John Force raced to the qualifying lead Friday at the FRAM-Autolite Nationals at Infineon
Raceway.
Doug Kalitta, Greg Anderson and Craig Treble also led their respective categories at the
$1.9 million race, the 15th of 23 events in the $50 million NHRA POWERade Drag Racing
Series.
Force powered his Castrol GTX High-Mileage Ford Mustang to the track elapsed time record
at 4.814 seconds at 316.90 mph to lead the Funny Car category.
"I never had a problem, the car did," said Force. "I did redlight a few times this
season. We finally got the gremlins out of this Mustang. (Crew chiefs) Austin Coil and
Bernie (Fedderly) have this car running like it should."
Doug Kalitta
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Kalitta blasted his Mac Tools dragster to a run of 4.531 at 325.77, a track record
performance, to lead Top Fuel qualifying.
"The track was plenty good for us," said Kalitta. "That was a good run for us. We had an
oil pump problem on the first run and had to shut off, so it felt good to get in a good
run tonight."
Anderson paced the Pro Stock field with a track record pass of 6.776 at 203.55 in his
Vegas General Construction Pontiac Grand Am to lead the Pro Stock field.
"I thought I could run quicker tonight," said Anderson. "I think we'll run better
tomorrow morning. It's so nice to have a smooth race track to run on. I'm really
enjoying racing here."
Treble rebounded from a recent performance slump to lead the Pro Stock Bike field with a
run of 7.179 at 187.00 on his Matco Tools Suzuki.
"It wasn't a driver problem, it was a tuning problem," said Treble. "It's been all me and
(crew chief) Calvin Aswege. After Denver, we went to Vance & Hines and Byron (Hines) said
we need to lean on it. The competition in Pro Stock Bike has stepped up this season, so
if they're going to lean on it, so are we."
Qualifying continues Saturday with sessions at 10 a.m. and 3 p.m.
