EVENT RESULTS EVENT NOTEBOOK POINTS AFTER EVENT ROUND-BY-ROUND RESULTS SPORTSMAN RESULTS

EVENT GALLERY

 

SUNDAY RANDOM NOTES

’79 TOP FUEL CHAMP BRUINS PRIDE OF NORTHWEST, CHANDLER SWEEPS SWING, TOP FUELERS EYE 3.6-SECOND RUNS, FIORITO GETS MEASURE OF P.R. REVENGE FOR HIS RACETRACK, JOHNSON PROVES SOMEONE CAN STOP BECKMAN MACHINE, ENDERS BESET BY CRAZY CIRCUMSTANCES, INTRODUCING THE WORLD’S QUICKEST AND FASTEST BEEF JERKY 

TODD BEATS LANGDON IN BATTLE TO EASE SEASON’S FRUSTRATIONS - JR Todd knew it was inevitable.

Somebody was going to get a knuckle sandwich, no matter who won the Top Fuel final round Sunday at the NHRA Northwest Nationals at Pacific Raceways near Seattle.

Todd’s Kalitta Motorsports team is notorious for pig-piling on one another in rowdy celebration when one of its four drivers wins at the dragstrip. And Sunday, they were ready to deliver punches and elbows and all sorts of mayhem in double dose, as both Todd and his Funny Car teammate Del Worsham advanced to the final round and a chance to bring the Ypsilanti, Mich.-based organization a $100,000 jackpot.

Worsham lost to Tommy Johnson Jr. in the Funny Car final before him, so the Kalitta wrestlers were more than ready to whoop it up when Todd’s 3.824-second elapsed time at 323.04 mph in the Red Line Oil Dragster defeated Shawn Langdon’s  3.902, 307.51 in the Knuckle Sandwich Toyota Dragster from Alan Johnson Racing.

Johnson denied Kalitta Motorsports its first-ever double-up triumph in 10 tries overall and its seventh opportunity since the start of 2014.   

“I was kind of hoping to see a DHL moshpit. I want to double-up so bad with Del,” Todd said following his eighth career victory. “Those guys deserve it. They’ve got one of the best Funny Cars out there. And they’re going to be a threat come Countdown time.”

So is Todd. He improved from ninth to sixth in the standings. That’s a huge leap into serious championship contention with just two races until the six-event playoff begins next month at Charlotte.

“It’s awesome,” the low-key Todd said.

“It’s still so surreal that I’m even driving for Connie Kalitta. He’s done so much for the sport, done so much as a driver, as a crew chief. Everybody knows the name Kalitta in drag racing. I’m the luckiest guy out here to be able to drive for him,” he said.

The dragster, Todd said, “is basically his personal toy. He takes a lot of pride in that thing. And he likes to see it go out there and run a quick time and definitely turn on the win lights and bring home trophies.”

He capitalized on his first final-round appearance of the season, which for him was a coup – a nose-thumbing to all the frustration that he said has beset him this season.

“We had high hopes coming into the season. We’ve been having a lot of issues,” he said.

Surely runner-up Langdon can appreciate that and vice versa, considering his team could have used the $50,000 winner’s share of the purse in light of losing its longtime primary sponsor on the ever of the season opener and living hand-to-mouth for these 16 races.

For Langdon, whose first final round since the February Winternationals bumped him up in the standings from 10th to seventh, the search for a marketing partner will go on. For Todd, some of the aggravation will let up.

Still, Todd said Sunday, “It kind of stinks not having Connie here with us.” The team owner is home, mending from knee-replacement surgery.

Kalitta Motorsports Vice-President and fellow crew chief Jim Oberhofer facilitated communication between Connie Kalitta and assistant crew chief James Riola all weekend. Todd said, “Jim O is doing a great job, working with him [Kalitta] over the phone, relaying the tune-up to James and the guys.”

Meanwhile, Langdon said, “We’ve had a tough year. We were really motivated to reach the finals. We made some great runs this weekend, and I think we finally have our race car again. It was a little disappointing to lose in the final, but we made up a lot of ground in the Countdown and we’ve got some momentum going into Brainerd and Indy.”

Langdon’s immediate concern was not running out of funds to make it to the Countdown races. Todd’s was not getting injured.

Todd said, “I’m glad I’m not on the starting line when there is a mosh pit going. But my guys, they started their own mosh pit when they got down to the finish line and tackled me and started piling on me. So I’ll probably be a little bruised up tomorrow – but nothing a few beers won’t cure tonight.”

TOMMY JOHNSON JR. CAPTURES SECOND FUNNY CAR WIN OF 2015 - Just when it appeared that Jack Beckman’s domination of NHRA’s nitro Funny Car class was going to continue, Tommy Johnson Jr. intervened.

The veteran driver of the Make-A-Wish Dodge Charger ended Beckman’s two-race winning streak in the semifinals and then used a holeshot to beat Del Worsham in the finals of the Northwest Nationals Sunday in Seattle.

Johnson clocked a 4.073-second elapsed at 308.00 mph to defeat Worsham’s 4.042-second lap at 307.51 mph. The difference was at the starting line as Johnson had an 0.040 reaction time compared to Worsham’s 0.087 light.

“I’m so happy for our guys,” Johnson said. “The car is so competitive right now and the class is so competitive and we’re peaking at the right time getting ready for the Countdown. I have a lot of confidence. When they told me I won the race against (Worsham) on a holeshot, then it got a little crazy. You can screw up a win, but as a driver, the only way you can make one happen is to win it on a holeshot.”

The six-race Countdown to the Championship begins Sept. 18-20 in Charlotte, N.C.

This was Johnson’s second win of the season as he also won at Chicago (July 12) and it was the 12th of his career and 10th in nitro Funny Car. Johnson also has two Top Fuel national event wins. He won his first national event in Top Fuel in 1993 in Seattle over Cory McClenathan and he added one more Top Fuel national event victory at Memphis in 1994.

Johnson became the third driver in Pacific Raceways history to win Top Fuel and Funny Car national event titles. Johnson joins Worsham (2011 Top Fuel and 1999 Funny Car) and Ron Capps (1995 Top Fuel and 1998 Funny Car) in the elite Seattle club.

“That’s pretty cool,” Johnson said. “I didn’t realize that.”

On Sunday, Johnson defeated Paul Lee and Chad Head before facing Beckman in the semis.

Johnson used a 4.070-elapsed time to defeat Beckman’s 4.166-second lap. Beckman’s blazing fast Funny Car slowed early in its run when it lost a cylinder.

“I never saw him” Johnson said about Beckman, his Don Schumacher Racing teammate. “I knew I had to cut a good light because that was the only advantage I could get on him without outrunning him. It was just a matter of time because they put so many good runs together you knew it had to come to an end at some point. We were at driver intros (Sunday morning) and I was talking to Tony Schumacher and everybody was talking about Beckman and I told Tony if we could get to the semis that’s where I would meet him and said that’s perfect because that’s the round he would be most susceptible to smoking the tires or having a problem because it was going to be the hottest of the day, and that gives us our best chance. We got there and I thought this might be our chance and we have to take advantage of it. I tell you my crew chief John Collins is doing such a good job. He and (assistant crew chief) Rip Reynolds they are not trying to do what Beckman is doing because we don’t know how yet. They are running the race track and they are running to win that round and the car was so consistent. I felt like I won Indy when I beat Beckman in the semis.”

Johnson is third in the point standings with 1,063 points behind reigning world champion Matt Hagan (1,177) and Beckman (1,172). Johnson has been to four final rounds in the last seven races. Tracy Renck

MCGAHA WINS SECOND PRO STOCK EVENT IN A ROW - On Sunday, Pro Stock pilot Chris McGaha didn’t drive like he had two left feet.

The Odessa, Texas native drove with two right-footed socks for the second week in a row and things fell in his favor as he won his second consecutive national event and the second of his career.

McGaha’s lastest victory came at the Northwest Nationals in Seattle, as he beat five-time Pro Stock world champion Jeg Coughlin in the finals.

McGaha clocked a 6.507-second lap at 212.59 mph to edge Coughlin’s 6.532-second effort at Pacific Raceways.

“Yes I do,” said McGaha, who is behind the wheel of the Harlow Sammons Chevy Camaro when asked if he was wearing two right socks. “I’m going to keep doing it (wearing two right-footed socks).”

The Seattle outing was almost identical to McGaha’s Sonoma, Calif., performance as at both races he qualified No. 1 and took home the titles.

McGaha became the first Pro Stock driver to capture back-to-back race victories from the No. 1 qualifying spot since Allen Johnson accomplished the feat in 2012 at Denver and Sonoma.

“I guess at this point, it makes me think of Lou Brown,” McGaha said. “You won this one and another one, you know what you call that? A winning streak.”

Lou Brown was the manager of the Cleveland Indians in the 1989 movie Major League. The character was played by the late James Gammon.

In Seattle, McGaha ousted Joey Grose, Vincent Nobile, and Shane Gray before defeating Coughlin in the finals.

“Taking down Jeg Coughlin two weeks in a row, something tells me he’s going to want revenge at some point,” said McGaha, who knocked out Coughlin in the semis at Sonoma.
McGaha arrived at Seattle fourth in the point standings – 210 behind leader Greg Anderson and he left town in third place, now in front of two-time world champion Jason Line, and only 175 points in back of leader Anderson.

“We knew we were close to Jason so we went around Jason,” McGaha said. “That’s a pretty big deal to go around Jason Line in the points. That’s way big.”

McGaha also clinched a spot in the six-race Countdown to the Championship, which begins Sept. 18-20 in Charlotte, N.C.

McGaha made his Pro debut in 2011 and he finished a career-best 10th in the points last season.

“We have got on a roll here and it does give us a legitimate chance (to win the championship),” McGaha said. “I’ve seen guys in the past peak too early and I don’t know if we’ve done that.” Tracy Renck

BRUINS AMONG NORTHWEST LEGENDS – Rob Bruins, the 1979 Top Fuel champion, never has met Pro Stock Motorcycle racer Eddie Krawiec. The closest connection they ever have had is a Lewis Bloom selfie photo with Bruins texted from last year’s NHRA Northwest Nationals at Seattle.

