EASTERN SPRING TEST NATIONALS - EVENT NOTEBOOK
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MONDAY NOTEBOOK -
THE QUICKEST DOORSLAMMER, PERIOD - John Russo admits he’s had an affection for the South Georgia Motorsports Park for quite some time. Today SGMP showed him the love.
Russo debuted a new Pontiac Firebird and on his fourth pass of testing thundering to a 5.895 elapsed time at over 246 miles per hour.
Russo was astonished by the numbers he earned.
Since Russo is the only Pro Modified driver, IHRA, NHRA or Outlaw to run a 5.8-second run, the question begs to be asked. What does a 5.8-second run feel like?
“The shifts come a lot quicker,” Russo pointed out. “I don’t have radios in the car but I knew that we had done something really good. When I got to the end of the track, I knew I had run faster but didn’t know how much.”
Making the feat even more impressive is the Vanishing Point Race Cars-built entry he’s driving still has the new car smell.
“The first time we came out with the car, it ran a 6.05,” Russo said. “The second time out we ran a 5.99 and established a new track record in Cayuga. Jim Geese does an incredible job in building these cars.
“But, I have to thank Al Billes too. The man is a thinker. He’s unbelievable.”
Russo had spent much of his time during the 9th annual CSR ESTN presented by Torco’s CompetitionPlus.com running short laps. In fact, during Sunday’s organized testing, Russo clicked off early to a 3.92 eight-mile elapsed time. The momentous run took a different route.
“All of a sudden, before I ran, Al walks over to me and told me if I wanted to run it all the way to the finish line that I could,” Russo said. “I decided to take him up on it.”
Russo plans to run primarily NHRA competition but adamantly points out the off-weekends will be filled with IHRA dates.
“I’m still IHRA legal except for the two-step, but I can easily go back to swapping feet,” Russo said.
Russo wasn’t the only driver who celebrated during extended ESTN testing.
Two-time NHRA Pro Modified champion Mike Ashley added another accomplishment to his resume of feats by stopping the clocks with his first career five-second run in a doorslammer.
Ashley nailed down a 5.994, 236.46 while testing the Camaro normally driven by teammate Roger Burgess. This marked the first time he and longtime crew chief Chuck Ford have recorded a five-second run together.
“I think Chuck was waiting on me, so we could do it together,” Ashley said on Monday afternoon while standing in the staging lanes at SGMP. “I know he could have done it last year so he must have been waiting on me. We just went ahead and got it out of the way today.
“The run was pretty good but not as good as it could have been. I short-shifted a bit and I lifted a little early. I just wanted to get it down the track and we did just that.”
SHAKING DOWN THE NEW CAR - Jerry Toliver will be behind the wheel of a new race car at this weekend's NHRA
Gatornationals in Gainesville, Fla. The driver of the Rockstar Energy Drink Dodge
Charger R/T Funny Car tested two days this week with a new chassis during the CSR Eastern Spring Test Nationals at South
Georgia Motorsports Park in Valdosta, Ga., in advance of the event.
The 2000 Gatornationals Funny Car winner made several shakedown
runs down Valdosta's quarter-mile in the new Murf McKinney chassis on Sunday and
Monday. The Rockstar Energy Drink team then packed up and headed to
Gainesville.
"I think it's going to be a good race car," said Toliver on
Monday from Valdosta. "We made a couple of planned shut-off runs to half-track,
but after that the track kind of went away so we never made a full pull. The car
seems to handle well and the crew did a miraculous job getting it ready. The
Rockstar Energy Drink crew received the chassis late Tuesday in Indianapolis and
had it ready to go here in Valdosta on Saturday morning. So hats off to the
crew. It helps when you have guys that have 110 percent of their hearts into the
deal, and that's what we've got over here. We made some good squirts here in
Valdosta, now we're off to Gainesville."
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SUNDAY NOTEBOOK -
THE SCELZI REVIEW - Gary Scelzi arrived at South Georgia Motorsports Park on Saturday
during the CSR Eastern Spring Test Nationals presented by Torco’s
CompetitionPlus.com to find a blast of high winds and frigid
temperatures forced the cancellation of the second day of testing. The
three-time NHRA world champion knew he and the Mopar Oakley team had a
tall order of objectives and parts to test in preparation for
Gainesville. Did we mention he was testing two cars back-to-back?
This setback didn’t set the agenda well.
Then he inspected the all concrete racing surface and while the
facility impressed him greatly, he couldn’t help but notice a yellow
film covering the rubber-topped concrete.
