Wed, 13 Oct 2004, 09:37 AM
It Just Keeps On Getting Better
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By Bob Frey
Photo copyright 2004 Auto Imagery, Inc.
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Team Schumacher celebrate championship.
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No sooner had I settled back and digested all that happened
in Chicago a week ago when I realized that it was time to head for Maple Grove.
I knew that the Reading track was always fast and I knew that the fans would
return, they always do, and I knew it would be a good weekend, but nothing
prepared me for what actually took place. The 20
th running of the
Lucas Oil Nationals just confirmed what
I always knew, there’s something special about Maple Grove. Always has been and
always will be. And if we could ever get that race in on the original weekend
we would break all records and that includes records for performance, records
for attendance and records for, well, just about everything that you keep
records on. When it was all over, a capacity crowd had witnessed one of the
great races of all time, and, while I know I shouldn’t say this, it will be a
long while before we top this one. Of course I said that after the Chicago
race, too. Now, where to start…
Tony Schumacher
clinching his second Top Fuel title would be a good place to begin. From the
very start of qualifying it looked like it was going to be a battle between the
“Team Kalitta” cars and Tony, After
all, Doug Kalitta, David Grubnic and
Scott Kalitta qualified in the top
three spots and that’s quite an accomplishment in itself. Tony checked in at
the 4th spot, not exactly shying away from Connie’s guys. And when
eliminations began and Rhonda
Hartman-Smith upset Larry Dixon
you knew it was going to be a wild day….and it was. But all along you knew that
Schumacher vs Vandergriff.
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Tony would have to face one or maybe both of his closest competitors if he
wanted to lock up the title which seemed inevitable. He did beat
Brandon Bernstein, who was third in the
points, but he never did have to race Doug since Rhonda beat him, too, in the
second round. Still, when Tony stopped Brandon and mathematically eliminated
everyone else from title contention you could hear the sigh of relief from the
“Team Army” camp. Then, to punctuate
his championship, Tony won the race and tied the single season record for wins
by a Top Fuel driver at nine.
Did you
know that both Larry Dixon and
Gary
Scelzi won 9 races in a single year? Larry also holds the record for the
most final rounds with 14 and
Kenny
Bernstein holds the mark for the most round wins in a year by a dragster
driver with 61. By comparison, Tony now has twelve final rounds and 55 round
wins so he could tie one record and break another depending on how he does at
the last two races. Whatever he does it has been a great year for the Army Top
Fuel team and they deserve all the respect in the world for what they have
accomplished. By the way, it was a nice gesture to take a few moments at Maple
Grove and acknowledge the entire crew from
Alan
Johnson on down after they had clinched the title. A tip of the cap, too,
for Rhonda and her team for waiting patiently while the honors were bestowed on
the team that
Don Schumacher put
together….
Bob Vandergriff has to get
some credit, too. Driving the
50th
anniversary Hedman Hedders car,
Bob made it to the final round before falling to Tony. Along the way he beat
Cory McClenathan, David Grubnic and
Scott Kalitta before meeting up with Tony. Bob has a lot to bring to the sport
and if all the rumors are true he could be announcing a major deal any day now.
Let’s hope so, the former Rookie of the Year would be another great addition to
the tour, especially if he does it on a full time basis.
Scelzi vs Force.
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As exciting as the TF racing was, there was still some
unfinished business in the Funny Car class.
John Force, with a win at the Grove, could lock up his 13
th
POWERade championship and he gave it
his best shot. With a 4.728 in the first round John served notice that he was
the guy to beat on Sunday and he followed that with a 4.762 win over
Tim Wilkerson and another 4.76 to stop
his main rival this year,
Del Worsham.
Now all he needed to do was beat
Gary
Scelzi in the final round and we’d have another champion to crown in the
winner’s circle. But Gary, one of the hottest drivers in the class lately, had
other ideas and his 4.853 was more than good enough to beat John’s tire smoking
run and enough to put the celebration on hold until Las Vegas. The way I do the
math all John has to do is qualify for the Las Vegas race and he’ll be the
champ for the 13
th time. And if you wonder when the last time was
that he didn’t qualify for a field, try the last race of 1987, a full 344 races
ago. He wasn’t alone at that race, though, since the list of DNQ’s included
Gary Densham, Ed Mohr, Bryan Raines and
Rodney Flournoy among others…. Other
than John,
did you know that
Gary Scelzi has won more rounds than any other driver in the class since the
Topeka race? John has won an amazing thirty rounds since the Topeka event while
Gary is not far behind with twenty four round wins. Plus Gary has beaten John
in two final rounds since then so he has had a pretty good season, wouldn’t you
say? With his win Gary has moved the
Oakley
Dodge to within two rounds of second place in the points. And if you say
what’s the difference between second and third place, well how about $50,000,
and that’s not chump change no matter what league you’re in…
Eric Medlen qualified number one for
the second time this year but it hasn’t been a very good year for the number
one qualifier in the Funny Car class.
Did
you know that only twice this year has the top qualifier gone on to win
the race in the FC class? Gary Scelzi did it in St. Louis and John did it in
Seattle and other than that the quickest guy going into Sunday has not been
able to close the deal.
Line vs Anderson.
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With all of the excitement going on in the fuel classes you
might think that the Pro Stock teams took a back seat at Maple Grove. Not so!!