Bloom, the “Stats Guy” from ESPN’s drag-racing telecasts, sent the picture to Krawiec, the three-time bike champion, along with this message: “You have something in common with this guy. Do you know him?” Krawiec responded no.

Bruins and Krawiec share the distinction of winning the series crown without winning a single race along the way. When Bruins pulled that off, the tour had far fewer events. Most figured that wasn’t likely to happen again, and for 29 years they were right.

But Krawiec came along and earned the first of his titles in 2008 the same way Bruins earned his in 1979.

Bruins, who lives a ferry boat ride away from Pacific Raceways in scenic Kitsap County, pointed to one big difference between his feat and Krawiec’s: “He turned around and won the championship again.” Krawiec claimed back-to-back titles in both 2011 and 2012. Bruins won only one championship.

Although he moved from Garden Grove, Calif., to Silverdale, Wash., when he was 12, Bruins claims the Northwest as his home. (He lettered in baseball, basketball, and football at Central Kitsap High School and recently retired after 22 years of overseeing the department that conducted non-destructive testing on the U.S. Navy’s Trident Submarines at Bangor, Wash.)

But after he attended his first drag race at Lions Drag Strip at Long Beach, Calif., he spent summers at the races at Lions, Orange County International Raceway, and Irwindale. He worked on cars for Jerry “The King” Ruth and Herm Petersen, but Bruins said, “Nobody knew who I was in drag racing until I started driving for Herm Petersen in 1976.” That year, he and Jim Wright campaigned an alcohol Funny Car.

“I had just been accepted for college, continuing on from Olympic College, to go to Western [Western Washington University in Bellingham]. And Herm asked me if I wanted to go on the road with him as his mechanic. So I never showed up at Western. I just never showed up when I was supposed to. I was a drag racer,” he said.

Petersen experienced at a July 1973 Professional Dragster Association event at Orange County a devastating crash and fire that melted his nose, claimed his fingertips, and burned 55 percent of his body. By 1976, he was back in the race car.

Said Bruins, “He had another accident in Calgary, Alberta, just in a match-race deal. It blew the blower off, took the wing off, and he ended up in a cow pasture.  After he got burned, he wasn't afraid to get back in the car because he knew what happened. The axle broke. Accidents happen like that but with the increased safety equipment they had, he felt safe in the car. In the second accident, he didn't know why it took the blower off. And that scared him. He was in the middle of his last year of his Olympic Brewery sponsorship and he said, ‘I've got a wife and three boys, and I don’t want to jeopardize them by getting back in that race car when I don’t know what's wrong with it.’ ”

Planning to step aside, Petersen asked Bruins for the phone number of another racer and got Bruins pondering a career-changing move.

“He called me to get the name of another driver, because I wasn't licensed to drive Top Fuel cars at the time. As soon as I gave him the phone number for another driver, I drove straight to his house and said, 'Hey, what about me? Let me drive this thing.' He let me do it,” Bruins said. “The next week I got qualified – I got my license, and the next race we got to race at was the PDA race at Fremont, California, and we won it. I beat ["Big Daddy" Don] Garlits in the final – my first race I'm driving in competition in a Top Fuel car.

“When you do something like that,” he said, “I think you really establish you have the mindset to be a racer, because anybody can drive one of those cars, honestly. Anybody can leave from the starting line and get the parachute out at the other end. But it's how people react on the starting line and don't worry about who's in the other lane. Look at all those guys who never win races because they get psyched up about who's in the other lane and they're not really race car drivers. You've just got to have the mindset that 'I'm here. I'm just going to do the best I can with what I've got.'

He earned his championship while driving for Gaines Markley, a Federal Way, Wash., product. And Bruins said he didn’t think he ever would win a championship without winning a race.

“No, huh-uh,” Bruins, a quiet-spoken man who claimed he “was not one of the self-promoters”  and“never was Mr. Social Guy,” said. “The Northwest has had some fantastic fuel racers over the years. I feel privileged to be part of them, that fraternity. I have to honestly say I was just lucky to drive for some good teams and guys who knew what it was about.

“I drove for Herman, who got out of the seat and put me in it. So he understood what was going on. Later I drove for Gaines, and it was the same program. He understood what it was like to be in the seat. I think in both cases, those guys, not being in the seat anymore, were able to make smarter tune-up decisions because it took the driver emotion of being the winner out of the equation,” Bruins said. “Now it’s 'What can I do to make this car beat that lane?' That's all you’re trying to do."

Bruins tackled the question of whether the cars are the stars and decided, “Now the cars are the stars, because the drivers are not even part of the equation. Back when I raced, I was the RacePac. I was the data recorder. All the other drivers were, too.

“I was so fortunate to drive for Herm Petersen and Gaines Markley, and they understood when we talked about a shudder or 'It felt like a wet lean' – they knew what I was talking about and could make changes. There's a whole lot of drivers right now who if it wasn't for that RacePac telling the tune-up guy what happened, the drivers don't know what happened. There are still drivers who don’t know a thing about the car who are excellent drivers. Don't get me wrong. You don’t want to ask Shirley Muldowney to build a race car and put the engine together, but she could tell you what happened on a run. But there are so many people now who couldn’t. And the fact that I had been a mechanic first [helped].

“Don Garlits said one time at a race, 'You know what I'd like to see? I'd like to see 'em take every one of the guys who qualified for this race and put us each in a garage and put our race car in there disassembled. The driver goes in and the driver has to come out of there with a car that’ll race.’ And he looked around and said, ‘You know, there’s only going to be four of us racing,’ ” Bruins said.

“That’s the way it was. Back then, every [team] was a three-man crew,” he said. “Gaines and I would bring one other person. [Competition Plus contributor] Chris Horn was our guy. Chris and I would do all the maintenance work. If we were on the road somewhere, Gaines still had a business to run.”

His 1978 season was memorable. “We had an unbelievable streak,” Bruins said. “We went to Indianapolis. We were runner-up at Indianapolis. We went to Edmonton and won the last Division 6 points race up there. We came to Seattle, back when they had the Fall Nationals and won the Fall Nationals. I won Ontario that year, beat Gary Beck in the finals. Gary Beck and Gaines Markley, who I was driving for, were best friends through high school.”

 Following a 10-year hiatus, Bruins drove a Competition Eliminator entry for the Byron Brothers of Hoquiam, Wash., from 1991-93, setting several national elapsed-time records and finishing eighth nationally.

“It’s just been in the past few years I’ve gotten to know guys like John Fletcher. He had one of the first Funny Cars in the Northwest.

Bruins worked as an assistant coach for a girls select fastpitch softball team for four or five years. Today he’s active in the Bremerton Yacht Club.     

DeJORIA HAS EXCITING WEEKEND – Despite a rather snoozy .104-second reaction time, Alexis DeJoria stiff-armed Courtney Force in the first round of Funny Car eliminations Sunday. DeJoria pulled to the line in 10th place, with Force in 11th place and only two more races before the Countdown fields are set this Labor Day weekend.

DeJoria won the pivotal match-up and preserved her edge over Force in the standings and gained a head-to-head advantage (5-4) in first-round pairings. DeJoria evened her overall record against her friend at six victories apiece. The Tequila Patron Toyota Camry driver did it with a 4.373-second pass against Force’s 4.461.

John Force, who had lost one-third of his match-ups with the Kalitta Motorsports driver already, avenged his daughter’s disappointment.

That wasn’t DeJoria’s first excitement of the weekend. She rode out the first explosion of her career during Friday night qualifying. She took it in stride.

“You know it’s going to happen one day,” she said. “You’re just wondering, ‘When is it going to happen?’ So now I know what it feels like. All right, now I can scratch that off the list.

“I just hope there’s not too much crap on the track for the dragster guys behind us,” she said Friday night, “but we ran a 4.08 [second elapsed time], which is still good.”

As for the incident itself, DeJoria said, “You can’t teach anybody how to react to something like that. You just got to see what happens when it happens. It’s part of this kind of racing. When you mix nitro in the fuel tank this is what you’re going to get.” – Michael Dennis contributed to this report.

COULD HAVE BEEN A 3.6-SECOND RUN? - When Tony Schumacher posted a 3.737-second pass in the final Top Fuel qualifying session Saturday, he detonated his engine near the finish line and ended up with a 288.33-mph speed.

It came after he and Don Schumacher Racing teammate Antron Brown in the Matco Tools/Toyota/U.S. Army Dragster did their burnouts and official starter Mark Lyle had them shut off their engines because of a few sprinkles. So they had to refire their engines.

One keenly interested observer was respected crew chief Mike Kloeber, who calculated that if Schumacher had finished the run under full power and clocked a 320-mph speed, he would have recorded the first 3.6-second run in class history. He arrived at that number using the formula that five miles an hour equals one-hundredths of a second. He subtracted six-hundredths from 3.73 and came up with 3.67.

“He got robbed,” Kloeber said.

After reflecting overnight about the numbers, Schumacher said Sunday morning, “I’d say more like about [3.]689.

“But we ran out of fuel. It’s not that we got robbed,” the U.S. Army Dragster driver said. “It’s our call. We could have splashed the fuel. We made the decision. You just don’t know in that situation. The longer you wait, the hotter the clutch is getting. The guys did the right call. We knew we were going to be a little light on fuel. It just ran out at 765 feet. At 765 [feet], the car had the burst panel out.”

He called it a “bad to the bone run.”

Richie Crampton, who ran immediately after Schumacher in that same left lane, seized the No. 1 starting spot. And he said he was hoping he could be the first one to claim the distinction of cracking the 3.6-second barrier.

“We all do. I’ve been doing it a long time I definitely deserve that,” Schumacher said.

FIORITO GLOATS – Track owner Jason Fiorito took the chance Sunday to gloat about the flurry of record-setting elapsed-time and speed records in all three professional classes – including Jack Beckman’s quickest pass in Funny Car history (3.921 seconds) – at his previously maligned Pacific Raceways.