“And what is that?” Scelzi asked a crew member who then explained the substance which happened to be pollen.
Scelzi knew then he was in store for a unique experience.
Scelzi spent much of Sunday and Monday making a run in one car, hopping a ride back to the starting line and strapping into a second Oakley Mopar Funny Car for another hit in the same testing session round making as many as eight runs in two days.
“We learned that both of these cars are different animals,” Scelzi said. “The Murf [McKinney] car seems to react better than our old Murf car. This one is made from the larger, normalized tubing. It wants more clutch and we like that, of course. We couldn’t get to that edge and we found it. We had some really fast sixty-foot times and we are very pleased with that.
“The Hadman car is showing a lot of promise early. The car wants more clutch and is very stable. We couldn’t get it to smoke the tires at the hit. We didn’t have any trouble until we got out about 400 feet. We found out some things that it really liked. We ran the quickest 60-footers and early times we have in a while.”
Scelzi made these runs at the newly implemented mandatory 2,550 pounds weight minimum.
“We are just a little more comfortable with the Murf car right now,” Scelzi admitted. “If anything, this car has a few more similarities to the old car than we are used to than with the Hadman. Right now we will run the Murf and continue to test the Hadman some more. We just want to make sure where we are at before we bring the Hadman out.
“Both cars were impressive and both were very comfortable. We could race either one but we can’t gamble with the weather in Gainesville. If we lose a qualifying run in Gainesville, we want to be stable.”
This test session for Scelzi was invaluable and it came on a facility to his liking.
“South Georgia is an awesome facility and the staff was very accommodating,” Scelzi said. “This facility could be in the top five or six the NHRA could have if they put a national event here. They are first class and do whatever it takes to make it right for you. I’m very satisfied with what we experienced here and we will definitely come back here to test.”
SGMP definitely earned Scelzi’s seal of approval.
“I would certainly recommend this place,” Scelzi added. “There’s plenty of shut-off, plenty of concrete, well-prepared and friendly people. This place is a home run from where I come from.”
Now, about the pollen Scelzi encountered on Saturday.
“Never in my life had I ever witnessed something like that,” Scelzi said. “It's so funny because of all the pollen in the air my eyes weren't bothering me nor were my allergies. Of course it was so cold, I think I know why, the pollen was frozen.”
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SATURDAY NOTEBOOK – RAIN YESTERDAY, WIND TODAY CANCELS TESTING
BLOWN AWAY – Early morning high winds blew through SGMP Saturday morning, coupled with frigid conditions prompted ESTN event officials to pull the plug on the event by 9 AM. The conditions improved slightly during the day and while no car made a lap under power, a few Pro Stockers did burnouts and scuffed tires.
NEW SCHEDULE – Testing will begin at Noon on Sunday with every classification expected to get in four rounds of testing. Teams could get even more depending on the track temperature. Weather forecasts are calling for mid-60 degree weather with clear skies.
THIS BUD’S FOR YOU – Brandon Bernstein was a surprise addition to the ESTN line-up on Saturday afternoon. He is expected to make test runs on Sunday.
FEELS LIKE THE FIRST TIME – Andrew Hines realized he hasn’t lost a thing from a tremendous 2007 season. This weekend’s ESTN event represents his first laps on the bike in 2008.
“It's the first and only major test for us this season,” Hines said. “I don't know if it's that crucial, we just want to see where we stack up with some of these people out here. We're going to take it easy out here this year. Last year we were out here for five days trying to get [teammate] Eddie [Krawiec] a bunch of laps and this year it's just going to be about trying to perfect everything for us. We're not going to try to beat on everything for us. We just want to see how consistent we can get down the track. We'll step her up in Gainesville.”
One might assume Hines made substantial gains during the off-season.
“We’re just trying to play it pretty conservative right now,” Hines admitted. “We don't want to go out there and set the world on fire. We're trying to work on our consistency and keeping the motors more reliable. We ran pretty good at the end of last season so we feel that we're in a pretty good position going into the off season so we're just going to go out here and just take it one step at a time. We'll be working on it throughout the season with the new points deal. You don't have to jump on it right from the get go, we can work on it and hopefully have a little more at the end of the year.”
DOUBLE THE FUN - Danny Rowe plans to have fun this season – fun times two. He’s confident a two-car team is the hot tip for winning Pro Modified in 2008.
“We feel that with how competitive the class has become we're interested in being at the top of the field and for us to do that we're going to need two cars,” Rowe explained.
