Torrence was fifth in the order after the first session and eighth at thecose of Friday’s action.

SHOOTING FOR TOP FIVE – No. 8-ranked Khalid alBalooshi has had to adjust his season goal to account for a rough start to the Countdown, but a return to Maple Grove Raceway has lifted his spirits.

“I don’t know if we have a shot to win the championship now,” the Al-Anabi RacingDragster driver said. “We are way behind, but we can still finish in the top five. I think we can do that. If something really crazy happens and we can make a big jump in the points, I don’t know. But really, I think our team should try for the top five in points.”
 
The Dubai native, who said he is hoping for “a good race on a good track,” said, “We started the Countdown with three straight races where we had some kind of problem with the racetrack. I hope our team can have a good weekend. We started the Countdown and went to the final round in the first race. Then we lost in the first round at the next two races. We need to get back to making the kind good runs we know the Al-Anabi team can make. We are going to do the best that we can do. 
 
“I won my first race in Reading, so it will always feel good to go back there. When I get to that place, I know I have won there. I know I can do it. I know our team can be one of the best in the show, and that is always a good feeling,” al Balooshi said.
 
The Al-Anabi Racing team has won four of the last five races at Maple Grove with three different drivers: Larry Dixon (2009, 2010), alBalooshi (2012), and Shawn Langdon (2013).
 

FUNNY CAR

PEDREGON CRUZES – In Friday-night conditions at Maple Grove Raceway that the Tim Wilkerson camp called “Candyland,” meaning primo, or ideal, Cruz Pedregon registered the first and only three-second elapsed time in Funny Car qualifying for the NHRA Nationals.

His 3.991-second pass at 319.52 mph in the Snap-On Tools Toyota got the attention of the rest of the class. In taking the provisional No. 1 qualifying position away from early leader Matt Hagan (4.008 seconds, class-fastest 321.50 mph), Pedregon also calmed his own fears.

He said he had been concerned because “we didn’t make a representative pass” in the first session and ended up 16th of 17.

He gave himself another cause for concern, though, with his outstanding run. He blew up his engine at the end of the pass. He said the mishap will set him back anywhere between $10,000 and $20,000, but at least “it was a good blow-up. We blew the motor up, but we got everything out of it.” He said that fourth three-second run he has posted “was really special to me.”

Furthermore, Pedregon said, “To say this is one of my favorite tracks would be an understatement.”

BIG DIEHL - Jeff “Surfer Dude” Diehl is a long way from his Monterey, Calif., home. But a big part of his heart is here in the region, where he won his first drag race. He beat Paul Lee in the final of the 2006 President’s Cup at Budds Creek, Md., in IHRA competition. Is seeking funding to run a full 2015 schedule.

Diehl narrowly missed slipping into the top 12 Friday. He’s 13th with a 4.120-second (.012 of a second behind No. 12 Courtney Force’s time). Two final qualifying sessions are set for Saturday.

AND THEN THERE WERE TWO - Funny Car’s John Force and Pro Stock’s Kenny Delco are the only active professional drivers who competed at the first NHRA national event at Maple Grove Raceway. The Eastern Pennsylvania racetrack is celebrating its 30th edition of this event.

THE SOCKS CAN’T HURT - Funny Car provisional 10th spot Friday went to Tim Wilkerson, whose initial goal Friday was to make a strong, clean run in the first qualifying session in his Levi, Ray & Shoup Ford Mustang, did that and found himself eighth. Like many others, he anticipated the cool conditions causing his competitors to go nuts in chasing a killer elapsed time. So he, too, used a more aggressive tune-up and ended up shutting off the engine early as it flirted with the center line. And he slid back to 10th overnight.
 
"You've got a very good track that's known for big numbers when the conditions are right, and the conditions were pretty conducive to doing it tonight, but it's never easy in this sport," Wilkerson said. "When you're making 10,000 horsepower, the line between tire spin and tire shake is pretty narrow, so even on a night like this you can't just load it up and throw the kitchen sink at it. A lot of people didn't make it, early in their runs, but our car was running fast enough to be pretty light-footed out there, carrying the front end quite a ways, and it didn't want to come back off the center line.  I've hit a couple of timing blocks this year, and I didn't want to do it again.
 
"Now we'll just wait and see what tricks Mother Nature has up her sleeve for tomorrow,” he said. “This is a really peculiar part of the country with regard to weather systems, because sometimes they look like they can't miss us and we never see them, and a lot of times they get here and just stop and spin around over us for days. I brought extra socks, so I'm prepared."
 

PRO STOCK

‘TEAMWORK MAKES DREAM WORK’ - Erica Enders-Stevens said she was looking for a baseline Friday in her Elite Motorsports Camaro. It turned out her baseline put her at the top of the Pro Stock qualifying order overnight with a 6.513-second elapsed time at 211.76 mph. She credited her crew, saying “Teamwork makes the dream work.”   

