Thu, 27 Dec 2001, 08:43 AM
Wrapping Up The Year!
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By Bob Frey
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Since the 2001 season, and the Winston Drag Racing era, have both been over for a
couple of weeks, I thought I’d clean out the notebook with a couple final issues of
"Did You Know?" Of course, the fact that there hasn’t been much new news
around the sport lately may have precluded me putting any really new stuff in this
week’s column, although, I will tell you
Skuza's Stratus
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this. Watch for the announcement real soon by one of the fuel teams that most folks
have written off as dead. This will probably come as a shock to everyone, since most
of the experts had already discounted this team for the year 2002. And, I’ll tell
you this, it will be big!! And, watch for the subtle restructuring of one of the
very big Pro Stock teams to take place in 2002. It may not come in the form of an
announcement, but it will be readily apparent to any, true fan. Of course, the
battle between the Ingersolls should be exciting next year, with Mark in the
Allen Johnson (Pro Stock) camp, and Buddy, in the
Warren Johnson
arena. That, by the way, is a major addition to W.J.’s team and he’ll be awfully
tough to beat in the Pro Stock ranks next year. Of course, with
Rickie Smith
and some testing opportunities on the horizon for Team Mopar,
Mark Osborne
and
Darrell Alderman won’t be pushovers, either. Word has it that the Neons
cranked out some 6.78 & ’79 runs at the end of last week’s testing. And, with
the new Dodge Stratus body on
Dean Skuza’s (and no one else’s) Funny Car next
year,
John Force may get a real challenge, and not just from those rumored
new Toyota cars. By the way, since I mentioned Buddy Ingersoll, I think I’ll give
you folks the real rundown on what his famous Buick V-6 turbo car really did back in
the mid 1980’s. We’ll do that in my next "From The Tower" column on Friday
of this week. Now…
Kenny Bernstein
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Since
Kenny Bernstein won the Winston Championship this year, it’s pretty
obvious that he won the most rounds of competition. But,
did you know
that he also had the best winning percentage in the class? Kenny’s final total of 61
wins and 16 losses gave him a winning percentage of .792. Wow, now that’s
impressive. It edged out
Larry Dixon who chalked up a .760 mark, which, I
think you’ll agree, isn’t too bad, either. By way of comparison,
Gary Scelzi,
in winning last year, finished up with a 54-14 mark, good for an amazing .794
percentage, while
Tony Schumacher only needed a .637 mark (37 – 21), and one
national event win, to win the crown in 1999. Life is all about timing, isn’t it?…
Did you know that, with all of the talk about the demise of the Top
Fuel class this year, that there were 42 different drivers who competed in at least
one round of competition during the season? Two years ago, when there was no talk
about the lack of cars, there were a grand total of 29 drivers who competed in at
least one round. 29. Hummmm….If you wanted to win this past season in Top Fuel, it
was a good thing if you qualified in the top half of the field. That’s because
drivers who qualified eighth or better in 2001 won 22 of the 24 races. Only
Darrell Russell (#9 at the Winternationals), and
Doug Kalitta, (#10 at
Phoenix), won when qualified in the bottom half of the field. That means
Larry Dixon
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that, after the second race of the season, every winner in TF came from the top of
the field.
Did you know that the number one qualifier won nine times,
and the number two guy won on four occasions? That means the top two guys won over
50% of the races this year in the dragster class. Wow…..Still in the dragster class,
did you know that there were six, multiple winners this year? Of
course, Kenny (8) and Larry (6) did it, but so did Doug Kalitta (3), while
Mike
Dunn, Darrell Russell and Gary Scelzi each won a pair of races.
Andrew Cowin,
David Grubnic and
Tony Schumacher all shared a dubious, distinction in
2001.
Did you know that all three of them made it to a Top Fuel final,
but none of them won a race? The rest of the statistical honors were split between
K.B. and Mike Dunn, with Kenny getting nine, number one spots and eight low elapsed
time marks, while Mike, in the Yankees’ car, set top speed at an amazing 11 races.
Still, the "King of Speed" wasn’t too far back in that category either.
Did you know that Kenny set top speed at 8 races this year.? Look back
at the numbers and it’s easy to see why Mr. Bernstein won the title, isn’t it?
