EVENT NEWS EVENT NOTEBOOK			EVENT GALLERY

 

SUNDAY NOTEBOOK -

BROWN PROVING HIMSELF TOP FUEL RACER TO BEAT - With different Top Fuel winners in the first four events of this NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series season, no one emerged as the clear-cut leader.

But Antron Brown, in his Matco Tools Dragster, has changed all that in the past couple of weeks.

Doug Kalitta has been the quiet killer with one victory in four final-round appearances and two No. 1 starts in the first five events. Khalid alBalooshi won the season-opener to continue Al-Anabi Racing's momentum. Tony Schumacher was starting to gain traction, as were Shawn Langdon and Steve Torrence.

But with his consistent and persistent performance Sunday at Royal Purple Raceway in the O'Reilly Auto Parts NHRA SpringNationals, "Throw-down, Downtown, Renowned Antron Brown" is the man to beat.

He qualified No. 2, ran away with three of his four match-ups in eliminations, posted several 3.7-second elapsed times for the weekend, won in convincing fashion, and grabbed the points lead.

Brown earned his second straight victory and class-leading third of the season in four final rounds with a 3.793-second E.T. at 317.72 mph on the Baytown, Texas, 1,000-foot course.

It was Brown's 44th overall victory (28th in Top Fuel) and his second at Houston. He won here in 2008 for his first triumph in a dragster. With Tony Schumacher's Las Vegas victory, it gives Don Schumacher Racing 223 event trophies and four in this year's six races.

Khalid alBalooshi, in his first meeting with Brown this season, smoked the tires of his gold Al-Anabi Racing Dragster and was runner-up at 4.433, 184.67.

Brown singled out new crew members Matt Sackman, Chris Watson, and Kyle Weekley as part of his "true all-star team . . . our dream team" that includes crew chiefs Brian Corradi and Mark Oswald, Brad Mason, "Red" Waite, and Michael O'Guin. They're the reason, he said, that he was able to advance past Clay Millican, Spencer Massey, and Shawn Langdon before squaring off against alBalooshi.

"We've been able to execute," Brown said. "When we have a problem, we're able to fix it from the last round and make it better for the next round. We work so well together, like a family."

They pulled together to tackle the complicated weather conditions that changed several times during the weekend but never ditched the mugginess.

"The track was good," Brown said, citing humidity as the wild card. "The grains of water in the air made our tune go haywire. You come up here, thinking you got some power because you’re at sea level, but all the humidity sucked the life out of the cars and made 'em so hard to make 'em go. "By far it felt like we were running a marathon out here this weekend. Instead of running like an 800-meter run, it felt like we ran 5,000-kilometers out there with all the humidity and sweat.

"That's what made it difficult this weekend, not just for us but for everybody," he said. "And we were able to fight through it."  

He denied alBalooshi a fourth overall victory and second since this February's Winternatonals at Pomona, Calif. 

However, alBalooshi was a bit of a spoiler all day. He defeated one DSR driver, Tony Schumacher, who was looking to build on momentum from a Las Vegas victory two events ago. Then he eliminated Leah Pritchett, who was hoping to figure into an historic day as NHRA's women close in on 100 victories. He followed by beating No. 1 qualifier Steve Torrence to reach his second final round in the year's six races so far.

"The Al-Anabi team is a top-tier team, because [team manager] Alan Johnson has won more championships in Top Fuel than any other crew chief out there," Brown said. "He used to work for The Boss [Don Schumacher], and when he left that camp it was like a divorce. And divorces are never good. When we line up against them, there's no love lost, trust me.

"They push hard," he said, "but we have a lot of respect for them. We have a lot of respect for Langdon, Balooshi, all the crew chiefs over there: Brian [Husen], Jake [Jason McCulloch], Ronnie [Thompson], and Smokin' Joe [Barlam], A.J. – all those guys are great guys. They work hard, and you can tell by the way their cars run."

Said Brown, who's going for a second series crown in three years, "You have to beat 'em to contend for that championship. The championship goes through them, and when we race 'em, we get up for that challenge. And anytime we beat 'em, brother, that's like hitting the jackpot.

"But there are so many strong teams out here," Brown said, describing the Top Fuel class as "Pro Stock car on nitromethane. It's incredible how tough and competitive our class is right now."

And it’s equally remarkable that he is the dominator in this first quarter of the 24-race season.

He'll get to tangle with them all again when the series heads to Commerce, Ga., for the May 16-18 Summit Racing Equipment Southern Nationals at Atlanta Dragway.

