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Sat, 10 Apr 2010, 03:50 PM

Competition Eliminator Qualifying Notes, Final Session

By Larry Sullivan

BAYTOWN, Texas - Notes from final, round 3 qualifying in Competition Eliminator at the NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series, 23rd annual O'Reilly NHRA Spring Nationals presented by Pennzoil listing lane, driver name, elapsed time, top speed this round, amount over/under index this round, position in order following run, best prior elapsed time, speed & over/under Index, and position in order prior to run:

Left Lane: Joey Tanksley Runs 12.578/62.80/5.138, Now #1; C/D Index: 7.44, Prior Best: 6.704/198.23/-0.736, Was #1
Right Lane: Charles Watson Runs 8.480/156.28/-0.500, Now #11; D/SM Index: 8.98, Prior Best: 8.338/159.63/-0.642, Was #11

8:57 a.m. Weather conditions: air temperature 68 degrees, relative humidity 67 percent, barometer 30.16 inches, adjusted altitude 1,036 feet, track temperature 74 degrees.
Duane Robison is on the bump spot at -0.376.
There's a whole lot more water in the air today, so performance may fall off a bit from yesterday's spectacular levels.

Tanksley left hard, chattered the tires, and lifted. Watson appeared to make a full pass - his speed was only down about 3 mph.

Left Lane: Del Segura Runs 8.507/153.26/-0.093, Now #30; F/D Index: 8.60, Prior Best: 8.139/164.15/-0.461, Was #30
Right Lane: Mike Trumble Runs 7.918/170.56/-0.642, Now #3; A/SMA Index: 8.56, Prior Best: 7.860/172.39/-0.700, Was #3

Left Lane: Craig Bourgeois Runs 6.850/195.87/-0.540, Now #26; B/DA Index: 7.39, Prior Best: 24.346/36.68/16.956, Was #35
Right Lane: Rhett Fulton Runs 8.942/99.77/1.072, Now #23; C/ED Index: 7.87, Prior Best: 7.303/178.50/-0.567, Was #23

Bourgeois was oh-for-two yesterday...he got in the field with this effort, but that's still an off-pace run for him. The car was somewhat lazy on the launch. Fulton lifted past half track.

Left Lane: Ernest Watson Runs 7.916/172.06/-0.644, Now #11; A/SMA Index: 8.56, Prior Best: 7.919/172.78/-0.641, Was #12
Right Lane: Don Thomas Runs 10.235/84.74/2.365, Now #17; C/ED Index: 7.87, Prior Best: 7.241/182.06/-0.629, Was #17

Watson actually stepped up slightly, enough to move up one spot in the order. Thomas ran to ha;f track and lifted.

Left Lane: Clark Smiley Runs 7.381/184.85/-0.589, Now #20; C/A Index: 7.97, Prior Best: 7.373/184.98/-0.597, Was #20
Right Lane: Duane Robison Runs 7.425/183.07/-0.545, Now #25; C/A Index: 7.97, Prior Best: 7.594/182.58/-0.376, Was #33

Keith Mawhee was on the bump spot at -0.435. Robison made a nice run today and now Del Segura is on the bump spot at -0.461 - and he has already made an off-pace run. There are three drivers yet to run who have a shot at bumping Segura.

Left Lane: Dennis Smiley No Time, Now #26; A/DA Index: 7.13, Prior Best: 6.588/204.48/-0.542, Was #26
Right Lane: Keith Mawhee Runs 8.062/165.78/-0.428, Now #33; F/AA Index: 8.49, Prior Best: 8.055/167.82/-0.435, Was #33

Smiley broke in the water. Mahwee matched his previous best run to the thousandth and stayed in the first-alternate position. Now Segura has two drivers to worry about.

Left Lane: Scott Cashio Runs 8.004/167.78/-0.686, Now #5; B/SMA Index: 8.69, Prior Best: 8.026/168.35/-0.664, Was #7
Right Lane: Brad Klein No Time, Now #19; B/AP Index: 7.88, Prior Best: 7.275/188.25/-0.605, Was #19

Nice run by Cashio to move up a couple spots. Klein broke on the launch and coasted to a stop short of the finish line.

Left Lane: Jody Holland Runs 9.209/143.73/-0.341, Now #7; L/AA Index: 9.55, Prior Best: 8.880/148.92/-0.670, Was #7
Right Lane: Ray Goodman Runs 7.551/173.52/-0.309, Now #34; A/EA Index: 7.86, Prior Best: 7.502/173.99/-0.358, Was #34

Goodman and Doug Warren are the only two cars yet to run with a chance to bump Segura from the field.

Goodman got a nice clean start and went right down the groove...and failed to improve. Now Segura only has one driver to worry about...

