Sun, Oct 25, 08:06 PM ENNIS - Funny Car Round 2 Eliminations

By Rick Green Strange One Here

ENNIS, Texas - Results of round 2 eliminations in Funny Car at the 13th annual NHRA Revell Nationals:

 Qua-Driver(Opp'nt)-RT-----ET---Speed-Rd-Qua-Driver(Opp'nt)-RT-----ET---Speed
   3 Chuck Etchells      4.848 300.10  Q   6 Whit Bazemore       4.891 309.70
   (J Epler     ) 0.497  5.030 311.31 E1   (T Wilkerson ) 0.483  5.172 274.64
                  0.529  5.246 214.38 E2 *****WINNER***** 0.510  4.921 309.59

Bazemore leaves first and then never looks back as Etchells' engine went silent on the top end.

 Qua-Driver(Opp'nt)-RT-----ET---Speed-Rd-Qua-Driver(Opp'nt)-RT-----ET---Speed
   4 Ron Capps           4.868 314.79  Q  12 Del Worsham         4.988 272.56
   (G Densham   ) 0.500  4.991 270.83 E1   (T Pedregon  ) 0.466  5.038 293.73
 *****WINNER***** 0.463  5.070 304.77 E2                  0.466  7.729 111.26

They leave together and then Worsham loses traction and smokes the tires. He attempts to drive through it, but does not. Capps has a puff of smoke on the top end, but takes the win light.

 Qua-Driver(Opp'nt)-RT-----ET---Speed-Rd-Qua-Driver(Opp'nt)-RT-----ET---Speed
   7 Dean Skuza          4.919 313.80  Q   2 Cruz Pedregon       4.839 317.90
   (R Anderson  ) 0.477  4.915 308.74 E1   (G Mikres    ) 0.536  4.944 315.01
 *****WINNER***** 0.497  5.020 302.01 E2                  0.550 10.600  41.61

Skuza is off the line first and as Cruz is chasing him down the engine lets go. The fiberglass pressure relief panel went flying into the air.

 Qua-Driver(Opp'nt)-RT-----ET---Speed-Rd-Qua-Driver(Opp'nt)-RT-----ET---Speed
   8 Al Hofmann          4.923 308.85  Q   1 John Force          4.787 322.81
   (T Hoover    ) 0.499  4.855 317.46 E1   (D Creasy, Jr) 0.498  4.962 312.06
                  0.000  9.999   0.00 E2 *****WINNER***** 0.534  4.848 321.19

This is a great one. Hofmann is standing in the staging area without his car. All of a sudden here comes Al's team and his car. Apparently he had some problems in the pits, but it looks like it is fixed. Now with the delay due to the clean-up Al goes ahead and attempts to fire it up. The car won't start, so Al goes over to Force and tells him he will have a single. Then there is some controversy over if Force can switch lanes, the decision is he can not. Force then just misses backing up the record by 0.006 seconds. This was really an interesting turn of events.