“If we got conditions like we got yesterday, with the track in the condition it’s in, we will be the national record-holder in every single pro class,” Fiorito said proudly.

He found some verification with Tony Schumacher. The Top Fuel points leader and reigning series champion said on sunny Sunday morning, “Everything’s underestimated, except [Jack Beckman’s crew chief] Jimmy Prock. If it was cloudy right now, we’d be going for a world record.”

OH, BOY – OBERTO – Seattle is home to quite a few corporate giants, including Boeing, Microsoft, Starbucks, Amazon, Costco, Eddie Bauer, T-Mobile, and Expedia. But one of the region’s most beloved companies is the food industry’s Oberto. And it was plastered this weekend on the Jim Dunn Racing Funny Car that John Hale drives.

“The Oberto family is famous up here for their hydroplane racing. It’s a name that just goes with racing up here in Seattle,” Hale said. “They announced a week or so ago that they were ending their sponsorship of the hydroplane racing. We’ve been talking to them since last year about doing something in drag racing. So we’re hoping that we can build on this.”

Oberto was on the car for the one and only time this season, unless something changes. But Hale said, “We’ve got a lot of fans who have come by and said they’re really excited to see the Oberto on the car. One fan described it as almost as nostalgic as seeing Marlboro or a beer sponsor on the car. It’s that [iconic].”

WE DO HAVE A SWEEP – Jack Beckman came to Seattle as the lone pro racer eligible to sweep the Western Swing. He didn’t. Tommy Johnson Jr., his Don Schumacher Racing mate, spoiled his bid to join Joe Amato, John Force, Cory McClenathan, Greg Anderson, Larry Dixon, Tony Schumacher, and Antron Brown in the elite group of “sweepers.” Johnson advanced to the final – and a victory – by using a 4.070-secnd E.T. to burst Beckman’s bubble and outdo his 4.166.

But Seattle did produce a Western Swing sweep – for Terry Chandler. She funds both Beckman’s Infinite Hero Dodge Charger and Johnson’s Make-A-Wish Dodge Charger that operate under the Don Schumacher Racing umbrella. So with Beckman’s victories at Denver and Sonoma, Calif., Chandler unofficially becomes the eighth to sweep the three-races-in-three-weekends grind. – Michael Dennis  

DREAMY DOMINANCE – Don Schumacher said he’s “kind of in Dreamland” with the performance of his seven-car teams this weekend and this season.

“My team is performing so well, at such a high level, it’s unbelievable – not just Jack’s car but all of the teams. All seven of my teams are at a level I’m just stunned with,” he said. “We’ve never, ever come close to winning as many races as we’ve won this year, and the competition is so darn tight. We’ve been very fortunate, and there’s some luck to it. But the harder you work, the luckier you get. My guys are working hard, keeping their heads down, doing what they have to do to get the job done.”

As for Beckman’s team, Schumacher said, “Never would I have imagined it would run [3.]91 yesterday. I figured he would run a mid-90 yesterday, but to throw up a 91 . . . That team is doing such remarkable things, with a different way of running the car than we’ve ever run a car. Jimmy Prock and Chris Cunningham and John Medlen and all the crew guys on that team are the ones making it happen. Jack gets to ride that horse, but that team is really getting the job done.”  

UGLY ALL THE WAY AROUND – According to Top Fuel team owner Bob Vandergriff Jr., a broken reverser was the culprit that knocked No. 3 qualifier Dave Connolly and his C&J Energy Services Dragster out of competition in the first round Sunday.

As soon as Connolly stepped on the gas for his run against No. 14 qualifier Terry McMillen, the motor blew up and the parachutes dropped out.

McMillen won with a 4.530-second elapsed time and said, “It wasn’t pretty. It was ugly. But we didn’t oil the track. It knocked the blower belt off. But we’re going to the next round.”

NOT TO WORRY - Larry Dixon’s crew chief, Mike Guger, said he was looking for a little atonement this weekend. “We’ve been off our game a little bit. We’re trying to redeem ourselves,” he said. Guger need not worry. Dixon, who qualified fifth and reached the semifinals, remained third in the standings.

ODD EVENTS PLAGUE ENDERS – Call him “Gentleman Jeg” Coughlin. He hadn’t pre-staged, so he waited patiently (but smartly with his engine shut off) for quarterfinal opponent Erica Enders’s crew to hurriedly fix her Camaro’s problems at the starting line. Well, maybe not altogether gentlemanly – because then he defeated her on a holeshot.

"The fortunate thing is my teammate Jeg Coughlin waited for me," Enders said. "He didn't have to, but we're a team back here, and we're a team up there [at the starting line]. He shut his car off, and he wasn't going to pre-stage without me. That speaks a lot about his character and the class he brings to this operation.
 
"The good thing about that round was that I was racing a teammate. Nobody else would have waited, and one of the red cars was going to the semifinals."
 
What wasn’t pleasant about the round was the series of mishaps that hampered her effort and left her feeling, a bit too harshly against herself, as though she had been Elite Motorsports’ weak link Sunday.
 
“I fired the car and had no oil pressure and no vacuum, so I radioed my guys and told them," Enders said. "My crew chief just waved me in the water to start the burnout. I went to start my burnout, and then they were waving their arms to stop. So I aborted the burnout.
 
"They told me to shut it off, and they pulled my front-end clip off. Turns out the oil sump belt had come off, so there was no oil turning to the motor. They put that on, put the front end back on, and I fired it up. I had to reset all my switches, and the starter said I could do a short burnout. As I was pulling up, they were like, 'No, back up.' I backed up through the water and started my whole procedure over again,” she said. “It was extremely rushed, and I was unable to do a burnout across the starting line, which means we couldn't put any rubber down or burn through the resin."
 
She said, "We did what we could with what we had. I pulled in and pre-staged, but to be quite honest, I didn't rise to the occasion today. I'm pretty disappointed in myself as a driver. Regardless of the distractions up there, I'm a world champion for a reason, and I didn't show it today. It makes me mad, but at the same time, there were eight things that were horribly wrong all at one time, and it was a distraction. This is a game that's won and lost by thousandths of a second.
 
"There have been multiple times when I did rise to the occasion, but today just wasn't one of them" Enders lamented.
 
WILKERSON CALCULATING – Funny Car owner-tuner-driver Tim Wilkerson, who remained in eighth place in the standings, sliced the deficit between No. 7-ranked Cruz Pedregon and himself from 40 to two this weekend. Especially helpful was his strong Round 1 victory over Pedregon.
 
Alexis DeJoria and Robert Hight, who entered the weekend 10th and ninth, respectfully, in the standings, left Seattle tied for ninth place, 51 points behind Wilkerson. DeJoria beat Courtney Force to block her out of the top 10, and Force goes to Brainerd, Minn., 124 points in back of Wilkerson.
 
Hight said, “We needed to go rounds today. [Crew chief] Mike Neff and the guys are looking at this Auto Club Chevrolet Camaro Funny Car to figure out what happened. There are two races left, so we are treating these next two races like Countdown races. We aren’t putting pressure on ourselves. We are just ramping up the focus. I have a lot of confidence in this team, and we showed we can run with anybody during qualifying.”
 
Already Wilkerson is calculating – and looking for something shiny.
 
"You have to remember that they changed Indy this year, and it's 30 points a round instead of 20," he said. "If we had a full seven-round lead with only eight left to run, that would be pretty much a lock, but the change in Indy points is meant to make it more interesting. And it probably will. We just need to keep running well and get some more rounds under our belt.
 
"Now we have a chance to get back to the shop and spread everything out to see what we have that's still shiny. A weekend off comes at just the right time, and then we'll head up to Brainerd before we go to Indy. My guys are working their butts off, but they need some time off right now to recharge and we'll take on these last two regular season races with all the focus we have. I'm ready to get after it,” Wilkerson said. 
 
HAGAN MAINTAINS POINTS LEAD  - Like Greg Anderson in Pro Stock and Tony Schumacher in Top Fuel, Funny Car’s Matt Hagan kept his lead in the standings. But Hagan said he’s planning to participate in the independent Night Under Fire classic event at Norwalk, Ohio, to prepare for the upcoming NHRA Countdown to the Championship.
 
"It's been a tricky Western Swing for this Mopar/Rocky Boots team. It certainly wasn't the results we were hoping for these last three races,” Hagan said. “We're going to go to Norwalk next weekend and have fun at the Night Under Fire match race, but we're also going to do some test runs and learn from there."

The Night Under Fire is an annual event at Summit Racing Equipment Motorsports Park that features Funny Car match races. The team will use it as a test run to gather more data.
 
He indicated Jack Beckman’s string of eye-popping three-second runs has him and crew chief Dickie Venables thinking extra hard these days.

"Those boys across our camp with  Beckman's car really have some stuff figured out. It's been impressive,” Hagan said. “We have to press hard to run with them, but we also have to run what we know and race our car. We know what works. We've had a lot of success, and we'll have more. We lost some momentum and some ground in the points, but we'll dig our way back. This thing is very cyclical out here, and we'll win more races this season.”
 
Beckman blasted to within five points of Hagan’s lead as the tour heads in two weeks to the Lucas Oil Nationals at Brainerd, Minn. Hagan had enjoyed a 57-point advantage over No. 2-ranked Beckman at the start of this past weekend.

SATURDAY NOTEBOOK - BECKMAN SHINES IN HISTORIC FUNNY CAR SIDE-BY-SIDE; CRAMPTON GRABS TOP FUEL LEAD IN 11TH HOUR; McGAHA AMBUSHES COUGHLIN IN PRO STOCK; PECK JOINS McMILLEN TEAM AS WENDLAND’S ASSISTANT; BUTNER FITS IN NICELY AT KB RACING; WILKERSON ‘PUNISHED’ FOR IMPROVING; HOMETOWN RACER STRONG HAS CHEERING SECTION 

‘CAR IS BEYOND AMAZING’ – A sprinkle interrupted Funny Car qualifying just as the final pair of qualifiers was set to go. After the approximately 25-minute delay, those who stuck around got to witness Jack Beckman make the quickest pass in Funny Car history at a jaw-dropping 3.912 seconds (at 322.88 mph).