And he won’t be cutting any of them any slack. He said Dexter Tuttle, owner of Clay Millican's Parts Plus/Liquid MPG Dragster, half-jokingly told him Sunday morning, "You going to take it easy on us?" Shot back Brown, "Take it easy? Shoot – you cleaned our clock in Pomona and ran a (3.)79." He added, "He took us out the first round in Pomona, so we owed him one."

Against DSR colleague Massey, who Brown said, "threw a great tree out there [cut a good reaction time] and the boys [his Battery Extender team] ran a solid lap that could have beaten anybody but us that round. This competition's just insane right now."

The definition of insanity, it is said, "is doing the same thing over and over and expecting the same results."

But that's what Antron Brown – three-time winner and points leader – has vowed to do: "We'll tune it up and come back hard."

FC DRIVER HIGHT GETS THIRD WIN HIS THIRD WIN OF 2014 - This weekend didn’t start out well for John Force Racing, but it ended in grand fashion Sunday afternoon at Baytown, Texas.

Robert Hight drove his Auto Club Ford JFR Mustang to the winners circle at the O’Reilly Auto Parts SpringNationals.

Hight clocked a 4.055-second elapsed time at 314.90 mph to edge Jack Beckman of Don Schumacher Racing at Royal Purple Raceway. Beckman came across the finish line at 4.176 seconds.

“It was like we didn’t even show up on Friday, it was horrible,” said Hight, who failed to qualify Friday, but ended up in the No. 4 spot. “The first run it got through the clutch and wore it out and eventually smoked the tires. The second run we just totally missed it. It was weak and shook. I didn’t lose faith in my team. (Saturday) we ran 07 and 08, and we kept things rolling.”  

This was Hight’s third win in six races this season. He also claimed victories at Gainesville, Fla., and Charlotte, N.C. He also was a runner-up at Phoenix and Las Vegas. Hight, the 2009 world champion, now has 32 career NHRA national event wins, his first also coming at Baytown in 2005. This was the 229th win overall for John Force Racing.

“When you win one of these races, it is an accomplishment and to have this already my third win of the year just shows how steady my team is,” Hight said. “Truthfully, that puts more pressure on me because when that car goes up there and runs like it does, a bracket car, all I can do is screw it up. I have to do my job.”

Hight came to the SpringNationals as the season points leader and he will maintain that position as he has 609 points, while his boss and father-in-law John Force is second at 487 points.

Dating back to last season at the U.S. Nationals, this was the 13th consecutive final round by a JFR nitro Funny Car and the team’s seventh win.

On Sunday, Hight was a measure of consistency while beating Bob Tasca III, Alexis DeJoria, Del Worsham and Beckman. The slowest elapsed time by Hight all day was 4.076 seconds in his victory over DeJoria.

“You know how hard it is to do that in one of these cars?” said Hight, about how his Funny Car was running like a dialed-in bracket car. “There are so many variables. It is hard to make that many consistent runs in a row. It shows how good my team is. They make tiny changes at the last minute and never act like there is a fire drill over anything is out of the ordinary. They just put their head down and do the job and it is a lot of fun right now.”

The win over DeJoria, who beat him in the finals at Phoenix and Las Vegas, was welcomed by Hight.

“She has owned me,” Hight said. “She has had my number. I finally got a win against her at the Four-Wide, but before that I was 0-4 against her.”

ENDERS-STEVENS GETS SWEET HOMETOWN WIN - All season, Pro Stock driver Erica Enders-Stevens has been making NHRA headlines.

That trend continued Sunday at the O’Reilly Auto Parts SpringNationals.

Enders-Stevens recorded her second win of the season and eighth of her career, beating good friend Allen Johnson in the final round on a holeshot at Royal Purple Raceway.

Enders-Stevens clocked a 6.594-second elapsed time at 210.60 mph, while Johnson came across the finish line at 6.588 seconds at 210.28 mph.

The difference was at the starting line. Enders-Stevens had an .018 reaction time compared to an .044 reaction time for Johnson. Enders-Stevens claimed her second win of the season and avenged her loss to Johnson in the final round at the Gatornationals in Gainesville, Fla., March 16.