Left Lane: Pete Carbery Runs 11.853/79.87/4.293, Now #9; B/A Index: 7.56, Prior Best: 6.909/200.44/-0.651, Was #9
Right Lane: William West Runs 7.934/169.83/-0.556, Now #21; F/AA Index: 8.49, Prior Best: 7.895/170.64/-0.595, Was #21

Carberry slowed almost immediately.

Left Lane: Greg Porter Runs 9.702/105.32/0.372, Now #24; G/SMA Index: 9.33, Prior Best: 8.774/154.74/-0.556, Was #24
Right Lane: Doug Warren Runs 6.663/208.52/-0.467, Now #32; A/DA Index: 7.13, Prior Best: 9.214/142.93/2.084, Was #35

Warren took his shot and bumped Segura from the field ... by six thousandths of a second.

Left Lane: Grant Lewis Runs 8.559/155.51/-0.641, Now #13; H/AA Index: 9.20, Prior Best: 8.571/150.56/-0.629, Was #18
Right Lane: Alan Ellis Runs 6.702/168.22/-0.468, Now #30; A/AP Index: 7.17, Prior Best: 6.648/205.76/-0.522, Was #30

Lewis improved enough to get lane choice in round one...Ellis made a good-looking pass, shut off around 1,000 feet.

Left Lane: Adam White Runs 6.992/160.86/-0.428, Now #22; A/ND Index: 7.42, Prior Best: 6.832/194.49/-0.588, Was #22
Right Lane: Keith Hall Runs 8.343/163.29/-0.637, Now #2; D/SM Index: 8.98, Prior Best: 8.279/164.53/-0.701, Was #2

Left Lane: Cordis Johnson Runs 8.831/151.61/-0.499, Now #31; G/SMA Index: 9.33, Prior Best: 8.809/152.69/-0.521, Was #31
Right Lane: Chase Williams Runs 7.388/182.70/-0.582, Now #23; C/A Index: 7.97, Prior Best: 7.437/182.08/-0.533, Was #28

Nice run by Williams to move up several spots.

Left Lane: Chris McGaha Runs 7.378/184.40/-0.592, Now #22; D/A Index: 7.97, Prior Best: 7.439/184.72/-0.531, Was #29
Right Lane: Michael Johnson Runs 7.325/181.84/-0.535, Now #8; A/EA Index: 7.86, Prior Best: 7.206/184.80/-0.654, Was #8

Left Lane: Will Hatcher Runs 9.990/117.91/2.860, Now #6; A/DA Index: 7.13, Prior Best: 6.459/210.14/-0.671, Was #6
Right Lane: Steve Holloway Runs 6.985/197.19/-0.635, Now #16; B/AA Index: 7.62, Prior Best: 6.987/198.38/-0.633, Was #16

Hatcher's dragster yanked the wheels up, then banged them down and he slowed.

Left Lane: Stephen Rosen Runs 8.522/117.54/0.062, Now #14; G/ED Index: 8.46, Prior Best: 7.822/168.43/-0.638, Was #14
Right Lane: Raymond Martin Runs 12.888/58.82/4.578, Now #15; K/AA Index: 8.31, Prior Best: 7.675/167.63/-0.635, Was #15

Both drivers slowed way before the stripe.

Left Lane: Adam Hickey Runs 8.219/144.71/-0.491, Now #10; C/SMA Index: 8.71, Prior Best: 8.062/166.95/-0.648, Was #10
Right Lane: Dan Fletcher Runs 7.810/150.72/-0.530, Now #4; B/EA Index: 8.34, Prior Best: 7.654/172.92/-0.686, Was #4

Left Lane: David Rampy Runs 7.207/183.24/-0.653, Now #9; A/EA Index: 7.86, Prior Best: 7.228/175.05/-0.632, Was #16

Rampy closes out Comp qualifying. Well, he almost closed it out - it's raining. I know there wasn't any rain in the forecast, but it's raining. 9:30 a.m.
2:19 p.m. Weather conditions: air temperature 69 degrees, relative humidity 54 percent, barometer 30.18 inches, adjusted altitude 973 feet, track temperature 89 degrees.
Once the rain cells moved away, the weather improved rapidly, with partly-cloudy skies and a nice breeze speeding track drying and we are resuming a few minutes ahead of the projected 2:30 resumption time.
David Rampy really wanted to make this run - he left his car parked under the tower and returned every few minutes to see how things were going. He had the toughest matchup of the first round (17 vs 1), so he wanted to move away from that matchup.

Rampy made his best run of the weekend and moved up to ninth on the ladder - setting up a possible matchup with the #1 qualifier in round two!

Timing data courtesy of CompuLink