“I just decided we needed to put it back like Sonoma [where Beckman ran a 3.921-second E.T.] and see if it’ll do it again, and it did,” Infinite Hero Dodge Charger crew chief Jimmy Prock said.

In the opposite lane from Beckman was John Force, whose 3.996, 318.32 would have been stunning in just about any other setting but by comparison almost looked sluggish. But Force wound up third in the order, because Del Worsham used his final qualifying pass to take the No. 2 starting position with his 3.984-second run. Force’s consolation is that he was part of the third side-by-side three-second performance in a one-week span.

As soon as he climbed from the world’s quickest Dodge, Beckman said, “Our car has been a bear to drive lately. It accelerates so hard in the middle. In Q1, I got it out of the groove or we would have been low E.T. of that session, too. Now it’s a joy to drive again,” Beckman said.

“It’s just ungodly to be at the reins of something this head-and-shoulders better than what everybody else has got,” he said. “And I’m not saying this to sound cocky. I’m saying this a tribute to the Infinite Hero crew. It’s absolutely mind-numbing how consistently quick this car is.”

Beckman said retired NHRA announcer Bob Frey texted him and needled, “Now you’re just showing off.”

The driver said he’s flabbergasted his car is producing elapsed times that “a week ago was unspeakable - they weren’t even spoken of. This car is just beyond amazing right now. There aren’t adjectives for this thing.”

In the end, Beckman said he would think about his opportunity to win the race, become only the second Funny Car driver to sweep the Western Swing, and set the national record that awards 20 points after a few other more important items of business.

Beckman improved the elapsed time of the national record he established last week at Sonoma, Calif. He would have to run a 3.951-second pass sometime Sunday if he is to back up Saturday’s track-record and NHRA-history-making mark for yet another national record.   

“Right now we’ve got to get past [first-round opponent] Terry Haddock,” he said. Moreover, he said he first would “get a Frosty at Wendy’s, have some seafood here at the DSR cookout, and go sleep on it.”

Worsham spoke for his DHL Toyota outfit, saying, “From the crew, to the crew chiefs, to myself, we are doing everything we can do to catch Beckman.”

All anyone could tell Worsham as of Saturday night was “Good luck.” 

TOP FUEL

CRAMPTON GRABS TOP SPOT – With one-hundredth of a second on closest rival Tony Schumacher, Richie Crampton slammed the Lucas Oil Dragster to the top of the order late Saturday in 3.727 seconds and a few minutes later declared, “We’ve got our old race car back.”

Said the Morgan Lucas Racing driver, "We started the year good and have had some rough points, but we are trying to peak at the right time. We're trying to finish off this Western Swing strong. Being No. 1 is good, but we'll see what happens on race day tomorrow. We can’t do any better than we did today.

“I thought it would be a nice, hot summer race,” Crampton said, “but we’re glad it’s cool.”

Washington’s Ron Smith, the No. 16 qualifier with a 4.189-second E.T., will try to pull off the upset over Crampton in the first round Sunday. Smith edged out Steve Chrisman, the lone driver to miss the cut.

McMILLEN GETS PECK OF FRESH HELP – Crew chief Rob Wendland has a new assistant for Terry McMillen’s Amalie Oil/UNOH Dragster. Bob Peck, who worked at John Force Racing and Bob Vandergriff Racing, joined the team as a fulltime member this week. He had helped in a consultant role for about four or five races.

“In today’s racing world, everybody has to have almost two or three crew chiefs. It’s not that we can afford that, but it’s almost to the point where you can’t afford not to have that,” McMillen said.

“Bob’s a great addition. Not only is he a tuner in his own right, but he’s also really good at communicating with the guys and bringing the guys to the next level for themselves. Overall, [the hire] is going to make the program a lot better. Right now, being focused and assisting Rob and giving him somebody to bounce things off of is really important,” he said. “We bit the bullet.”

McMillen agreed that pattern seems to be in place for him, even with parts and equipment.

“You look at what it takes to run these cars and what it takes after you break something, because you’re cutting a corner somewhere else. If you take all those numbers and you add ‘em up, in the long run, it’s cheaper to do it with another crew chief. So we’re taking that approach,” he said. “We’re going to find out for sure if that’s really true.

“What I can tell you is it has been successful as far as team morale and the output of the guys. They’re doing a better job. They have somebody they can go to and ask questions. Rob, if he’s doing it all by himself, he has to struggle, trying to give everybody a little bit of time, still look at the computer, and make all these other decisions. With Bob here now, that’s taken a lot of burden off Rob. That still gives Bob and Rob the opportunity to confer [on all matters],” McMillen said.

The Top Fuel team is a work in progress still, new since McMillen decided at the close of the 2014 season to start at Square One with his crew. He has had 16 races now to reflect on that bold move, and he said he has mixed feelings but no regrets.

“It’s a bittersweet situation. The guys I’ve surrounded myself with in the past are like family. To make that decision and try to better our opportunities, it was something that had to be done. I don’t regret it, other than from the personal-friendship standpoint,” he said. “As far as where we’re at today, I think the guys have picked up the pace. We’re not hurting much stuff anymore. It’s been a struggle. We were behind the eight-ball.”

Preseason prep at the Elkhart, Ind., shop didn’t get finished before the February season-opener in Southern California. “We never even started the car until we got to Pomona,” McMillen said, volunteering, too, that the crew worked until midnight the night they were leaving Northern Indiana to load the dragster – which wasn’t completely ready – into a new hauler that had to be set up, as well. “we were up against the wall when we left,” he said.

Although he hasn’t broken into the top 10 in the standings all year, McMillen has shown flashes of progress with semifinal finishes at Atlanta and Englishtown.

“Hot tracks seem to be better for us,” he said. “We’re not going to be the fastest. We don’t know how to run (3.)70s yet. On race day, it doesn’t take 70s to win. If we had more parts and more budget, maybe we would look at trying to throw more out there. But you have the oildown penalty, which costs you dearly. So you have a really difficult time saying, ‘Gee, we’ll just go out there and see what can happen.’ Rob’s approach all year has been to pick away at this and make this thing respond, make it repeat. And we’ve been able to do that. Our forte now is hot tracks. I’m convinced we’re still going to run a 70. It’s a matter of when.”

The best he clocked this weekend was a 3.845-second elapsed time Saturday that gave him the No. 14 starting positon and a meeting in Round 1 with No. 3 Dave Connolly.

“You’ve got such great crew chiefs and so much talent out here, when you look at Don Schumacher’s operation, Kalitta’s, and all these guys’ who have so much data and control their own destiny by the parts they make and the quality control of everything. They’re in a whole different league,” McMillen said. “I’m not going to lie. It’s still pretty good to go out there and beat anybody anytime you get the opportunity. Sometimes when you beat those powerhouse teams [and he has won this season against Dave Connolly, Clay Millican, JR Todd, Spencer Massey, and Shawn Langdon], they’re more rewarding, because they’re like a machine and very seldom do they make mistakes.

“When it’s your opportunity to outrun ’em or whatever happens, you just want to live that for a few seconds and enjoy it,” said the overexcited underdog fans get a kick out of watching. “I would love to see it more often – there’s nothing wrong with going home hoarse on Monday,” he said. “I’ve always watched racing and watched interviews. You see a car shake the tires at 300 feet – well, that’s no excitement, you know? My thing was always to make whoever is sitting in that chair become energized – or at last use enough energy to get up and turn off the TV because he doesn’t like me. But one way or the other, he’s going to do something. He’s going to move.”

Said McMillen, “I’m a blessed person to be able to do what I do, and when I get the opportunity to do well, I want to share it with everybody.”          

BROWN HAS NEW MILESTONES TO REACH – Antron Brown won from the No. 1 qualifying spot at Sonoma last weekend and posted consistent 3.7-second elapsed times in his Brian Corradi-, Mark Oswald-tuned Matco Tools/Toyota/U.S. Army Dragster. His supremacy netted him a 3.707-second qualifying time that tied him for fourth quickest in Top Fuel history, and his victory lifted him to sixth best in NHRA career Top Fuel wins. That 51st career victory and 35th in a dragster, moved the former NHRA Pro Stock Motorcycle star into a tie with "Big Daddy" Don Garlits on the all-time Top Fuel wins list.

"To tie one of the greatest racers in history is just unbelievable," Brown said, although his more immediate satisfaction was slicing Tony Schumacher’s points lead to 37 points and having another crack at overtaking him within days here at Seattle. And Brown said he wants to be No. 1 when the Countdown kicks off in September at Charlotte.

"We gained a lot of points on Tony at Sonoma, but it won't be easy to catch him over the next three races before the Countdown begins after Labor Day," he said. "That team is running strong. But this Matco/U.S. Army/Toyota team is focused, and we want that top seed when we start the Countdown."

Brown has been no worse than fifth in the lineup this weekend and closed qualifying Saturday as the No. 8 starter. He and DSR colleague Spencer Massey both registered 3.772-second E.T.s, but Massey had a faster speed (328.30 mph to Brown’s 314.39). Brown will race No. 9 Shawn Langdon in Sunday’s first round.

But Brown started the weekend running slower than expected, even though he was an enviable fourth overnight. He said he figured to run a low 3.70-second pass, possibly even a 3.69. However, the track, Brown said, had become much "tighter" than he and his crew were prepared for after the oildown/sunset delay. Unfortunately, his team did not have time to return to the pits and make all the necessary changes needed to take full advantage of what he called the "extremely optimal" conditions. He said the car could not "get up on the wheels" enough to take full advantage. – Mike Burghardt contributed to this note.

TORRENCE ‘NOT SAFE’ – Capco Contractors Dragster owner Steve Torrence is one of seven drivers battling for the final five starting positions with just three races remaining until the playoff fields are set. He came to Seattle in eighth place, not strong enough to ease his mind.