“I had to get him back for Gainesville,” Enders-Stevens said. “Allen and I and Pam (Allen’s wife) had breakfast on Friday morning for Pam’s birthday. We talked about how cool it would be to qualify 1-2 and go to the finals and we did just that with the Good Lord’s blessing. My team has been really awesome and I have had a really consistent race car. Doing it on a holeshot makes it that much sweeter. He (Johnson) got me on a holeshot in Gainesville.”

This was Enders-Stevens’ eighth career Pro Stock win and her first at her hometown track in Baytown, Texas just outside of Houston. Enders-Stevens lives in New Orleans now, but is a Houston native.

“I have never won Indy, so I don’t know what that feels like and I have never won the championship, but this one rates right up there,” Enders-Stevens said. “This one is as important to me as Indy probably is to all the other drivers.”

Enders-Stevens’ win also was the 99th for a female driver in NHRA’s professional ranks. The female drivers will have a chance to get the historic victory at the next national event at Atlanta, May 16-18.

Enders-Stevens’ latest win almost didn’t happen.

“We were thrashing,” Enders-Stevens said. “We had to make a last minute transmission change and go through the gears and make sure everything was right. We got up here and A.J. already was in his car buckled up and I had not even had my firesuit pulled up yet. I was getting in, my clutch can was still open, my hood scoop was still in, I was still hooked up to the golf cart, and you want to talk about pressure and craziness. It was very intense. I was pulling up into the water box and A.J. had already done his burnout and backed up. Fortunately enough I was able to focus and get done what we needed to get done. I thanked Allen down at the top end for waiting as long as he could because he didn’t have to. My guys once again gave me a really great Chevy Camaro to drive to the winners circle.”

RANDOM RACEDAY NOTES -

RIVALRIES RESURFACE - The tiff between Funny Car racers Bob Tasca III and Robert Hight came to the surface again this weekend because the two met in the first round. Hight ran away with the victory as Tasca lost traction right away. Afterward he admitted that beating Tasca gives him a little extra satisfaction.

"It does. It does. But you've got to forget about the past, but truthfully, you've got to let that motivate you and dig down a little deeper. It's pretty cool, driving for Mike Neff and the way this car's performing. Friday was not a good day, but we came back Saturday, starting over. And man, three runs in a row . . . perfect."

Then Hight had to race Alexis DeJoria, a racer with whom he quickly has developed a different style of rivalry, strictly an on-track competition.

Meanwhile, Hight's boss, John Force, renewed a longer-standing rivalry in Round 1. He and Cruz Pedregon have raced each other 92 times. Before the run, Force said, "I've got my coffee and my oxygen. I hit the wall three times, trying to beat him when he was driving that Hamburger from Hell." Force was referring to Pedregon's McDonald's-sponsored, Joe Gibbs-owned Funny Car years ago.

Evidently Force was way too hyped up, for he went red against Pedregon Sunday by .121 of a second. It was only the 23rd time in 641 races he fouled out.

Pedregon, though thrilled to get his Snap-on Toyota Camry into the quarterfinals despite some engine gremlins this weekend, was far more sympathetic than gloating. "People don’t realize – you're in these cars and your adrenaline's pumping. And John's a fighter. He's like me. And it’s so touchy between cutting a good light and [fouling out].  I've been on the other end of that," he said. "Maybe that's the break we needed, but I'm not real proud of how the car's performing this weekend. But John knows we can run good, so part of that is we put a little heat on him. But John is one of the best drivers out here, I can tell you that."

THE EMOTION OF DRAG RACING - Bob Tasca III shows his frustration after losing in the first round to Robert Hight.

JUST MAKING SURE - No. 1 Funny Car qualifier Del Worsham is the most recent pro racer to win from the No. 16 position. And he was determined not to let Courtney Force, his first-round opponent, become the next. She gave him an excellent challenge with her best pass of the weekend (4.113 seconds, 299.80 mph), but he remained perfect in his career from the No. 1 spot (14-for-14). He won by .0101 of a second, or about four feet, with a 4.106, 308.07 on the 1,000-foot course.

"I drove it 11- or 1200 feet," Worsham said just after exiting his car.

This was Force's first time to start from the final qualifying spot, but Worsham said he wasn't shocked he would have to race a Force in the opening round if he qualified No. 1. He said any race is a matter of focusing on one's own lane and pulling the maximum from his own car. But he said, "If you’re going to win this race, you're going to go through the family at some point."

Worsham already had two Houston victories in a Funny Car and one in a Top Fuel dragster.