“We wanted to get a baseline in case we get some sprinkles tomorrow,” she said after knocking Shane Gray from the tentative No. 1 spot in the second session. She said her first run was “conservative,” because “we didn’t want to be on the outside, looking in.”

Like everyone else, Enders-Stevens and team are strategizing according to weather reports and are expecting some early-Saturday showers and cooler temperatures later on that should yield record-setting runs.

She said she’s aware the Countdown is “down to three races” but said she doesn’t dwell on the fact if she should pass points leader Jason Line, hold off her challengers, and dethrone current champion Jeg Coughlin she would become the sports’ first female Pro Stock champion. “I try not to get too far ahead of myself,” Enders-Stevens said. “God already has a plan.” She said he job is “to execute the task at hand.”    

BROGDON GETS SURPRISE, ALL RIGHT - Before the race began, Pro Stock racer Rodger Brogdon said his Owens Corning Camaro would “be a whole different car than it was this past weekend. We're going to . . .change everything in that car, front to back. We're going in a whole different direction, that's for sure.”
 
The Houston businessman said, "If you look at the incremental sheets . . . we are really suffering, in the 60-foot to 330 area. The car is running good down the back half. We're not starting from scratch, but we're making some major moves in the four-link area.
 
“We can run just as well as anybody there. We just have to get to the middle faster. We know what the problem is. We just haven't figured out how to fix it yet. Soon we're going to run out of races to figure it out,” he said. “Hopefully, we figure it out this weekend so we can have good races for the rest of the year."
 
Brogdon wasn’t exactly sure what results his overhaul would bring, although he said, “It's going to be pretty fast there I'm sure.” To hedge his bet, he said, “Ask me after Q1 though, and if I tell you I've got my car fixed, then I'll be excited. When you make these kinds of moves, just turning the clutch pedal the first time can be an adventure. You don't know what is really going to happen."
 
Indeed he didn’t. He wound up with something Friday he didn’t anticipate – either food poisoning or a miserable touch of the stomach flu and almost had to forgo the opening run of the weekend. He took the 10th spot in the order in that first run, despite a clutch malfunction going into second gear. Then he retired to the lounge of his hauler, lying down with a cold towel over his head. He ended the day in the No. 11 slot.
 
FRANK TALK – Frank Gugliotta, of Mount Airy, Md., hadn’t raced a Pro Stock car since his appearance here at Maple Grove one year ago. But he wasn’t all that rusty Friday, taking the tentative No. 15 place in the line-up in his 2013 Ford Mustang at 6.719 seconds and 202.64 mph. 

Once a regular on the International Hot Rod Association circuit and frequent competitor in NHRA action, Gugliotta has raced, by his best guess, “a half-dozen times since 2009.” 

He spent some of his time out of a car serving as crew chief for J.R. Carr, the Washington farmer who has stepped away from drag racing to tend his gigantic potato crop.

‘THREE FORD-KETEERS’??? – Ford hasn’t enjoyed a strong presence in the Pro Stock ranks in recent years. But this weekend, Larry Morgan and his protégé Travis Mazza in the LMR Streamlight Mustang and Frank Gugliotta in his year-old Mustang carried the Blue Oval banner. The last time three Fords were in the Pro Stock mix was in August at Seattle, with Morgan, Mazza, and Mark Wolfe.

PRO STOCK MOTORCYCLE

‘GATOR BIKE’ GOBBLES TOP SPOT - St. Louis winner Jerry Savoie’s momentum continued Friday at Reading, as he was quickest both Pro Stock Motorcycle sessions Friday in pursuit of his second No. 1 start this year and second of his career.

He improved from his early 6.879-second elapsed time at 192.47 mph with a 6.860, 194.66 to give him a one-hundredth-of-a-second advantage over tentative No. 2 racer Andrew Hines.

“We came here with the intention to run (6.)67s,” Savoie said, conceding that his White Alligator Racing Suzuki might not be able to produce such a performance. “If that happens, we’ll be blessed by the Good Lord.”

He said one of the reasons he made the trip here from his Cut Off, La., home is the weather forecast that could yield ideal conditions. “If we get one hit tomorrow,” Savoie said, anticipating some rain Saturday, “it’s going to be fast.”

He said he anticipated running better than he did in his second opportunity Friday  but conditions worsened. He said he was grateful nevertheless: “If I’m dreaming, somebody slap me and hit me hard, with a bat or something. I don’t know if this is even true! I’m just humbled in my heart to be doing this.”

Savoie thanked crew chief Tim Kulungian and said his team, saying, “We tested in the off-season. We’ve tested between races. We’ve tested in the wind tunnel. We’ve been working hard.”

In the previous six races, Savoie was No. 1 on the grid once (at Sonoma, Calif.) and No. 2 twice (at Indianapolis and St. Louis).