“We’re not in a safe position, by any means,” he said. “We just have to keep doing what we’ve been doing.”

What he has been doing is winning. He did so at Denver, at the start of this Western Swing, and has improved one position in the standings in each of the last three races. In the last month, Torrence has made the two quickest 1,000 foot runs of his career (3.734 last month at Chicago and 3.732 last week at Sonoma, Calif.). In Friday’s second overall qualifying session, he clocked his quickest pass at Pacific Raceways for a 3.803-second elapsed time.

But he knows a misstep this week can derail his progress.

Torrence entered the event leading JR Todd by a single point and former series champion Shawn Langdon by only three.

“You’ve got to be in it to win it,” Torrence said of the Countdown, “and there are going to be some good cars that aren’t in. There’s just 40 points between sixth place and 10th – two rounds. Then you have Clay Millican and Dave Connolly who are No. 11 and No. 12.  So we’re not safe. But we do control our own destiny and you can’t ask for more than that.  We just need to keep taking it one round at a time.”

Torrence, the 2012 winner at Seattle said the Western Swing has helped: “Racing three weeks in a row can keep your head in the game (because) you don’t lose your focus going from one race to the next. My focus and concentration haven’t been where they needed to be, but my guys haven’t faltered. And right now we feel like we can line up and beat anybody out there.”

He’ll get a chance to show that against first-round opponent Spencer Massey. Torrence qualified 10th, Massey seventh.

 

FUNNY CAR

CAPPS NOT SATISFIED WITH NO. 5 – NAPA Dodge Charger driver Ron Capps entered this event in fifth place in the standings but said he wants to use this race "to move back up in the points and get ready for the Countdown. It's so important to get ready for the Countdown and we only have this weekend and then at Brainerd (Minn.) and the U.S. Nationals at Indy before points are reset for the Countdown.”

Watching Don Schumacher Racing teammate Jack Beckman dominate at Sonoma and continue his elite performance here in qualifying surely ignites his passion to win a third Wally trophy this season. Unfortunately for him, all the crew chief camaraderie doesn’t mean his car is set up identically to Beckman’s Infinite Hero Dodge Charger. Capps said the clutch set-up, clutch fingers, clutch discs, and camshafts are among the notable differences between the two and that all DSR Funny Car crew chiefs have their own preferences for a variety of parts and their applications. Capps said if his car is set up like any of his teammates’ cars, it would be Matt Hagan’s Mopar Express / Rocky Boots Dodge. And that’s not a bad association – Hagan is the points leader.

As for the standings and the changes that might occur here, in two weeks at Brainerd, and Labor Day weekend at Indianapolis, Capps said, "There are a lot teams jockeying for positions. Fortunately, we're not one of those down in ninth or 10th, trying to protect a spot. We surely have a car that's capable of being in the No. 1 spot, and that's our goal when we leave Indianapolis. With the extra points, I don't think that's out of reach. We just need to get hot, and this NAPA team can do that."

"We do well at Brainerd and Seattle, and I'll never forget what it was like to win for the first time at Seattle."

If Capps, the No. 8 starter,is to earn his first Seattle victory since 1998, he will have to get past first-round opponent Hagan, the No. 9 qualifier, in Sunday eliminations.

NAPA Dodge car chief Dustin Heim learned Thursday that his grandmother, Lucille Incontro, died in Omaha, after a long illness. He was willing to forego Sunday's funeral to stay with the team but his racing family insisted he fly back for the service. He won't be at the track Sunday, and the team focused Friday and Saturday to prepare for not having a key member of the team.

"Dustin is a big part of this team," Ron said. "There wasn't a hiccup from anyone on this team about him leaving. Right away guys stepped up and figured out how to fill in for him on Sunday. They've been doing that today to get ready for it. That's the kind the band of merry men we have. If one guy goes down, the others are there to pick him up. I love these guys like family."

HE LIKES 28 – For anyone who ever has wondered why Funny Car driver Ron Capps has the competition number “28” . . . Capps purchased that number for two reasons. He was a fan of the late Davey Allison, who drove the No. 28 Ford in NASCAR’s top series, and Capps’ own first car was a Z28 Camaro. – Mike Burghardt  

WEIRD FOR WILKERSON – Tim Wilkerson had a great day Saturday but a weird “reward” for it.

"It's tough out here when you have a couple of days like we did, just getting better and better with each run, and you end up moving backward on the ladder. It's hard to believe a 4.01 is seventh here, but that's what we have and that's where we'll race from.  

His 4.032 in Q3 and his 4.017 in Q4 were outstanding for the independent owner-driver-tuner who has won here before. But it paled next to Jack Beckman’s over-the-top 3.912-second pass as he and John Force powered to side-by-side three-second runs.

Wilkerson improved on both of his Saturday runs but ended up sliding to seventh in the process. He will face Cruz Pedregon in Round 1.

Other notable pairings are Courtney Force versus Alexis DeJoria, in a direct fight for the final Countdown playoff spot, while top-spot contenders Matt Hagan and Ron Capps will square off in the 8-versus-9 match-up.
 
Wilkerson will go into race day trailing Cruz Pedregon by 22 points. Pedregon was docked 15 critical points after a Q4 oil-down. Wilkerson will head into race day leading Robert Hight by 31 points and DeJoria by 51. Hight will face Chad Head in the opening round.
 
“We're duking it out with Cruz in the standings, so it will be a big round,” Wilkerson said. “The Alexis-versus-Courtney match-up is everything a promoter could want, too, although I'm sure neither of them are thrilled with it.
 
"We'll see what the weather does, and just like always we'll make the call as to what we're trying to run when we see that and take a look at the track. Like last week, I'm sure you can count on us being seventh pair, too,” he said. “We had a huge crowd from [Seattle-based sponsor] Rottler with us today, and another solid guest list with them tomorrow, so hopefully we can show them a good time. I know they enjoyed themselves today."
 
MORE MATCH-UPS - In other Round 1 pairings, Tommy Johnson Jr. will race against Paul Lee, and nostalgia Funny Car racers Del Worsham and John Hale will go against each other. John Force drew Jeff Diehl for his first task Sunday. 

PRO STOCK 

McGAHA AMBUSHES COUGHLIN – Jeg Coughlin held onto his 6.501-second Pro Stock qualifying lead from Friday evening almost all the way through qualifying Saturday – until Chris McGaha came along toward the end of the final session and took the lead from him with an identical elapsed time but a faster speed. McGaha’s 212.86 mph trumped Coughlin’s 212.59.

Even McGaha called his second straight No. 1 qualifying effort “kind of shocking,” saying, “I thought somebody else would go faster.”

He said Saturday’s humidity and the sun’s game of peek-a-boo had him unsure of what to expect but once the cloud cover rolled in “we swung for the fence.”

The Sonoma winner will begin his quest for back-to-back victories against No. 16 starter Joey Grose.

QUICK FIELD – When the weekend opened, currently inactive driver Mike Edwards owned the two-year-old Pro Stock track elapsed-time record at 6.526 seconds. By the end of Saturday qualifying, the top 11 starters had run quicker than that. Coughlin and McGaha shared the quickest time   

HOW I BARTERED 170 TCKETS – Aaron Strong, who made his Pro Stock debut last weekend at Sonoma, Calif., certainly is no stranger to Pacific Raceways, in both business and drag racing.

The 38-year-old from nearby Auburn, Wash., has been racing here since he was 16 years old, sharing a retired Mustang police car with his racing father at test-and-tune sessions and later a ’62 Chevy Nova. Today he owns his own trucking business that serves the construction industry. His dump trucks haul materials for clients, who include Pacific Raceways.

And that’s how Strong, who earned the Comp Eliminator trophy last November at the NHRA Finals at Pomona, Calif., was able to barter 170 tickets for this weekend’s Northwest Nationals.

He doesn’t have a fancy hospitality area like the bigger pro teams – he doesn’t have one at all. Just the same, he connects with the customers, business associates, local racers, family, neighbors, and friends he invited to come and watch him enjoy his dream. “They come by about every minute or two and B.S. with us a little bit and take off,” Strong said, grinning, happy to have his working world and racing world intersect.

“The track will call us and say, ‘Hey, we need some sand for the barrels’ or ‘We need some rock.’ If the track needs some paving done, I find them guys to come in and do the patching. It’s kind of cool to give back to the track where I grew up racing,” Strong said. “I grew up racing Pro Bracket out here, doing the points series back in the ‘90s. I never imagined it’d turn into something like this,” Strong said.

“When I run Comp, I race here only once or twice a year and then I travel. Last year I went to 14 races – two of them were here and the rest were all over the country, West Coast. When you race at home, all your friends and family and people you work with come out. I didn’t want to debut here, and Sonoma is on the Western Swing. These are back-to-back races, and it’s a sea-level race. Denver’s altitude – I didn’t really want to go to that one for my very first race. We went back and tested and licensed at St. Louis about two months ago. That was sea level. So it just kind of made sense to set up the car to go to Sonoma and Seattle.”

Strong said he plans to compete at Las Vegas and Pomona this fall and is hoping to attend eight to 10 events next year. “We may not have enough time to test before the year starts, but we want to. It’s going to depend on how the rule changes turn out.”

Because the rules were designed to reach out to racers such as himself, Strong said overall he’s in favor of them: “I’ve wanted to go Pro Stock for 20 years. I finally get to run the class I want to run and then they do all these rule changes, which aren’t a bad thing, honestly. They’re trying to get more participation by guys like me in the class. I have mixed feelings about the rule changes, but I think it’s going to be a positive thing. I want to participate more.”      

He bought Greg Stanfield’s equipment, including his Chevy Camaro and engines – and parlayed that Friday into the 13th place in the lineup early Friday. He settled in at No. 15 overnight and remained there in the final order, preparing for a first-round meeting Sunday with No. 2  qualifier Jeg Coughlin.    

What’s more, Stanfield’s son Aaron, who drove this car in a limited number of races last season, is Strong’s clutch specialist. Mike Stanfield, Greg’s older brother, is in charge of the motor.