>From the first qualifying session which ended with
Ken Koretsky at the top of the list, to the final race between
Jason Line and
Greg Anderson this was one of the best Pro Stock shows in years. For
a while it looked like the home town hero, Mr. Koretsky, was going to go all
the way, but he was stopped on a holeshot in the semi-finals by Jason Line who
had been driving well all day long. In the final round, Jason’s teammate and
partner, Greg Anderson, had a chance to set a single season mark with fourteen
wins and that’s something that no other professional driver has ever done in
any class. Most of the folks that I spoke to thought that it was a given that
Greg would win, but Jason, Greg and their car owner
Ken Black have always said that they will race heads-up every time
they face each other and this final round was one for the ages. With another
great start (.029 reaction time) and with his quickest run ever, Jason ended
Greg’s
bid for history and in the
process he also passed
Dave Connolly
and moved back into second place in the points. Believe it or not I actually
heard some people say that Greg let Jason win so he could move into second.
People are amazing, aren’t they? Let me say that I have been doing this for a
long while and I thought the PS final was about as exciting as it could get and
the entire Ken Black team is to be congratulated for giving the fans a stunning
show. That is a championship team in every sense of the word and I’m sure the
folks at
Summit Racing couldn’t be
happier with their sponsorship of the flagship car.….With his semi-final round
appearance Ken Koretsky did move into ninth place in the points,
Rickie Smith is tenth and Warren
Johnson is now out of the top ten. Amazing, isn’t it?
Warren has now had almost as many DNQ’s this year as he had in
the previous three decades of racing.
Savoie vs Brown.
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The “Team Schumacher” gang really strutted their stuff in
the Pro Stock Bike class as
Angelle
Savoie and
Antron Brown met in
the final round, with Angelle winning and making one of the best runs in the
history of the class, a 7.018 in the final round. If anyone could have taken
one for the team, it might have been Angelle, since Antron is only about six
rounds out of first place right now. A win over Angelle and he would have been
in real striking distance of the leader,
Andrew
Hines going into Las Vegas. As it is, things could get real exciting in
Vegas if Andrew stumbles in the early rounds. Of course that hasn’t happened
for a while, in fact, not at all this year.
Did
you know that the last time Andrew lost in the first round was back at
Brainerd in 2003? That’s a streak of eighteen races and that’s pretty good in
anybody’s book…..There was no six second run in the bike class in Maple Grove
and that means that the folks at
Mickey
Thompson can tuck that ten grand away for a while. I don’t think we’ll see
a record breaking run in Vegas but I wouldn’t rule it out at the final race in
Pomona….Angelle’s win was her fifth at Maple Grove, the site of her first win
back in 1996, and to say that she was happy afterwards would be an
understatement. Angelle and Antron really are good friends on and off the track
and I guess they made some wacky bet and now Antron has to wear one of
Angelle’s shirts for the entire weekend in Las Vegas. The good thing about
that, Antron, is that it’s Vegas and nobody will even notice!
Lucas vs Force.
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Morgan Lucas and
Ashley Force gave us another great run
in the final of the Top Alcohol Dragster class while
Frank Manzo and
Bob Newberry
did likewise in the alky Funny Car class.
Did
you know that this was Frank Manzo’s first win since this event a year
ago? Now that’s amazing. Frank won it in fine fashion, too, with a stunning
5.529 en route to the win and a holeshot win in the final round….
Bob Phillips, who has raced at Maple
Grove for about twenty years finally won a national event there when he won
Super Gas over
George Stack, and
Tex Miller, the former World Champion,
won for the first time in a dozen years when he took Stock Eliminator honors.
All in all it was a great race and I hope everyone who was there appreciated
what they were seeing. If you missed it you will be able to catch it on ESPN
next week, the sportsman show will air on Saturday, October 17
th
beginning at 12:30 P.M., while the pro show runs that Saturday night at 7
P.M…..And don’t forget the Dutch Classic this week at Maple Grove and the
Lucas Oil Division race at
No Problem Raceway in Louisiana. By the
way,
Robert Book’s car, the one that
I wrote about this week, will be at the Grove and that alone should be worth
the price of admission. Of course if you bring your ticket from this past weekend
you’ll get in free to the Dutch Classic. Go and enjoy….
NHRA: 10 Most Recent Entries [ top ]
Oct 16- DALLAS - JEGS Allstars Top Alcohol Dragster Final Qualifying, Session #2 Order
Oct 16- DALLAS - Top Alcohol Dragster Qualifying, Session #2 Order
Oct 16- DALLAS - JEGS Allstars Top Alcohol Funny Car Eliminations Ladder
Oct 16- DALLAS - JEGS Allstars Top Alcohol Funny Car Final Qualifying, Session #2 Order
Oct 16- DALLAS - Top Alcohol Dragster Qualifying Notes, Session #2
Oct 16- DALLAS - Top Sportsman Round 1 Winners
Oct 16- DALLAS - Top Alcohol Funny Car Qualifying, Session #2 Order
Oct 16- DALLAS - Top Sportsman Round 1 Eliminations
Oct 16- DALLAS - Top Alcohol Funny Car Qualifying Notes, Session #2
Oct 16- DALLAS - Super Gas Round 3 Winners