BESTS OF THE MEET - In defeating Richie Crampton in the first round of Top Fuel eliminations and returning the favor from the season-opener at Pomona, Brittany Force posted a 327.82 mph – the fastest of the weekend – in the Castrol EDGE Dragster. Three pairings later, top qualifier Steve Torrence eclipsed her feat. He defeated Terry McMillen with a 3.776-second elapsed time at 328.86 mph. Antron Brown came close to matching Torrence's low E.T. in the second round as he beat Spencer Massey with a 3.778.

GREG WHO? - Much has been made of Greg Anderson's return this weekend from heart surgery in February, and his comical crew took the chance to poke some fun at their team leader. Asked if he is excited about Anderson returning to the seat of the KB/Summit Racing Camaro, Wes Williams asked, "Who? Who?" Pat Topolinksi joked that he was relieved to have Anderson back inside the car instead of having him meddling in his engine-maintaining chores. Jason Line even got in his dry-sense-of-humor jabs. And substitute driver Jimmy Ålund, who was disappointed to turn the seat back over to Anderson after winning at Charlotte two weeks ago, donned a fake Anderson-like moustache and pretended to give himself back the job. 

WHAT WE'LL MISS – Fans learned early Sunday they wouldn’t see Bob Vandergriff chugging back up the track in Top Fuel triumph for a second straight year. He lost in the second pairing of the day to Doug Kalitta. No Top Fuel racer has won this event for two consecutive years.

Fans also learned during the second round of nitro eliminations that the women of the sport wouldn’t hit 100 victories this weekend. Leah Pritchett, who had defeated JR Todd in the first round, dropped out against Khalid alBalooshi. And Brittany Force lost an ugly pedalfest against Steve Torrence. Courtney Force already was out of competition when her teammate Robert Hight knocked out Alexis DeJoria. So that left Erica Enders-Stevens in Pro Stock to go for "Female Victory No. 99." She did her part in Round 2, defeating Jason Line.

YOU GO, ERICA – Drag-racing icon Shirley Muldowney, intently following the action from home this weekend, said she cheers for Pro Stock racer Erica Enders-Stevens.

"I'm closer to Erica than I am to any of the other ladies. It's just that we've gotten to know each other, and I kind of root for her. So I think it'd be kind of unfair for me to root for anyone else," Muldowney said when asked if she has a preference for which female racer hits that 100th-victory milestone. "I believe that she has the hardest car to drive out here, and the consistency that she delivers is by far something I didn’t think I’d ever see in drag racing."

She said the reason the NHRA doesn't have the diversity angst that the other motorsports sanctioning bodies seem to have is that NHRA "is smarter than all the other sanctioning bodies. They saw that it definitely was going to give the women spectators something of interest, something that would help fill the stands. It would propel women into the sport, to do something other than make lunch. They [women] didn't have the opportunity until NHRA came along and realized, 'Hey – we can make money!' Once they saw that I could handle the race car as good as any driver out there, they gave me free rein."

Muldowney said her start in the sport was rooted in lawlessness. With her mother, Mae, a laundress and her dad, Belgium Benedict Roque, a cab driver and boxer, she certainly didn’t learn the sport from her folks. Muldowney said, "I didn’t listen to either one of them. And whenever I could sneak out of the house and go street racing, that's what I did. So I started out breaking the law."

MORE TORTURE? - Steve Torrence's explanation of his wild quarterfinal run against Brittany Force literally was 18 times longer than the run itself. He outlasted her with a crazy 5.363-second ride that threatened to touch the centerline. Force blew the tires off her dragster right away and never could benefit from the fact he smoked his tires starting about a third of the way downtrack. When he hopped out of the car he raised his hands as if to ask, "What happened? Did I win?" Then he pumped his arms into the air, rejoicing.

Explained Torrence, "I could feel it smoking the tires. I try to get it to recover. I can't hear her. I can't see her. She hasn't passed me. So the whole time I'm thinking, 'I've got to get back on this thing and get it down through there.' I tried to roll into it. It never would get hooked up, so the whole time I'm just banging the throttle: left, right, left, right, trying to keep it straight. Down there at the end, she still hasn't come around me. And I'm thinking, 'I've got to keep going!' It tries to come around on me. And I said, 'You know what? I probably need to abort now before I run into some cones or whatever.' So I get it straight and I'm right at the 1,000-foot . .  .and it’s wanting to go that way so bad [he said, gesturing to his right]. I held on. I didn’t want to whip it too hard and let the rear of the car swing around. So I just kind of stayed skinny on it, and we got the win light. Down at the end of the track, I get it pulled around the corner and I'm asking the guys, everybody down there, ' Did I hit the cone? Did I win? What happened?' Nobody really had an answer for me. My guys came up and they're like, 'We're good. We're good.' "

He called it "an eventful race for sure. Brittany's had an awesome race car. The Capco team, Red Line Oil, we got it done. Maybe we can keep going."