BB-KB A-OK – The BB-KB Connection has nothing to do with Brandon Bernstein and father Kenny Bernstein. It’s the relatively new alliance between Bo Butner, the 2006 national Comp Eliminator and five-time Division 3 champion, and the KB-Summit Racing team of Greg Anderson and Jason Line.

“They’ve learned me, and I’ve learned the car. And it’s showing,” the Floyds Knobs, Ind., resident said Friday afternoon, with a track speed milestone freshly inked in the record book. [It was a 212.39 that teammate Anderson eclipsed a couple of hours later in the evening session.]

Two-time Pro Stock champion Line tunes the car, and Butner said Line has “helped me along. All the guys are great – the hardest-working group I’ve ever seen in my life. They never quit.” Among his crew members is fiancée Randi Lyn Shipp, who packs the parachutes and helps on the starting line when she isn’t racing her own ’67 Firebird in the Stock Eliminator class, like she is this weekend. She began her Saturday by defeating British Columbian Derrick Johnston in Round 1 of eliminations, then beating local star Mark Faul, of Tacoma, by about 13 inches (.0068 seconds).

Butner, a Chevy Pro Stock driver, also competes in Stock Eliminator when feasible, oddly enough, in a Ford Cobra Jet. So he has a relationship with both automakers.

“I’ve been with them since 2010,” he said. “It’s OK because Ford’s not in Pro Stock anymore. So they kind of understand, and KB doesn’t care. The GM guys are trying to get me to switch over to the COPOs [COPO Camaro], but Ford’s been too good to us.”

What’s maybe more astounding is the decision by the KB team to bring “an outsider” into their tight-knit fold. He said they can be wary of other drivers “unless you know them from the inside out” but said they welcomed him warmly and are fun to work with “once they open up to you.” He said he understands that caution: “This is top-secret stuff.”

The KB team is associated with Vincent Nobile on a lease basis.

“That’s a big deal. That was cool, because it’s really KB against the world.” Butner said. “When they asked me at the end of last year if I’d be interested in it, I was like, ‘I don’t want to run Pro Stock and spend the money it takes.’ It’s tough. It’s a lot of hard work. They came up with a decent deal with Ken Black. All I do is drive. This is Ken Black’s car. I like Ken a lot. I respect him, him and Judy, his wife. Ken and Judy, they’ve got a big heart for racing. It all came together, and we seem to be growing together. It’s cool.”

He said, “Let’s hope we keep everything together for next year. The rule changes are kind of tough.”

For right now, 10th-place qualifier Butner will have plenty to think about, knowing he’ll take on reigning champ and 2012 Seattle winner Erica Enders, the No. 7 qualifier, in the opening round.

WHO RACES WHOM? – Jason Line (8) and Vincent Nobile (9) are among Sunday’s first-round opponents, along with Greg Anderson (4) and V Gaines (13), Shane Gray (5) and Matt Hartford (12), Jonathan Gray (3) and Deric Kramer (14), and recent winners Allen Johnson (6) and Larry Morgan (11).

FRIDAY NOTEBOOK - RECORDS FALL IN FIRST DAY AT PACIFIC RACEWAYS, NORTHWEST LEGEND STILL GOING,  CRAMPTON MAKING MORE SEATTLE MEMORIES, BRITTANY FORCE WOWS SEAHAWKS WITH HER JOB DESCRIPTION, BECKMAN RULES AGAIN, CRUZ MOTIVATES HMSELF WITH RAIDERS VISIT, COUGHLIN DOESN’T MISS A BEAT 

Seattle, notorious for its frequent rain showers that contribute to it being “The Evergreen State,” ironically had a “sun delay of 52 minutes Friday during the second Top Fuel qualifying session. The track faces west, just perfect for having the evening sun wreak havoc on drivers’ vision.

Before that, though, records fell in Pro Stock, Funny Car, and Top Fuel.

Jonathan Gray, with his Pacific Raceways-best 6.521-second elapsed time, seized the Pro Stock lead in the first session, and Bo Butner reset the track speed mark at 212.39 mph. But Jeg Coughlin and Greg Anderson came along in the evening session and wiped out those achievements. Coughlin took the provisional No. 1 qualifying position with a 6.501-second pass, and Anderson was fastest with a record 212.76-mph speed.

In Funny Car, it sounded like a broken record with Jack Beckman once again dominating. He crushed both ends of the track record with a 3.997-second, 4.17-mph performance to take the tentative lead overnight.

Dave Connolly’s 3.751-second run at 327.19 mph claimed both ends of the Top Fuel track record. 

TOP FUEL 

RON ‘LAST MAN STANDING’ SMITH – Top Fuel racing in the Great Northwest is deep with history. The likes of Ed “The Ace” McCulloch, Jerry “The King” Ruth, Larry “Lash” Hendrickson, “Gentleman Hank” Johnson, Herm “The Northwest Terror” Petersen, Rob Bruins, and the late R. Gaines Markley all cut their teeth racing at tracks from Edmonton, Alberta, Canada to Portland, Ore., with dozens of tracks in between. They ruled the region during their careers.  Back in the days of Division Six events with more than two dozen Top Fuelers, many from California, regularly entered for the eight-cars shows.
 
Going pretty much unnoticed (because he didn’t sport a catchy nickname and is modest by nature) during the era was longtime driver Ron Smith . . . who has one thing on the legends. He’s still competing at age 72.
 
Referring to Chris “The Greek” Karamesines, presumably the NHRA’s oldest driver at age 83 (although he never has divulged his exact age, not even to some family members), Smith said, “When the Greek retires, I’ll have another 10 years.”
 
Smith started competing in Top Fuel in 1973 after a decade of racing in sportsman classes, BB/Gas and A-Fuel. 
 
After moving up to Top Fuel, Smith was a consistent qualifier locally and when he traveled to Orange County and Fremont in California. He could hold his own. 
 
Smith, a retired Boeing engineer, and his nine-man volunteer crew take months of evening and weekends to prepare their Brad Hadman race car for the one weekend that the team travels the 40 miles from the shop at Kapowsin, Wash., to Pacific Raceways. Smith is the lone Division Six Top Fuel driver.
 
This weekend is the first time the team has had any kind of sponsorship. Seattle-based Watson Security Services and electronic surveillance company with six stores in Washington State has partnered with the team.
 
"This is our weekend, there's no more match racing. This is it for us," said Smith. "Our goal is to just qualify - and be around on Sunday like the good old days." – Chris Horn 
 
CRAMPTON MAKING MORE SEATTLE MEMORIES - Richie Crampton already had some happy memories at Pacific Raceways. He was the clutch specialist on Morgan Lucas’ crew when the team owner-driver beat Dave Grubnic in the final round to win here in 2013.
 
"That was a fun day, for sure, and what's important now is we have that data in the books to look at for this year's race,” Crampton said.
 
It paid off, for he took the early Top Fuel lead Friday with a 3.849-second pass at 315.49 mph. He’s third heading into Saturday’s two sessions that will set the field for Sunday eliminations.
 
"Pacific Raceways is a great track in one of the most beautiful places in the country, and it can be very, very fast when the conditions are good because of all the trees around the facility. Even though we make our own air with the blowers, the motor doesn't have to work nearly as hard to make it ideal when there's an abundance of oxygen,” the Lucas Oil Dragster driver said.
 
"This is the last stop of the Western Swing,” he said, “so we need to earn as many points as we can, get the car running strong, and brace for what's ahead."
 
What’s ahead is the Countdown, which will begin in September after the U.S. Nationals at Indianapolis. Crampton is fifth in the standings at the moment, and he said his goal is “to make fast, consistent runs on race day. If you do that, everything else falls into place – the wins, the points, your spot in the rankings, the championship, that all gets taken care of when you run well on Sundays.
 
"Ideally, you want to have good momentum going into the Countdown," Crampton said. "We've seen so much happen since the inception of the playoffs, some where people have come from way back to win it all, and other times where the leader going in just powers through. It's all in how your team performs for those six races. The main thing is to get on a roll and minimize mistakes down the stretch.”
 
FORCE IMPRESSES TWO-TIME SUPER BOWLERS – Brittany Force said she is brimming with confidence these days, knowing her Monster Energy Dragster is on the verge of carrying her to her first victory. And how could she not be inspired after visiting with the NFL’s Seattle Seahawks, who won the Super Bowl in 2014 against the Denver Broncos and returned to the 2015 Super Bowl?

While her father, 16-time Funny Car champion John Force, talked motivational tactics Friday with Seahawks Coach Pete Carroll at the Virginia Mason Athletic Center at nearby Renton, Brittany Force impressed him with the basics of her 300-plus-mph, 10,000-horsepower, nitromethane-powered dragster. The dad and daughter drag racers also met quarterback Russell Wilson, and the 5-foot-2 Brittany Force enjoyed the comical height difference between herself and 6-foot-5 offensive guard J.R. Sweezy when they posed for pictures.

But Force, like the Seahawks, knew she had to get back to work to prepare for a big assignment. For the football team, it is the preseason schedule and this fall’s regular-season lineup. For Force, it is this race, the next one at Brainerd, Minn., and the NHRA’s marquee race at Indianapolis, and then the six-race Countdown to the Championship.     

“We have come so close to getting that first win. [It] just gives me so much confidence. Since Monster Energy came on board in Atlanta, we have been more aggressive and have been really making some positive moves. I am feeling good about our chances every race,” she said. “This is the third race in a row for us, so I am in a really good groove as a driver.”

Force is looking to advance past the opening round in this third Top Fuel visit to Seattle. As a sportsman racer, she drove her A/Fuel Dragster to a semifinal finish at the 2009 Northwest Nationals before losing to sister Courtney, who went on to win the race. Brittany Force is one of only seven women with as many as three No. 1 starts in a pro class, and she has five runner-up finishes in her career.

