Steve Johnson appeared headed toward his second straight No. 1 qualifying position in the Pro Stock Motorcycle class as action kicked off Friday at the Dodge//SRT Mile-High NHRA Nationals Presented By Pennzoil at Denver’s Bandimere Speedway. 

Johnson recorded the third-quickest elapsed time in the history of the Morrison, Colo., facility – 7.130 seconds on the quarter-mile course – to claim the provisional No. 1 berth. 

However, NHRA tech officials disqualified the run immediately afterward because of a fuel violation and awarded the tentative No. 1 spot in the order to Matt Smith, who posted the second-quickest time Friday at 7.145 seconds with the class’ fastest speed (188.46 mph). 

Johnson said he thought the NHRA’s decision was a fair call and took responsibility for the error. However, he said he and his team did not tamper with or alter the fuel and that the reason for the problem remains unknown. 

“The fuel didn’t pass,” Johnson said. “At the end of the run, they take a fuel sample, and it has to fit within a certain range. And it’s the responsibility of the team to check that. 

“Something happened with the fuel. We don’t tamper with the fuel, except buy the fuel from Sunoco at the track and put it in our motorcycle. Something obviously happened,” he said. “I’m not a chemist. I can’t tell you what happened. We don’t push any limits. We don’t engage in any kind of chemistry. We don’t tamper with anything you’re not supposed to do. And fuel is a no-no. You just don’t touch fuel. 

“We took fuel out of our gas tank and poured it in, just like we do at every race. And clearly, the temperature, the heat, something’s changed in our fuel. The top was left open. Something happened,” Johnson said. 

He said he knows “somebody who wants to buy fuel for everybody in the staging lanes, but we’ve got two different kinds of fuel now. There’s a Cyclone 17 and an SR 18. New this year is the Cyclone 17, and that’s the fuel that we use. 

“It’s quite a story,” Johnson said without providing details, “but I’m trying to be careful. I just had a big meeting about trashing people who help the sport.” 

Ultimately, Johnson said, the responsibility lies with him: “Yeah, for sure.” 

He said, “If we would have just checked the fuel before the run, we would have known whatever reason it doesn’t pass. We should have just bought new fuel. 

“We buy fuel. We don’t touch it. We store it. We use it. And we go to the next race. Clearly, something changes with the fuel. I don’t know anything about it. The sanction body just checks it. So the right thing to do is to check the fuel before the run, before the weekend starts. And we didn’t do that.” 

Smith, the current and four-time champion, is the Pro Stock Motorcycle points leader, and Johnson is his closest challenger. They entered the weekend separated in the standings by 93 points. 

Other tentative pro-class leaders Friday night were Steve Torrence (Top Fuel) and Matt Hagan (Funny Car).