Performing well is a double-edged sword.
 
Just ask Top Fuel team owners Tim and Renee Coghlan and driver Brady Kalivoda.

 

In just four appearances this season, the achieving underdogs made such a positive impression that several teams showed interest in crew chief Keith Adams, who had been one of tuning ace Alan Johnson's understudies and has admired former boss Dale Armstrong.

 

And it appears Don Schumacher Racing has hired Adams to serve as crew chief for Cory McClenathan's Fram-sponsored dragster.

 

DSR has not announced terms of the final deal, but both Tim Coghlan and Kalivoda have confirmed that Adams will join the Schumacher fold and that the Coghlan Motorsports Dragster -- which had the financial backing to run three more races this season -- will be parked.

 

"This was a dream and a passion," Tim Coghlan said. The former sportsman racer said he plans for the team to return to the track when he secures proper funding. He said he is prepared to field the team again for a  full schedule in 2008 if serious sponsorship makes it possible.

Performing well is a double-edged sword.
 
Just ask Top Fuel team owners Tim and Renee Coghlan and driver Brady Kalivoda.

 

In just four appearances this season, the achieving underdogs made such a positive impression that several teams showed interest in crew chief Keith Adams, who had been one of tuning ace Alan Johnson's understudies and has admired former boss Dale Armstrong.

 

And it appears Don Schumacher Racing has hired Adams to serve as crew chief for Cory McClenathan's Fram-sponsored dragster.

 

DSR has not announced terms of the final deal, but both Tim Coghlan and Kalivoda have confirmed that Adams will join the Schumacher fold and that the Coghlan Motorsports Dragster -- which had the financial backing to run three more races this season -- will be parked.

 

"This was a dream and a passion," Tim Coghlan said. The former sportsman racer said he plans for the team to return to the track when he secures proper funding. He said he is prepared to field the team again for a  full schedule in 2008 if serious sponsorship makes it possible.

 

"If I go out, it's going to be first-class," Coghlan, of Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, said. "I f I can't do it first-class, I won’t be doing it." He and wife Renee have funded the operation for seven races in 2006 and four this season with profits from their trucking business and house-moving company.

 

"We put together a nice team, and we've proven ourselves," he said. "We had all brand-new stuff last year, and we were running 4.40s and 4.50. We had a really fast car. We had a lot of people looking at us."

 

It's no wonder. At the April race at Las Vegas, Kalivoda qualified No. 2. His 4.490  put him second only to Tony Schumacher (the driver for whom he worked briefly as a crew member several years ago) on a day that saw Doug Kalitta's six-year, 164-race qualifying streak end.

 

Then at Atlanta Dragway, Kalivoda was No. 3 qualifier and beat longtime pal Clay Millican (for whom he also turned wrenches in IHRA and NHRA competition) in the first round.

 

In June at Joliet, Illinois, he missed the show along with Brandon Bernstein, Whit Bazemore, Morgan Lucas, Dave Grubnic, Scott Weis, and an improved Luigi Novelli. Still, he ran a 4.86, which would be more than enough to win a few rounds at a few racetracks this year. But Kalivoda rebounded at Bristol the next month with a No. 14 start and a first-round loss to Bernstein, who used a 4.538-second pass to set low elapsed time of the meet.   

 

"It's just kind of one of those things," Coghlan said. "If you qualify No. 2 and No. 3 and win a round or two even on a limited schedule, people start looking at your crew chief. And when a person gets offered everything under the sun and three or four times what he's making, I can't compete with the wealthy teams with the tremendous resources and the great corporate backing.

 

"It's just another independent team that's parked right now."

 

Like Coghlan, Kalivoda said he wanted to emphasize that their team has no sour-grapes attitude toward Adams for leaving.

 

"It's awesome for him. It's disappointing for me," Kalivoda said. "This is the best chance I ever had [to be competitive]. Keith and I know each other really well. We communicate really well. I like him personally and professionally. We had fun working together."

 

The Coghlan Motorsports team had planned to run the Memphis event and with help from Las Vegas businessman and former Pro Stock driver George Marnell and construction company owner Larry Moorefield, they also planned to compete again at Las Vegas and at the season finale at Pomona, California. Kalivoda also was scheduled to appear later this month at the World Series of Drag Racing at Cordova, Illinois, the week before NHRA's Mac Tools U.S. Nationals.

 

"It was really bad timing for us," Coghlan said of the devastating development.  

 

"If we had a couple million dollars, it wouldn't be an issue," Kalivoda said. "It was less a matter of the money figure -- it was more about the fact we didn't have anything to offer him concrete. My dream is to drive one of these cars for a team that has the resources to go to the winners circle and win championships. Keith's dream is to be a crew chief for a team that has the resources to go to the winners circle and win championships. So I get it. It's an unfortunate reality."

 

Kalivoda, a second-generation dragster driver from Seattle who moved to Phoenix late last year and invested in a business, said he agreed with Coghlan's decision to suspend racing until funding is in hand.

 

"We could do the rent-a-crew-chief thing," he said, "but it would be tough for somebody to come in and make the situation work. But let's say we did and went out and kicked butt and turned some heads, The same darn thing is going to happen. All of a sudden the dream's gone -- again."

 

Coghlan said that's why he thinks sidelining the car "is the right business decision." He said, "If you keep running the car, it could go either way. Nobody's going to know the set-up. Yu could fall flat on your face, and that doesn't help get sponsorship. You could let somebody else shine or go with the deal and not get anything. So the best thing to do is park the car and focus on trying to get funding secured for the team.

 

He said he and Kalivoda "are working real hard" to find sponsors to resuscitate their team and dream.

 

"It's aggravating," Coghlan said. "We all had fun. We could compete with the best of 'em. The crew got along, and the car was running good. We had a great team put together. And it all goes to crap in a week's time."

 

Coghlan said he sympathizes with Scott Griffin, the Wilmington, North Carolina, businessman who funded a dragster for Andrew Cowin last year and saw that operation also  put in mothballs this winter because of a lack of experienced crew chiefs. It was the same problem that delayed Jerry Toliver's Funny Car re-emergence and ultimately cost Top Fuel's J.R. Todd two crew chiefs before Kevin Poynter joined the Dexter Tuttle Motorsports team. Griffin then purchased the Carrier Boyz Racing outfit -- now, just weeks later, driver McClenathan left to lease a Top Fuel operation from DSR, leaving Griffin reportedly with only the equipment he purchased.

 

"Scott has been put in quite a predicament," Coghlan said, "and that's hard to swallow."

 

Just like it is, he knows, to be too good for your own good.