LANGDON PLUGGING AWAY – Shawn Langdon started the year at the top of the standings as winner of the Winternationals. Today the Knuckle Sandwich Toyota Dragster driver is 10th and hanging on to that last Countdown spot with this race and two others to complete before the Countdown starts. The remarkable part of that is that he still is in contention for Countdown eligibility while the search for a long-term primary sponsor continues. The team was blindsided by its former sponsor just before the opening of this season with news that it was discontinuing funding.

Despite the deflating turn of events, Langdon and his Alan Johnson Racing team have won a race, qualified No. 1 twice this year, registered the quickest elapsed time in NHRA history at 3.700 seconds. So this team, which Langdon also brought the fastest pass in NHRA history at 334.15 mph in 2012 at Reading, Pa., knows how to make the most of even a tough situation. He trails ninth-place J.R. Todd by only two points and seventh-place Brittany Force by just 14 points.
 
Langdon lost in the opening round of eliminations last weekend at Sonoma, Calif., as his camshaft broke. Even so, he said the Brian Husen-tuned car is improving.
 
“We made some really good runs last weekend – the only one we missed was the Friday-night qualifying run, and that’s why we qualified 10th.  The Knuckle Sandwich Toyota dragster was making good runs on a hot race track. We dropped some cylinders along the way, but the car still made good runs,” Langdon said. “Breaking the camshaft on Sunday was kind of a fluke deal, but we’ve had a lot of fluke deals this year. It’s not typically something you break, but it broke. If we can duplicate the runs we had last weekend in Sonoma but take the bad luck out of it, the Knuckle Sandwich Toyota Dragster should be really fast this weekend.”
 
He didn’t have much magic in the first qualifying session here at Pacific Raceways Friday, ending up 13th.
 
Langdon said this is the weekend “to turn the corner” and was encouraged, thinking, “The Seattle race track is very similar to the track in Sonoma.  So we can take a lot of the information from Sonoma and use it in Seattle because it’s a good-air track where you make a lot of power.  It gets a little tricky when the sun gets on the track just like Sonoma.  But I think we can have a good race there this weekend.”
 
Langdon, the 2013 Top Fuel champion, has qualified for the Countdown in each of his six previous seasons in a dragster.
 
RETURNING TO SCENE OF HIS PRIME – For U.S. Army Dragster driver Tony Schumacher, the Seattle stop is by far his most successful racetrack among the three on the Western Swing. He has seven final-round appearances here in the last 11 seasons, including victories in 2004, 2006, 2007, and 2008. His 2004 and 2008 triumphs came from the No. 1 qualifying position. Last August, Schumacher qualified No. 1 for the third time in his career.
 
“At Seattle, we’ve probably had more success than the first two races (of the Western Swing) put together,” he said. “We have a great car at that place – very fast, and the crowd seems to be building there. Hopefully, we can go out and win it and go off and try to win a championship. It’s a fast racetrack and there’s good side-by-side racing. It’s the end of a grueling session, so you can be the team that’s not thinking, ‘Let’s get this over with,’ but thinking, ‘Let’s close this out and do it right.’”
 
This season, Schumacher said, “the changes we make reflect in the car. We’ve had seasons where we’ve made changes and it does the opposite, and you’re fighting that for a long, long time. Right now, it seems to be when we do something to the car, it is fairly predictable. When we miss it, we miss it by just a little bit and that’s usually when we’re trying to go faster and we have the opportunity to do that. It’s a great time to get good. The end of the year is the premier time to peak, but it’s comforting going to the end of the year with a good car.”
 
The reigning Top Fuel champion and current points leader has the chance to make his ninth series title a back-to-back accomplishment.
 
“I think just driving well gives our team, our engineers Mike Green and Neal Strausbaugh, confidence to go into Brainerd and Indy,” he said, referring to the last two races before the Countdown-eligible group is finalized. “We understand what it’s like to get there, how big those moments, are and how good you’re going to have to be in those moments. That’s how you win those back-to-back titles, going into it knowing you can do it. You show up knowing, ‘We’ve done this before.’ It’s very, very hard to win one, and it’s going to be even harder to win back-to-back. We’re in the position to fight for it, and that’s all you can ask for – to be in the position for the battle. I couldn’t ask for any more. I just have to go out and do my job because the car is running well and I don’t want to be the weak link.”
 
IT LOOKS BAD BUT THE CAR IS GOOD – REALLY –Spencer Massey is ranked No. 6 in the standings, a position many other racers would like to find themselves. But that belies the fact he has five straight first-round losses in the Red Fuel Powered by Schumacher / Sandvik Coromant Dragster. 

"I guess if you just look at things on paper, you'll see that we haven't had a round win in a while and, yes, that's true,” Massey said. “But it's not because we have a bad car.  Actually, we have a very good car and one of the greatest teams out here. We just haven't had the best of luck on race day when it counts."

He said he’s hoping this will be the weekend his early exits stop.

"It'll be really important to get things turned around this weekend in Seattle. The last thing we want to do is send our team home to Indianapolis after three tough weeks out on the road without anything to show for it,” he said. 

"I know things will start to fall our way we just have to be patient and that's something drag racers aren't the best at doing. We can't get our heads down. Everyone on this team is working hard, from [crew chiefs] Todd [Okuhara] and Phil [Shuler] and all of our crew members and me. I'm trying to stay focused on the driving part and do what I can to help out."
 
He helped morale early Friday with a 3.882-second pass that was quick enough for the No. 2 spot in the order, and his 317.05-mph speed was a class-best. He slid back to a still-respectable sixth Friday night.

VALUABLE DATA STARTING TO HELP – Clay Millican said crew chief Dave Grubnic’s data-collection project is paying off for the Parts Plus/ Great Clips Dragster.

“At the beginning of the year, the tuning window – that is, the variance of making the car go down the racetrack or not – was so small that it was exceptionally quick when the car made it, but it was also very close to spinning the tires all the time. So for many races now, the team has been working on calming the car down a bit and making that tuning window bigger,” Millican said.

At Sonoma last weekend, Millican recorded his career-best run, then eclipsed it. His best run of the weekend was a 3.738-second elapsed time during the first round of eliminations.

Millican is 11th in the standings and has a chance to clinch a spot in the Traxxas Shootout bonus race at Indianapolis, with a fan vote during the voting period on the NHRA’s Facebook page. That is scheduled to begin immediately following the conclusion of the race at Brainerd and will last until noon Tuesday, September 1, the day before the NHRA Fan Fest at Indianapolis. 
 
FUNNY CAR 

INFINITE INTIMIDATOR? – Jack Beckman is the lone NHRA pro eligible to become the eighth to sweep the Western Swing. But the driver of the Infinite Hero Dodge Charger for Don Schumacher Racing said he has to put that on the back burner here at Pacific Raceways.
 
“It has to be business as usual,” he said. “When you're good at something, you're probably good at it for two reasons: you have a passion and you practice. I have a passion for drag racing and I practice. And when you do something in your mind tens of thousands of times, you have a mental zone that you perform best in. When you change that because suddenly you tell yourself, ‘This time it's really, really important,’ you don't have that 10,000 repetitions to fall back on anymore. You change something. So I think it has to be business as usual.”
 
Beckman said he knows nothing is assured because of his national-record-setting performance at Sonoma last weekend. But said he thinks his team is headed in the correct direction as the number of races until the Countdown field is set has dwindled to three (Seattle, Brainerd, Indianapolis).

“Past performance is no guarantee of future success. Nitro racing and the stock market share that slogan,” he said. “A lot of times you think, ‘Boy, these guys are getting hot at the right time, then we run out of one clutch disc in our clutch pack combo, you have to cycle in a new one, [and] the tune-up just goes to crap. A lot of times the opposite happens. A team cycles in a clutch just right before the Countdown and all of a sudden they're brilliant and consistent every run.”

However, he said, “It appears that we have made the right decisions, put ourselves in the position that our car is predictable. Once the car is predictable, it's much, much easier to step on it and make it quick. Then you can go out there and win rounds. Maybe the other factor is, Mike Dunn said this on the ESPN broadcast, with the way our car was running, he said, this is a game-changer. This is going to force the other crew chiefs to step outside their comfort zone. Now whether that makes them run better and makes things tougher on us, I don't know. But it might backfire. A lot of times when you try to pick up five-hundredths of a second in a car, you blow the tires off.”

His conclusion is “I'm comfortable with the fact that our car is probably the intimidator right now.”

No “probablys” about it Friday – it was the best on the lot. And Beckman said he hadn’t thought that was possible. He told his crew and fans alike that Pacific Raceways’ first 3.9-second run wasn’t possible unless the track temperature dipped to at least 105 degrees. It was 109 degrees when he made his run.

Referring to his crew chiefs, Jimmy Prock, John Medlen, and Chris Cunningham, Beckman said, “Jimmy, John, and Chris made an absolute liar out of me.”  

He didn’t mind that, though.

“I’m tellin’ ya, man, I keep riding the wave,” he said. 

LEE CHANGES MIND, RUNS WELL – Paul Lee didn’t make a first-session qualifying attempt, but he made up for that later in the day by landing in the protected top 12. He squeaked in at No. 11, pending two Saturday runs, with a 4.095-second effort in the McLeod-Worsham Family entry.
 
He said the terrible glare on the track prevented him from seeing where he was going, but complimented Chuck Worsham and his team for helping keep his momentum from Sonoma going. Lee’s 4.105-second, 307-mph showing last weekend in California spurred the team to travel north for the final leg of the three-race Western Swing.
  
“After that 4.10 run, we wanted to keep the fun going,” Lee said.
 
He had said he wouldn’t run Friday at all but changed his mind. “Like in Sonoma, we will do the same thing and just run the car on Saturday and hopefully cut someone’s day short on Sunday,” he said before the event began.
 
This weekend Gears to Go Driveline has partnered with McLeod Racing. As Canada’s premier muscle car driveline dealer, Gears to Go Driveline will be offering a 20-percent discount of McLeod products through August 11. To receive the discount, visit www.gearstogo.com online or call 1-800-432-7786. 

NO TONY - Tony Pedregon did not enter the Seattle event for the first time in 11 years.

