Lucas fired the first salvo early in the day with a steady 3.891 at 306.95 mph that led the opening round of time trials. He later returned to post an improved 3.868 at 309.91 mph in his GEICO Powersports/Lucas Oil dragster to finish the day seventh overall.

"I'm probably happier with the 3.89 than I am with the 3.86 because the conditions we had in Round 1 are what we'll be racing under on Sunday," said Lucas, who like Langdon grew up in Riverside, Calif. "The Friday night session is always a lot of fun but it's nothing more than a chest-beating contest. It usually has nothing to do with racing on Sunday because we'll never see conditions like that when the sun's out.

"I'm not saying it wouldn't have been fun to stay No. 1 but we just missed it by a smidge. Nevertheless, Sunday's what we like to focus on and right now I'm real happy with both cars. I like the way they're running."

Langdon's Lucas Oil/Dixie Chopper crew showed their veteran experience earlier in the day when they noticed their motor's oil pressure was off during the warm-up process for Q1. Rather than risk anything, they jumped into action and swapped out the entire motor assembly, warmed up again, and had Langdon to the starting line in 30 minutes.

The extra effort ultimately paid off in the evening round when they used the data from their earlier run of 3.975 at 289.82 mph to run a quicker 3.857 at 309.20 mph, placing them sixth on the grid.

"These guys blew me away today with the way they handled themselves," Langdon said. "They swapped out everything and we didn't miss a beat. That's world-class right there.

"I'm super happy with both runs and the 3.85 was very nice. I don't think anyone will run quicker than that tomorrow so we can work on our race day set-up and get ready to go some rounds. I'm very excited right now."

Saturday's final two qualifying sessions begin at 11:30 a.m. and 2:15 p.m.

Courtesy of Rob Geiger