Rowe is teamed this season with fellow Californian Kirk Kuhns, who will be driving a 1941 Willys – a second car on the team. This year marks a career come full circle for Rowe. Rowe drove a second car for Mike Ashley during the 2004 season.
Rowe can’t help but notice how quickly his career has evolved into what it is today.
“Yeah it's happened pretty quickly,” Rowe admitted. “I've always have to give my credit to Mike Ashley as far as giving me an education and giving my regards to how he ran his team and how professional he was. I think that I am here today because of a lot of that. At the same time I'm excited about running my own team, I'm excited about growing it. I've got great people. Jimmy's incredible and he does a fantastic job. We really feel like we can be competitive this year but we've just got to work hard at it. Work ethic is kind of my thing.”
Rowe plans to make the NHRA Jeg’s Pro Modified series his primary choice for racing this year but he’ll certainly keep his options open for IHRA and ADRL. He’s not taking any chances about underestimating the competition. That’s why he’s running ESTN this weekend.
“I think it's like going out there and shaking off all the cobwebs and getting everybody excited again,” Rowe admitted. “I just think there are a lot of good cars up there now. I think with Jeg's being involved with what their doing in NHRA it's going to be more competitive and more people want to play better. We're excited about being involved.”
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FRIDAY NOTEBOOK – RAINOUT FOR FRIDAY, LOOKS LIKE A GOOD DAY TO HANG OUT
WHAT TO DO? – Here’s our version of the popular television show “You Make the Call.”
The new ownership of South Georgia Motorsports Park treated the teams and their crews to half-price burgers ($1), hot dogs and fries and you want to know the real kicker? The beer was on the house.
MOVING THE CHAINS – Due to the inclement weather, Friday’s schedule was moved to Saturday. Saturday’s Chicago Style Shootout will now run on Sunday.
FILLING UP THE HOUSE – With the Don Schumacher Racing teams en route as well as Mike Ashley’s Gotham City Racing the front row of SGMP will completely fill the length of the asphalt with the exception of one spot. The vacancy is reserved for Tommy Johnson, Jr. and the Monster Energy Funny Car team.
On the middle row, the teams are parked all the way to the quarter-mile scoreboards.
Today’s latest nitro addition was the Funny Car team of Del Worsham.
ROTATING THE EARTH – If you felt the ground move underneath you on Thursday afternoon, we know why. No, there was no earthquake or seismic activity. Former IHRA Top Alcohol Funny Car champion turned Pro Modified tuner Jimmy Rector was at ESTN testing with the Danny Rowe team.
In baseball terms, Rector was swinging for the fence. At least that’s the impression he gave.
Does he just have too much horsepower?
“Or, too much gear,” Rector answered.
Rector stared at the computer graph from one of the tire-rattling efforts and explained. The veteran tuner knows he’s clearly got a challenge to calm his Pro Modified cars, the 1968 Camaro driven by Rowe and the 1941 Willys piloted by Kirk Kuhns.
“That's what I'm trying to determine right now,” Rector said. “I expected both of them to go down then and neither one of them go down so we've just got to calm them down. Air is really good and all that stuff. If you can't run 6.95 or so for this year then you aren't going to be real competitive.”
FAMILIAR GROUND – When Karen Stoffer ran her 6.95 elapsed time on Thursday, she had an advantage. Her run was not a lucky guess on the tune-up.
“We kind of cheated a little,” Stoffer explained. “We were here last weekend to do some testing. We kind of had a little bit of a tune up. I kind of expect the other bikes out here to pick up pretty quick and be right there.”
Stoffer was correct in her assessment as Andrew Hines ran a 6.88 and Angelle Sampey registered a 6.91.
One week before the season opener and Stoffer sees some performance gains thus making the multi-time Pro Stock Motorcycle national event winner excited about her chances in 2008. She's not ready to make predictions beyond her personal improvement
“We are better than we were last year and we know that for a fact,” Stoffer said. “That’s because we compared it to our own data and our own stats. At least if nothing else we've improved on our own product and our own package so we'll find out at the end of this week. I'll answer that at the end of this week when we see how we rank up against these other bikes out here.”
So what is Stoffer testing this weekend?
“You name it,” Stoffer explained. “We're going to test all of our motors and me. Making sure all my lights are the same and making sure I can still ride the bike. It's been 3 months, so mostly that's what we're doing.”