SEATTLE STILL KIND TO JOHNSON JR. – For Tommy Johnson Jr., this is the perfect time to come to Seattle. He and his Terry Chandler-funded Make-A-Wish team are fresh off their runner-up finish to Don Schumacher Racing teammate Jack Beckman at Sonoma.

"We've been to two final rounds in three races. Our Make-A-Wish team is really good, and heading into the last race of the Western Swing, I feel like we're peaking at the right time," Johnson said. "We need to carry the momentum as we get closer to the Countdown to the Championship, so it makes me happy knowing our car is running better and better."

And Pacific Raceways happens to be a fond place for Johnson, who has raced Top Fuel and Funny Car with winning results.

"Seattle has been one of my favorite races. It's a beautiful part of the country, and that's where I got my first national-event win in Top Fuel,” he said. “I always look forward to this race every year, and over the years I've gotten to know a lot of the fans in that area. I look forward to seeing them every year. It's just an enjoyable race for me.
 
"I remember that first win there. We were an under-funded team, and at that time we were just trying to compete and run with the big boys,” Johnson said. “Everything lined up. It was kind of a shock because we weren't really expecting to win. We just wanted to qualify and go a couple of rounds if we could. But to have everything come together solidified why I was racing and why I was trying to be a professional drag racer. Maybe it wasn't the start of my career, but it was the start of my future."
 
He fared well again here Friday, closing the day as the provisional No. 2 qualifier (4.036 seconds, 308.00 mph). He improved 10 positions from his early showing.

Last weekend in Seattle, Johnson gained two places in the standings, as well, from sixth place to fourth.

"We did a great job last weekend, and now we feel like we have sort of solidified ourselves in being in the top 10," Johnson, the No. 3-ranked driver last year, said. "We aren't 100-percent locked in [to Countdown eligibility], at least not officially, but we're in. A lot of people right now have panic setting in, because this is a critical part of the season. You have to be on your game. We're not trying to ruin anyone's day, but we have to keep our spot. We'll keep fighting."

RAIDER STRONG – With a semifinal showing last weekend in Sonoma, Cruz Pedregon has climbed to within 80 points of the top five in the Funny Car standings. The two-time champion has reached the semifinals in two of the last three events and three times in the last six races.
 
He made it into the top 12 Friday, even though he dropped from seventh to 12th. Maybe he got added motivation from some special athletes. Just as Brittany Force chatted with the Seattle Seahawks, Cruz Pedregon made a stop in California on the way up here to watch his beloved Oakland Raiders.

“We beefed up our training on the way here with a visit to the Oakland Raiders training camp after Sonoma. I got to attend practice and meet so many of the team’s players, coaches and legends. Anyone who knows me, knows I’m one of the biggest Raiders fans on the planet, so it was a big day for me,” Pedregon said.

Amazingly, he still is seeking his first victory of the season.

“We keep getting closer and closer to a Wally. It’s all about timing and getting over that last hurdle to get the win. We’re on our way and ready to shake things up as we wrap up the Western Swing,” he said. “Pacific Raceways is a great setting, and the weather is looking good. It’s all on us to make it happen this weekend. This season has been truly competitive, but I know we have what it takes to break through for a victory before heading back east.”

His crew chief, Chris “Warrior” Kullberg, said, “We’ve been working hard as a team, getting to the semis two races in a row, and we plan to carry that energy into this weekend. Our entire team is working toward the consistency that leads to a win as we head into the Countdown. It’s all about meeting our full potential out there, and we’re ready.” 

RARE DISTINCTION FOR WORSHAM, CAPPS – Del Worsham and Ron Capps are the only two drivers to have won in both Funny Car and Top Fuel at Pacific Raceways. Worsham won in a dragster in 2011 and a Funny Car in 1999. Capps did the reverse, winning first in a dragster (1995), then Funny Car (1998).

COURTNEY LEADS FORCE DELEGATION – Like Cruz Pedregon, Courtney Force is looking for her first victory of the year. She earned her first victories in both the Top Alcohol Dragster and Nitro Funny Car classes here, and this would be an excellent time for her to make a move, considering she isn’t in the top 10 in the standings with time running out to qualify for the Countdown.

“Qualifying usually plays a big part going into race day. Obviously you want to qualify high to earn points, but also to have the advantage of lane choice over your opponent. However, I did get the win here from the No. 14 position so sometimes it's a matter of who you face and if you can get your car consistently outrunning the field that day. We have won from the bottom half, but are striving to improve on our qualifying to have lane choice on race day,” Force said.

So far she’s fifth in the order, best among the three JFR racers. Dad John Force will open Saturday qualifying from the No. 8 spot. Robert Hight is 10th after the first day of time trials.

Courtney Force has qualified No. 1 twice this season and gone into race day with lane choice seven times. She has 13 round-wins in 2015 and recently was runner-up at Norwalk, Ohio, in her 14th career final round. 

“I love coming back to Seattle, because there are so many great memories at this track. Getting my first win in Top Alcohol Dragster and my first win in Funny Car; this seems like a lucky track for me for ‘firsts’ so maybe it can be my first win of the season,” Force said.

Force and her Traxxas Chevrolet Camaro are in the No. 11 position in the standings, 53 points (less than three rounds) out of the No. 10 slot.

A victory would give her the final guaranteed position in the lucrative Funny Car Traxxas Shootout. Only six different drivers have won Funny Car races so far this season, leaving one open spot. 
 
PRO STOCK 
 
FANTASTIC AND PHENOMENAL AND FIRST - Jeg Coughlin said it felt “fantastic” to be back on the racetrack and at the top of the order on the first day of the event. And he said when he let the clutch out on his second run Friday, “it felt phenomenal.”
 
The newest addition to the Elite Motorsports team used a 6.501-second pass to grab the provisional No. 1 spot.
 
"I can't thank Mark Stockseth, Richard Freeman, and the entire Ray Skillman Chevrolet family enough for giving us the opportunity to work with such a talented group," Coughlin said. "Rick and Rickie Jones, Mark Ingersoll, and the rest of the crew, I'll tell you, I've been on a lot of teams and had great successes in the past, but this is a fine orchestra of talent all working together in concert so well. It's impressive,” the five-time class champion said.
 
After a semifinal finish in his “re-debut” at Sonoma that Coughlin said was “about as good an outing as we probably could have expected, he came off the Pro Stock sidelines and proved he hadn’t lost anything during his hiatus.
 
He said the Sonoma performance “allowed me to get re-acclimated to a Pro Stock car and gather up the focus it requires to execute good runs. The goal at Seattle is to continue what we started in Sonoma. We would like to be a top-half car in qualifying, maybe sneak up into the top three during a round or two and gather up some bonus points to keep some of the others from earning them, and then attack race day."
 
Mission partially accomplished, with two more qualifying sessions remaining Saturday. 
 
The Seattle race is the second of three national events that Coughlin plans to race with Elite Motorsports.   
 
McGAHA MOMENTUM MISSING - Chris McGaha got a reminder that fortune is fleeting sometimes. The Sonoma winner and top qualifier, who notched his career-first victory there in Northern California’s Wine Country last week, started this race in the No. 16 position. By the late Friday session, he had improved six spots to No. 10.
  
The Harlow Sammons Racing Chevy Camaro owner-driver said, "Finally getting that first win gave me a lot of confidence heading into these next few races and the Countdown. I feel like I have nothing to lose. From this point forward, I have nothing to lose."
 
He’s fourth in the standings, assured of a position in the Countdown. He has three final-round appearances in 2015.
 
“This is like getting the monkey off my back,” McGaha said of the victory. “I hope it turns into the same thing that happened with the No. 1 qualifiers. I wanted one, then I got it, and it just got easier each time. Hopefully, the same thing happens but I'd take just one. If I never get another win, I'll be more than content in this lifetime."
 
MORE SEATTLE HISTORY FOR ENDERS? – Current Pro Stock champion Erica Enders shared the Seattle winners circle with Funny Car’s Courtney Force during her breakthrough 2012 campaign. And she remembers it fondly, that day they made NHRA history as the first pair of female professionals to win at the same national event.
 
"That was such a cool day," Enders said. "I had just won my first ever Pro Stock trophy in Chicago a few races before the Western Swing, and that was a huge deal because no woman had ever won in Pro Stock before. We finally got it done and it was like, 'How can we top that?' Then we come up here and make some more history with Courtney. It was really neat to be a part of that, especially with my buddy Courtney.
 
"The Seattle win was special because it validated the Chicago win. It proved we were legit. We ended up winning a couple more times that year, but the Seattle win was one of the biggest I've ever had."
 
Enders, the 2014 champion,is legit, all right. And she’s right up there again at Seattle this time around, too. She’s sixth overnight in a tough class that Friday saw tentative top-qualifier Jeg Coughlin and No. 7 Shane Gray separated by just .011 of a second.  
 
In the standings, Enders is second, 47 points behind Greg Anderson and 147 ahead of third-place Jason Line.
 
Last year she skipped this race and the Sonoma event before it as her Elite Motorsports team prepared for the Countdown. This year, she said, "We have to go to Seattle and perform flawlessly, especially coming off a quarterfinal result in Sonoma. We all know what we need to do in this pit, and we just need to get to work. Seattle is usually a hot and tricky racetrack, so we'll be prepared for that and try to win some rounds and maybe get back in the winners circle. I'll talk to Courtney and see if we can't recreate 2012.
 
"As much fun as it will be to reminisce a little bit, we'll definitely have our work cut out for us,” she said. “This year has been extremely competitive, like it seems to be every year, but I think the new fuel and tires they have us using this year have really evened the playing field more than ever before. It's been stressful but fun."
 
While in town, Enders will be sure to take in Seattle’s sights.
 
"Seattle is such a beautiful city," she said. "You start taking it in before you even land, just looking out the windows of the airplane and seeing Mount Rainer and Puget Sound. I know we'll be eating a lot of fresh seafood and taking in some glorious sunsets. I'm excited. This is definitely a race you always look forward to every year."
 
And maybe she’ll leave saying it’s a place she never will forget.