With that match-up taking some of the starch out of Torrence, fans waited to see whether he'd get the chance to make good on his first-round promise to do a chorus-line dance if he won the event. The Kilgore, Texas, native has been hanging out this week with the Kilgore [College] Rangerettes, famous for their Rockettes-like high-kicking drill team dances.    

FUN WITH FIRE - Ron Capps said his NAPA Dodge Charger "was on another good run" in his quarterfinal race against Don Schumacher Racing mate Tommy Johnson when he noticed his hot rod was a little too hot for its own good.

"Where your normal floorboard is in your rental car out there, I've got firewalls, and when they light up orange it’s not a good thing in a Funny Car," Capps said. "I'm on the gas. I don’t see Tommy and I still see the finish line and it’s got orange going, which I know is fire. That's when you earn your money, man. It's got to be one of the funnest things ever, to be going pedal down, over 300 miles an hour, on fire at the same time --and you’re allowed to go back to Don Schumacher and say, 'Don, it's Sunday – I had to stay on the gas!' It was a lot of fun."

Life wasn't so much fun for Capps when his other DSR colleague, Jack Beckman, defeated him in the semifinal. Beckman did him a favor, though. He dashed over to Capps' car with a fire extinguisher at the top end.

OOPS - Reaching his first Funny Car final round of the season and his first one since last fall's St. Louis Countdown race was not all the fun Jack Beckman thought it might be. Before he got the car stopped following his semifinal victory over Ron Capps, his Infinite Hero/Valvoline/MTS Dodge Charger crashed into the barrier during his turnoff.

Beckman was unhurt, but the body was scrapped on site. The left front A-arm took the brunt of the smash-up. Among the lesser damage was a hole in the fuel tank and a broken release bracket that enables the body to be raised. Crews are permitted to swap out or change everything but the chassis, and the plentiful DSR crew hands were feverishly working to recover from the mishap even before the remains of the car returned to the pit.

Beckman slid in his own oil after the rods kicked through the engine and spewed oil.

"It slid in oil and just spun the wheel out of my hands," he said.

He said he steered the car toward the wall, trying "to keep it off the racetrack, the racing surface and try to make the turn."

"We kicked the rods out got oil under the tires, hit the barricade at the top end, and tore up what was the best appearing car and a brand new body," Beckman said.

"By the time we got back to the pits, the other teams had our spare car unloaded, all the parts out ready to go, and everybody dove in. We had to weld a bracket back on the chassis, had to put a different supercharger, different engine block, a couple pieces of wiring had to be replaced and a brand new body. We went up there with so many changes it was a testament just to get down the track," he said. "No matter what, when drivers are interviewed they always say, 'I'm so proud of my crew' and the crew does deserve it. They work hard all the time. They don't get any glory. I'm so, so, so proud of the Infinite Hero/Valvoline crew and of all the other crews at DSR that said, 'We're not in, so instead of spectating let's go help our car try and win the final round.' "

'APRIL FOOLS IS DUMB' - Back in 2006, with his three daughters still racing in the Lucas Oil Drag Racing Series ranks, John Force and Co. pulled into Houston, along with an entourage that included TV producer Brent Travers and his A&E crew filming segments for the original "Driving Force" reality series.

As he stood at the starting line, watching the action, a production assistant beside him asked him, "When do those cars come around again?" as if it were a circle-track race. Then the drag-racing neophyte asked, "Where do those cars go?" Replied Force, "To hell, sometimes."

Those questions might have been painful for Force to hear, but they were nothing compared to the joke his daughters decided to play on him. April Fool's Day happened to fall on that weekend, and they thought they'd have some fun by fibbing that Ashley had been tossed from the event for cheating. They had heard their dad say many times that he would quit the sport if he ever were accused of cheating.

They had great fun watching him stew about their false story, and when they said "April Fools!" he was none too pleased. And then he went on a tirade about that.

Even after he calmed down, Force groused, "April Fool's is dumb. It ain't like it's 'Warshington's Birthday' or nothin'."