MY COUSIN VINNY – Vinny Budano has two objectives for bringing Scott Shafiroff’s championship-winning Camaro to ESTN every year. He considers the annual test session to be crucial to his championship aspirations.
ESTN provides the snow-weary Long Islander a chance to get some seat time in.
“We're working on some stuff with Bob Book with carburetors and of course like always we work on some Speed Tech nitrous stuff,” Budano said. Hopefully by Saturday we'll try a new intake manifold.”
This testing is as much to dial-in the driver as the car.
“It gives me a good launch mentally,” said Budano. “It's nice to kick the cobwebs out. It's cold back in New York and I haven't been in the car since Orlando. It's really as much for me as it is for the testing of the car itself.”
Make no bone about, Budano takes everything serious. He wants to make his way to the finish line first every time, regardless of whether he’s testing or in competition. ESTN provides the perfect scrimmage game.
“We take this very serious,” said Budano. “We look at every race very serious. This is just a race for us. Test sessions are test sessions, we come to race.
“Plus, they give away some nice trophies.”
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THURSDAY NOTEBOOK – EXTENDED DAY OF TESTING; POOR WEATHER IMMINENT
SENDING A STATEMENT – Clay Millican sent a statement to the racing world during Thursday’s testing. South Georgia
During a planned early shut-off, Millican thundered to a coasting 4.72 elapsed time. The real thunder came from a 3.11 elapsed time on the eighth mile.
“I love this track,” Millican said. “This is the first time I’ve ever been here and I make one run and can’t wait for the next time to go.”
This weekend’s test outing for Millican and his team represented the true meaning of the word testing.
“Lance Larsen impressed me to no end,” said Millican of his co-crew chief. “We have two completely different cars in the configuration they are in. I am in a brand new car and my teammate Bobby Lagana, Jr. was in a car that was a bare frame three weeks ago. What this team has done to go out there and run that quick and fast with these two cars, even though both were planned shut off runs. This team is unbelievable.
“They were ready to get out here and show what they can do because they’ve been stuck at that shop all winter working our tails off. This is quite an event the gang at SGMP and Torco’s CompetitionPlus.com has put together.”
FINDING THE COMBINATION – Millican pointed out his team was concerned about finding the right combination for the first run. His Thursday run was the last time he’s been out since last season.
“A lot of those racers were having trouble finding the right combination early on,” Millican said. “When we pulled Bobby Lagana’s car up there we were just hoping it would go down. He went out there and went right down the track. The funny thing is – everyone else did too. There’s no question this is a good race track and has a lot of teeth.”
Millican estimated the car would have been a mid-4.50 had it run to the finish line.
“I had instructions to lift early,” Millican said. “Next time I’m guessing the instructions won’t be the same.”
THE RAFTER CAR – Sometimes a drag racer can find a race car in a peculiar place. Bobby Lagana, Jr. found the car he’s
“Clay, Lance, Johnny and my brother made this happen,” Lagana said. “Four weeks ago, we brought all of our equipment to Clay’s shop and had no idea what was going on. We had parts of our own and they had some parts there – and had a car with us that we didn’t really want to use.”
So what’s a man to do? Take a look at the shop ceiling if you’re Lagana.
“Clay’s got cars hanging off of the rafters in the shop,” Lagana explained. “I’m talking about cars just hanging 50 feet up in the ceiling.”
Lagana and the team hopped aboard the scissors lift and ascended high for a closer look.
“I knew the one I wanted when I first saw it,” Lagana said. “I looked at the guys and said, ‘That’s the one.”
Lagana brought the chassis down and the Millican team worked non-stop to prepare the car for this weekend’s test.
“This is the typical Lagana Racing where it is last minute and fixing stuff,” admitted Lagana.
Lagana pointed out his drive to succeed was more than just getting the car out for some testing.
“Evan is a part of this, just like the guys who put the car together,” Lagana said. “Everyone knows the man needs to get better. That’s what we’re doing this for. We’re using this equipment to provide motivation for him to get better. We have some surprises for him on the car.
“The bottom line is everyone deserves to be healthy and now it’s his turn. We do this because we all love this sport.”
Lagana loves his “rafter” car too.
JUST LIKE OLD TIMES – If you come to a test session to witness Robert Patrick running the huge numbers, then you’ve come to the wrong place. The defending IHRA mountain motor Pro Stock champion has a different agenda.
“We'll have two pages of stuff that we're going to try as far as testing here,” Patrick admitted. “I don't really care if someone goes out and runs a 6.25 and I'm running a 6.31, I'm going to stick to what I came down there to test as far as intakes, carburetors, headers and what I'm going to do. I'm going to try to learn from that so that I can apply that to my combination going into the first race.”
