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POMONA, Calif. - Notes from round 1 qualifying in Top Alcohol Funny Car at the NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series, 47th annual Automobile Club of Southern California NHRA Finals listing lane, driver name, elapsed time, top speed, and position in order following run: Left Lane: Bernie Harrington Runs 7.587/115.44, Now #1 Right Lane: Jordan Pawlick Runs 10.467/83.16, Now #2 2:42 p.m. Weather conditions: air temperature 73 degrees, relative humidity 28 percent, barometer 28.96 inches, adjusted altitude 2,407 feet, track temperature 78 degrees. Pawlick shook and lifted. Harrington's car shook, he pedaled, the car turned
right and he almost crossed the centerline, then lifted. Left Lane: Brian Smith No Time, Now #4 Right Lane: Jeff Ashwell Runs 8.968/99.37, Now #2 Both cars shook hard on the launch and both made hard right turns. Ashwell shut it off without hitting anything. Smith tried to pedal and continue, but the car came back with a hard left turn and he body-slammed the left wall, so his ten-second run won't count. Left Lane: Sean O'Bannon Runs 8.915/99.85, Now #3 Right Lane: Keeter Ray Runs 7.865/124.57, Now #2 Lots of tire shake, tire spin and tail-wagging, but not much acceleration and both eventually shut off. Left Lane: Shane Westerfield Runs 5.677/256.21, Now #1 Right Lane: Sean Bellemeur Runs 6.170/180.14, Now #2 Bellemeur's car was taking dead aim at the 1,000-foot timing reflector and he finally had to lift to avoid it. Westerfield stayed more-or-less in the groove and made a full pass. Left Lane: Paul Gill Runs 5.561/261.93, Now #1 Right Lane: Fred Tigges Runs 20.170/76.22, Now #9 This is Tigges' first appearance at Pomona and Gill's second. It sounded like something broke in Tigges' driveline and
he coasted through, the engine silent. Gill made a nice run to take over the top spot, running a career-best speed. Left Lane: Doug Gordon Runs 5.699/260.71, Now #3 Right Lane: Clint Thompson Runs 5.857/241.58, Now #4 Gordon made a strong effort, ended up in the third spot. Thompson was a few hundredths back to about 800 feet, then it looked like his engine started going away, trailing light smoke as the car slowed. Left Lane: Kris Hool Runs 5.829/238.93, Now #4 Right Lane: Steve Gasparrelli Runs 7.805/91.93, Now #8 It sounded like gasparrelli popped the burst panel at half track and his car slowed with the chutes out. Hool made a full pass, but his car fell off the pace on the top end. Left Lane: John Lombardo Jr. Runs 5.628/258.76, Now #2 Right Lane: Jay Payne Runs 5.642/260.56, Now #3 Lombardo took the Division 7 championship away from Payne last weekend with a final-round win against Clint Thompson. Thompson also figured in Payne's outcome, beating Payne in the first round. Two nice runs, Lombardo getting to the stripe first.
Both were about a tenth off Gill's pace, however. Left Lane: Roger Bateman Runs 5.596/257.43, Now #3 Right Lane: Tony Bartone Runs 5.559/260.56, Now #1 Last pair. Nice runs, a pair. Bartone got to the stripe five thousandths ahead of Bateman to take over the top spot, Bateman had to settle for third. Jordan Pawlick is on the bump spot at 10.467 after one round.
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