John Force
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The other fuel class, the one dominated by John Force, gave us some interesting
stats, too. The most amazing one is this.
Did you know that there were
only 23 drivers who competed in at least one round this year? That’s 23 compared to
the dragster mark of 42. And,
did you know that there were 33 drivers
who scored points in the Funny Car class this year? That’s 33 compared to the
dragster number of 46. Now by "scoring points" I mean drivers who entered
at least one event, whether they qualified or not. Of course, John had the best
winning percentage with a .753 mark, based on a round total of 55 – 18. Only three
Funny Car drivers qualified for a race and never won a round this year, do you know
who they are? I’ll bet you guessed
Bob Bode and
Dale Creasy, but do
you know who the third one is? I’ll tell you later. By the way, as an aside, I
understand that some big things may be in store for the Creasy family this year. Let
’s keep our fingers crossed. Anyway…As far as where to qualify in the Funny Car
class, it’s almost as important to be in the top half of the filed here as it is in
the dragster class.
Did you know that only four races were won last
year by drivers in the bottom half of the filed? And three of them were by the same
team.
Del Worsham won from the number 11
spot in Pomona, and he won from the number 12 spot in Sonoma, while his teammate,
Frank Pedregon, won Atlanta after qualifying 12
th.
Gary
Densham, also won from the bottom half of the field, winning in Texas after
starting 12
th. Like the dragster class, the top two qualifiers in Funny
Car were tough to beat, winning a total of eight races, seven of them by either John
Force, Whit Bazemore or Tony Pedregon. Tony’s win in Englishtown marked the first
and only time that he has ever won a race when qualified number one.
Whit Bazemore
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Like the dragsters, we saw six, different, multiple winners in the Funny Car class
this year, with five of them winning more than twice. Gary Densham won a pair of
races, while Force, Del, Baze, Tony and
Ron Capps all won three or more
races. In all, there were nine guys who won races in 2001. With all of the talk
about what a great season Whit Bazemore had,
did you know (or
remember), that Del Worsham actually won more races (4) than Whit did (3)? And, to
show the parity in the Funny Car class, (yes, there was parity),
did you
know that 13 different drivers went to final rounds this year? Hey, when
only 23 drivers qualified for a race, 13 is a pretty, impressive number, I think.
That means that four guys made it to the finals, but not to the winner’s circle,
right? They were
Jim Epler, Al Hofmann, Dean Skuza and
Bob Gilbertson.
For the first time in a long while, Mr. Force did not dominate the statistical
categories this year, except for the big one, of course. Did you know
that Whit Bazemore had more number one qualifying spots and more low elapsed times
than John did this year? Well, he did. Whit qualified at the top of the pack nine
times, including five of the last seven races, while John had to settle for second
best, with six. Whit also had the upper hand in the low E/T category, with eight to
John’s six. Force ran the best speed at six events, while Whit did it at 5. Sounds
like 2002 should be some fun, huh?
Next week, I’ll look at the Pro Stock classes and then we’ll get into the 2002
season predictions. For now, I want to wish you all a Happy New Year, and I hope you
’ve had a great holiday season so far. Oh, by the way, the other Funny Car guy who
qualified for a starting berth but didn’t win a round this year was, of course,
Vinny Arcadi. But you knew that, didn’t you?
NHRA: 10 Most Recent Entries [ top ]
Nov 13- POMONA 2 - Stock Eliminator Eliminations Ladder
Nov 13- POMONA 2 - Stock Eliminator Final Qualifying, Session #1 Order
Nov 11- POMONA 2 - Thursday Schedule
Nov 11- POMONA 2 - Top Fuel Preview
Nov 09- Loaded 2027 Schedule Announced for NHRA Lucas Oil Drag Racing Series
Nov 06- LAS VEGAS - Top Alcohol Funny Car Final, Round 4 Eliminations
Nov 06- LAS VEGAS - Competition Eliminator Final, Round 5 Eliminations
Nov 06- LAS VEGAS - Top Dragster Final, Round 5 Eliminations
Nov 05- POMONA 2 - Event Preview
Nov 02- LAS VEGAS - Summary of Eliminations in Top Alcohol Funny Car
