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PERSISTENT
RAINS FORCE POSTPONEMENT OF LUCAS OIL NATIONALS
MOHNTON, Pa. -
Sunday's final eliminations for the 18th
annual Lucas Oil NHRA Nationals at Maple Grove
Raceway were postponed due to persistent rains.
Eliminations have been rescheduled for Monday at
10:30 a.m. for the $1.9 million race, the 18th
of 23 events in the NHRA POWERade Drag Racing
Series.
The start of eliminations was delayed nearly two
hours before the first round of Top Fuel was
completed. Midway through the opening round of
Funny Car eliminations the rains resumed,
forcing NHRA officials to postpone the race.
Top Fuel No. 1 qualifier Tony Schumacher
recorded the second quickest pass during the
opening round when he clocked a 4.589 second run
in his U.S. Army dragster to defeat Don Sosenka.
Schumacher, who will face Doug Herbert in the
second round, is looking to earn his second
consecutive tour victory.
"We would have loved to continue the race
in the conditions we had in qualifying and
today," said Schumacher.
"Looking at the weather, it's still going
to be cloudy tomorrow and if it's cool we'll
still be able to run good. I feel we
definitely have the car to beat. I would
have rather gotten the race in, but there's
nothing we can do about it. We'll just
have to wait until the morning and see what
happens."
Top Fuel points leader Larry Dixon advanced to
round two of eliminations, as did his nearest
competitor in the points chase Kenny Bernstein.
"We've been through this many times
before," said Bernstein. "You
just have to live with it and go with it.
The hardest part before the first round was that
I got in and out of the car four or five times.
That was the hardest part of the day."
The biggest upset of the rain-shortened first
round happened in Funny Car when No. 15
qualifier Todd Paton defeated John Force, who
was racing for his fourth straight victory.
Force suffered an engine failure near
half-track, which allowed Paton to drive around
for the win.
"It's kind of nice to be the little fish
that could," said Paton. "It's
anybody's day. Once you get a dance card
to Sunday, anything can happen. That's
only the second time I've raced him, so I'm
batting .500 against him. Not many people
can say that." |