Patrick might not plan to run the big numbers but sometimes when you are ahead of the game like he is, those quick elapsed times come naturally. Patrick’s 6.319 elapsed time at 222.32 miles per hour topped the mountain motor IHRA Pro Stock drivers who tested in Valdosta.
Patrick admitted this first test opportunity provides the first opportunity for the IHRA competitors, whose season begins a month later in San Antonio, Texas, to gauge their off-season progress.
“We had to put a motor together that was our worst block and our worst set of cylinder heads and we went down there and made some runs,” Patrick recalled. “I was kind of looking around I'm sure some people read on the Internet and drew their conclusion some cars had closed the performance advantage we had. We knew what we had in the car as far as our block and cylinder head. We were able to run some intakes and some carburetors and run some gear ratios.
“That all applied until San Antonio and we put one of our race motors in and we basically just had a test motor in. That's what we went down there and did. There were some cars that out run us. We applied what we learned at the test session at San Antonio. If you look at the qualifying sheet we were number one qualifier by 2 hundredths. That's what I think a lot of people get caught up in is that they go to these test sessions and they just want to light the scoreboard up for an ego trip and be the fastest instead of going down there and sticking to a game plan.”
EXTRA SET OF EYES – If the competition thought Patrick was sitting idle during the off-season, they thought wrong. He’s hired former IHRA Pro Stock champion Mike Bell to serve as his co-crew chief alongside Rich Purdy.
Bell assisted Patrick during his tours on the NHRA 500-inch tour in 2001 through 2003.
”I've been friends with Mike since I went through Roy's school in 1991,” Patrick said. “That's when I built a relationship with him and I raced with him of course. He won the championship in 1995 in the IHRA and I raced against him when he drove for Roy for the three or four years over there.”
Bell is a calming measure for Patrick. An excellent example of this was during the final race of the 2007 IHRA World Finals in Rockingham, NC.
Patrick was in the midst of a three-way battle for the championship and Bell was only a phone call away. Bell, the 1995 IHRA champion, found his niche immediately as an extra set of eyes.
“I think he definitely helped me on Sunday with that second round win against Frank Gugliotta and that was a big win,” confided Patrick. “Mike had given us some feedback that we had put into the car that run and it really helped us. He wasn't doing anything this year and I asked him if he wanted to come aboard and be our co crew chief with Rich Purdy and kind of help us on the setup. He agreed to it.”
Patrick sees a value in this arrangement before the season has even began.
“Definitely in the long run he's going to be able to help me with my setup on the car and even my driving,” Patrick admitted. “Just taking some of the pressure off of me where hey I've got something I've got to do with the media or I've got a commitment outside of racing that I've got to take care of, I know I've got the guys there that can handle it.”
SENDING A MESSAGE – Don’t think for a moment that Andrew Hines doesn’t have flashbacks of last season’s NHRA AAA
In fact, Hines has played the scenario over and over in his head all winter long. This mentality is the reason Hines came out in his first test session firing bullets.
A 6.889 elapsed time at 193.13 miles per hour makes a profound statement.
Hines let his intentions be known from the outset when he cranked out a 6.94 on the maiden voyage down the SGMP racing surface.
“We didn’t change a thing from our earlier run,” said Hines, who previously belted out a 6.94. “We have a brand new motor and it has all new piston, rings and rods and all of that stuff. It just worked.
“We’ve seen on the dyno, when we make a pull on the dyno with the brand new engine it’s got all the oil in the rings and that has to get burned out of there. They usually pick up four or five horsepower on the second pull. It does the same thing out there on the race track and we were just hoping it would repeat. We came back and made a few clutch adjustments.”
From the time Hines let out on the clutch, he knew the run was going to be a quick. He did admit the 6.88 was a pleasant surprise.
“I knew it was a great run going down the track because when you don’t have to correct it, you get the big numbers. I saw our earlier runs and figured I’d run a 6.90. I was just hoping to run quicker than Angelle.”
Sampey holds the current Pro Stock Motorcycle record with a 6.87 elapsed time.
BUELL’S WORKING RIGHT – Funny thing happens when you put air in the tires on a Buell.
“We’re not playing around with this thing any more,” said Sampey, who turned in a couple of early lackluster runs. “We were struggling with the starting line. We got it figured out.”
Sampey aborted the run prior to producing her best of the day.