Houston has had a few weird moments for Force through the years. Some time ago, when the NHRA used to visit Baytown twice, one stop came near Halloween. And one year Force and arch-enemy Al Hofmann agreed to dress up as each other for in the spirit of the holiday. Hofmann reneged on his part of the bargain, looking at Force's firesuit and saying, "I'm not wearing that filthy thing!" Force fired back, "Yeah? Well, at least mine ain't haunted!"

GLAD TO HELP – When fellow nitro Funny Car driver Tim Wilkerson had his generator stop working during qualifying it put the veteran driver in a bind because he had no power for his computers.

Enter Bob Tasca III.

Tasca let Wilkerson tap into his team’s generator and didn’t think twice about it.

“We took care of Tim,” Tasca said. “Wilkerson is like a brother to me. I said it before; he is one of the finest people I have ever met. He is just a generally good guy. He**, unless it was a part on my car that I was running that round, he can have anything in my trailer.”

Tasca, who qualified No. 13, lost in the opening round to Robert Hight when he smoked the tires immediately after he left the starting line Sunday at Royal Purple Raceway. Wilkerson, who qualified No. 8, lost to Chad Head in the first round.

WILD RIDE – Pro Mod driver Ron Muenks had a memorable time during his second round loss to Mike Janis.

Janis claimed the victory with a 5.895-second time at 245.58 mph. Muenks came across the finish line at 5.964 seconds at 241.67 mph, and that’s when his troubles began.

“Yeah, I threw the laundry out there,’ Muenks said. “It only felt like one parachute opened up and I think the wind caught it and threw it back down. So I reached up and threw the second handle (the manual handle parachute handle) and I couldn’t get it to come out. So I just got on the brakes to slow the car down, then I saw the sandpit coming up and all I could do was just ride it out.”

Muenks’ car slid into the sand pit, but it wasn’t damaged and he wasn’t hurt.

“No damage to the car, other than paint. Muenks said, “A few scratches here and there -were all good.”

SATURDAY NOTEBOOK -

TOP FUEL

TEXAS BOLD - Steve Torrence jumped into the Top Fuel lead from the No. 15 spot in Saturday's first qualifying session for the O'Reilly SpringNationals. And he hung on as cloud cover – and doubt his 3.786-second elapsed time would remain quickest -- crept in at Baytown, Texas.

But the native of Kilgore, to the northeast of this Houston suburb, earned his first top-qualifying position of the season and fourth overall. He did it by edging Antron Brown by one-thousandth of a second in elapsed time to lead a field in which one-hundredth of a second separates the first seven competitors.

Following Brown's 3.787 were Shawn Langdon (3.788), Tony Schumacher (3.790), JR Todd (3.792), Doug Kalitta (3.793 with a top speed of 324.51 mph that was fastest in the class), and Larry Dixon (3.796).

Crew chief Richard Hogan told Torrence before the run in that third overall session, "Low E.T. or no E.T." And his Capco Contractors Dragster responded with a 3.786-second, 321.81-mph performance on the Royal Purple Raceway 1,000-foot course.

Said Torrence, “The conditions were right. There was no reason to be conservative."

Especially with exactly enough cars to fill the field of 16, the owner-driver of the Capco Contractors Dragster said, "We swing for the fences every time. We were trying to hit a home run. We were trying to go (3.)70s every lap. It just didn’t stick yesterday. Last night it was very very close. So we took that (Q2) run and fine-tuned it a little bit."

Finesse wasn't the operative word on that pass, though. It was mash down on the accelerator and keep it straight.

"Richard's doing really well," Torrence said of the tuner he rehired for this season. And he said he has confidence in his crew. But best of all, he said, "Right now, more than ever, I've got a real good hot rod going into any race we go [to]."

With that level of confidence, he said, "you drive better, the car does better, and things just start happening for you."

Still, this weekend, no one, not even Dixon, flirted with the track E.T. record of 3.772 seconds that Dixon set in 2010, when he raced for Al-Anabi. Torrence equaled that E.T. but conceded the record to Dixon because of Dixon's better speed that day.

Saturday's Q3 kamikaze blast knocked early leader Richie Crampton aside, but he enjoyed only a four-thousandths-of-a-second margin over Tony Schumacher.

Torrence said that before the star of the final qualifying session, he thought his time would hold up as No. 1 "because we had a lot of sun out. As the session started, there was a lot of cloud cover that started coming in, so I started to question it. I had some doubts that it would stick. There for a while I was a little concerned."

