One of the few holdouts of the conventional vs. canopy cockpit has now gone over to the other side. Or at least they are taking it for a spin.

During a test session last week at Gainesville (Fla.) Raceway, Kalitta Motorsports rolled out its first canopy-equipped dragster. Doug Kalitta was the first of the team's two drivers to drive it during the private test session.

"It's pretty nice," Kalitta said while waiting out a rainstorm Saturday. "We've still got some modifications to do on it, so we'll go back and make some changes. But so far, so good. As far as being able to see out of the thing, you can see well. It's kind of nice, actually. It's kind of like a Radillac, a Cadillac with the Radman's name in front of it."

Kalitta didn't take long to experience the difference between the cockpit styles.

"Pretty much like driving a rental car," Kalitta explained. "It's not too bad. Performance-wise, it's not much different because this car and my car are pretty much running exactly the same. We'll see. We have a couple of days to run with it."

Kalitta said he didn't have any apprehensions about the new enclosed cockpit because as a pilot, he's used to jumping in a variety of airplanes. Just like in an airplane, visual freedom is second to none.

"It's just something a little different," Kalitta said. "It's a pretty safe piece of plastic. The vision, that's probably the biggest thing, being able to see through it, see the tree well."

Kalitta's canopy gives him the feeling of being in a fighter jet.

"Yeah, that's about as close as you're going to get," Kalitta said.

Kalitta Motorsports General Manager Chad Head said the team wanted to try the canopy, if only for safety.

"It is safer. There's no question about it," Head said. "That's the number one reason we are working with it. Doug has talked about it for a couple of years. We were just going to give it a shot and see what happens. If we're happy with it, then we'll get it on Shawn's car."

Kalitta's teammate Shawn Langdon has experience racing with a canopy dragster dating back to his days with Don Schumacher Racing. He's good with racing either configuration.

"I really don't have a preference," Langdon said. "I drove the canopy cars when I was at Schumacher, and they're very nice pieces. Of course, I'm used to the traditional open cockpit. There's really not a whole lot of difference between them. Obviously, there are weight differences that the crew chiefs will deal with, but as far as driving them, there's really not much difference. The main difference is the sound of the car."

Team Kalitta plans to continue their testing into this week. Both Kalitta and Head said there's no certainty the canopy will be on the Mac Tools dragster when the season starts next month.

"We'll see what we got," Kalitta said. "It's just like a new pair of shoes, man. We're trying it out."