“We had a leak in the tire while we were sitting in the staging lanes,” said Sampey, who said her team usually runs four to five pounds of air in the tires. “We have two-and-a-half by the time we left the starting line.”
If Sampey could have envisioned her fortunes Thursday evening; chances are she might have made the move sooner.
“I was excited with what we were able to accomplish,” Sampey explained. “We might have had some more in it but I fuzzed the rev-limiter a bit. That’s good enough for now. We don’t want anyone to start fussing too much.”
A LITTLE MORE CUT IN HIS STRUT – Pro Stock Motorcycle icon George Bryce had a little more cut in his strut walking through the pits at SGMP. With his baseball cap turned backwards, Bryce was walking a bit quicker than usual although he sported a substantial knee brace.
Bryce had off-season surgery to repair some knee damage.
“I had to get me some new parts put in,” Bryce said. “I got me some new ligaments and tendons installed. Since I'm getting old I had broke one a long time ago and my leg was getting kind of wobbly. Ken Johnson got mad at me for whining about how bad my knee hurt and he don't even have a knee. I told him that I've been sympathizing with him over his knee for 2 years and I love how he handles it and I think he's the man. My knee was hurting so I went and got it fixed. They put me some new parts in and I know one thing, they wouldn't use any of my parts because I'm too old so they got me some new parts.
“They asked me what I wanted and I said some 22-year old, somebody who can run fast and jump high a basketball player or somebody like that.”
So where does a person get a fresh set of ligaments? Certainly, a person cannot go down to the local story and place and order.
“You know that's a very good point,” Bryce said. “I did some research and found out on the Internet. I got me a cadaver implant. I had to look up cadaver because I didn't know what that was but it's a dead person. I got me some parts off a dead person.”
Bryce pointed out the new parts came with a steep price.
“They charged me 10,000 for that rubber band,” explained Bryce. “I did some research because I wanted to find out why that rubber band cost me so much. They said that it's hard to find one that's clean, one that has no HIV issues, and that has had a good lifestyle. I found out that it's young people that are clean, don't have HIV issues and they have a good lifestyle and don't have vascular situations, they don't usually die so they don't have a lot of parts in stock so they charge a lot for it. It's like a high dollar crank shaft.”
MORE THAN SCUFFING – Billy Glidden didn’t mind getting the quickest NHRA Pro Stock elapsed time in the books during
Mouton, Carl Robinson and Glidden are busy this weekend testing different tire compounds for their large tire program.
“Let's just say we have several different specs we'll be trying out this weekend,” Moulton answered when asked how many different tire combinations will be tested over the weekend. “We're still learning so we're throwing some different things into this car to see how they react.”
According to Moulton, they’re looking at several different factors including the construction of the tires. He’ll gather the data and make adjustments where adjustments are needed.
“After the test I'll go back and analyze all the results based off all the data we're getting off the car,” Moulton explained. “From there we'll work with some of the guys at the plant and I'll come up with some specs. If we need to, hopefully we hit something that hit a homerun here but this is a tough egg to crack.”
This weekend Glidden is testing as many applications that will work well within the Pro Stock. This technology will then be filtered down into the other high-horsepower sportsman classes such as Top Sportsman and Super Comp.
LIKING THE WEATHER, FOR NOW – So what’s a Canadian doing in 70-degree weather during March? If you're Rob Atchison,
“This is beautiful,” Atchison, a three-time IHRA Alcohol Funny Car driver said. “I'm really glad that we made it down and it was a little tricky coming down through the ice rain but it's definitely worth it right now.”
Atchison said the crazier the winter, the better the weather is for the upcoming season. Or, at least he sees the trend turning this way.
“It’s been a crazy winter,” Atchison explained. “We get a foot of snow and then it'll be 15 or 20 degrees warmer melting all away, then the next week we'll get another foot. It's been a really, really weird winter but we're toughing it out we're okay.
“Usually when it's a crazy winter it sells down in the summer so it should be nice hopefully less precipitation.”
Whether the weather settles down or not, Atchison will come to battle prepared.
“We've just got to try a bunch of stuff and get this car sorted out,” Atchison said. “We've really been struggling with consistency issues and shaking the tires this weekend. We’ll try and get our little gremlin to get back to consistency and then we've got a chance.
“This IHRA Alcohol Funny Car class is getting a lot tougher than people think and there's a lot more people to worry about than just myself and Mark Thomas.”
WEDNESDAY - PARKING DAY; THE ENTRIES MOVE IN
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