His dragster, he said, gave him valuable data Saturday, particularly considering Saturday's conditions will mimic those forecasted for race day. "We needed this more than the runs we made yesterday," Torrence, who'll race Terry McMillen in Round 1 Sunday, said.

He said, "Consistency's going to be the key" for eliminations Sunday. What it will take to win the race – which would be his first victory this year – is "you've got to be the best guy, and The Good Lord's got to be on your side."

Torrene said he considers both this track and the Texas Motorplex, near Dallas, as his home racetracks. So to qualify No. 1 at a home race, "there's nothing better than that," he said.

"This is where I come from," Torrence said. "To come out and show off and do good and run well in front of friends and people that supported us through all the years to get here, that's what this is about, to me."

TOWARD FRONT AGAIN - Shawn Langdon moved up steadily through the field during time trials and will keep up his qualifying average. The current Top Fuel champion, the No. 1 starter at the previous race, improved from 13th Friday to fifth early Saturday and settled into the No. 3 spot for a first-round meeting with Troy Buff. The two raced each other in the first round at the season-opening Winternationals.

Langdon’s average qualifying position in 2014 is 3.16, even better than his 2013 year-end average of 3.75. He had seven No. 1 qualifiers and qualified in the top-five positions at 19 of the 24 events last year. This season, Langdon has started no worse than fourth at five of this year's six events. His worst start, eighth at Las Vegas, still put him in the top half of the field. 

The Al-Anabi Racing Dragster driver was runner-up here last year to Bob Vandergriff.

AL BALOOSHI EAGER TO WIN AGAIN - Last year at Royal Purple Raceway, Al-Anabi Racing Dragster driver Khalid alBalooshi scored his career-best qualifying position – No. 2. This time he'll start No. 13 and meet Tony Schumacher in the opening round. And NHRA fans never seem to tire of anticipating a showdown – in whatever round it is – between Schumacher and Al-Anabi team manager Alan Johnson, who teamed for 49 victories. AlBalooshi had only winning again, like he did at Pomona, on his mind.

"Our Al-Anabi car was very good in Charlotte (two weeks ago). We made good runs in qualifying and on race day.  I think our car will also be fast this weekend. We started out the season perfectly, but after that, we had some tough races. I have been talking with our crew chief, Jason [McCulloch], and after Charlotte, I think we have our hot rod back. From what we did in Charlotte, I think we are getting close to running the way we did earlier this year.  I know our car will keep on getting better and better and better. We were good at this race last year. We can be good again this time," the Dubai native said.

SLIDING DOWN - Richie Crampton's "reign" of the Top Fuel field was short-lived, as Friday's provisional top qualifier found himself seventh by the end of the third overall session Saturday. Steve Torrence jumped into the lead from the No. 15 spot, Tony Schumacher moved up from No. 7 to No. 2, and Shawn Langdon leapfrogged seven rivals. Spencer Massey, who had been No. 2 Friday night, tumbled to eighth, while the Kalitta Motorsports tandem of JR Todd and Doug Kalitta stuck together at Nos. 3 and 4, respectively. He wound up ninth, with Brittany Force as his first-round opponent.

PUSHNG ON - The memory of getting his first Top Fuel trophy here at Houston has Antron Brown wanting another. And despite a Saturday spent, in his words, "playing catch-up a little bit," thanks in part to a burned piston Friday, he's optimistic about his chances.

Besides, the Matco Tools Dragster driver and No. 2 qualifier this weekend has a quirky performance pattern here. He has reached the Top Fuel final round every other year at Royal Purple Raceway. Last year he lost in the first round, so this could be his year to shine again.

"We're going to give it all we got here at Houston tomorrow," Brown said. "This is a special place for me and our team. We got our first Top Fuel win here way back in 2008 and I have a lot of friends and family from Louisiana here rooting us on."

He said, "The humidity got us a little bit this weekend, and we just underestimated the tune-up. It's hard to make good power when it's this wet out, but Brian and Mark [crew chiefs Corradi and Oswald] stepped our game up with that last lap. Now we want to keep our momentum going and get the No. 1 spot in the points."

His march Sunday starts against Clay Millican.

LADIES DAY? - No. 12 qualifier Leah Pritchett, in the GUMOUT/Dote Dragster, will take on strong-charging No. 5 JR Todd in the first round of eliminations Sunday. She and Brittany Force in the Top Fuel field will try, along with Funny Car's Alexis DeJoria and Courtney Force and Pro Stock's Erica Enders-Stevens, to become the NHRA's 100th professional female event winner.

OTHER MATCH-UPS – Doug Kalitta (No. 6 in the order) will face Bob Vandergriff, last year's winner here. Kalitta was the 2003 winner at this track. And Spencer Massey (No. 10) will take on Larry Dixon (No. 7).

CATCH IT ON H2 CHANNEL - Shawn Langdon and the silver Al-Anabi Racing team were featured prominently in an episode of Rise of the Machines, a 10-part series airing on H2.  The “Ultimate Dragster” episode features Langdon and the Al-Anabi team from the time the team arrived at Pomona last November to the championship celebration after the team clinched the 2013 title, as well as 2012 NHRA Mello Yello Top Fuel  World champion Antron Brown and his MATCO Tools team’s quest for a come-from-behind championship in season’s the final weekend. The focus is on the cars driven by these two champions, but the episode also examines the psyche of an NHRA competitor and what it takes for these 8,000-horsepower machines to reach 320 mph in less than four seconds from a standing start.  “Ultimate Dragster” aired April 15, but it will be rebroadcast Tuesday, April 29 at 11 p.m. (ET) and Wednesday, April 30 at 3 a.m. (ET) on the H2 channel.   In addition, “Ultimate Dragster” is available on the H2 website: www.history.com/shows/rise-of-the-machines/episodes.

GETTING BETTER AND BETTER - Brittany Force, in the Castrol EDGE Dragster, qualified nine places better Saturday than she did last year. Moreover, her 325.30 mph clocking is top speed of the meet so far. 

"We keep improving on each pass, and that’s exactly what we want to do. I ended up running a 3.80 and had the top speed with 325 miles per hour, and I was really excited about that," she said.

"Going into our fourth qualifying pass we wanted to improve. Unfortunately I lifted at 800 feet, due to an engine and clutch problem, and we didn’t get the car down the track like we hoped. It didn’t go as planned, but we ended up in the No. 8 spot and I’m looking forward to racing tomorrow." Force said.

She drew rookie Richie Crampton, who beat her in the first round of the season.

"I'm excited to be racing Richie Crampton. He's a rookie. I remember how I felt during my rookie season, so I know what’s he’s going though. Sometimes I feel like I'm still a rookie," she said.

DIXON ENJOYING DRIVING AGAIN - Larry Dixon has proved he’s one of the best Top Fuel drivers in NHRA’s history.

Since 2011, Dixon has only competed on a limited basis, but he’s back in the driver’s seat this weekend driving Bob Vandergriff Jr.’s second dragster at the O’Reilly Auto Parts SpringNationals and loving every minute of the experience.

“(Friday) was a lot of fun, it felt like home,” said Dixon, a three-time world champion. “I just feel really fortunate that he gave me the opportunity to drive the car. (Friday) went well and it was a lot of fun going down the race track.”

Dixon’s two runs Friday were 3.856 seconds and 3.828 seconds, the latter which left him No. 4 in the qualifying ladder.  On Saturday’s first qualifying session, Dixon slowed to 6.99 seconds, but he bounced back in the final qualifying session with a 3.796-second lap, leaving him No. 7 in the field. Dixon meets No. 10 qualifier in round one Sunday.

“They gave me an awesome car and I’m hoping I can keep up with it,” Dixon said.

Following Houston, Dixon will drive for Vandergriff again.

“They have nine races on the schedule still and we’re looking to hopefully add more to it,” Dixon said. “My next race is to-be-determined, sometime between now and Denver. I’m really appreciative to Bob and his team for giving me this opportunity and to be able to see all the fans welcoming me back. I feel really blessed to have this opportunity.


MCMILLEN SEARCHING FOR ANSWERS - This season has been a tough one for Top Fuel driver/team owner Terry McMillen.

McMillen, who pilots the Amalie Oil dragster, lost in the first round at Pomona, Phoenix, Las Vegas and Charlotte and he failed to qualify for Gainesville.

McMillen arrived at the O’Reilly Auto Parts SpringNationals with a sense of urgency as he came to town 14th in points.

“We went back to the five disc clutch this weekend,” McMillen said. “We played with the six disc a little bit and we started the year out with it, and right now we can’t seem to find consistency with it, so we have the five disc back in for this weekend, hopefully that combination will get us down the track from A to B. We waited long enough now that we have to make a move to get in the Top 10 (in points). This was kind of Richard’s (Hartman, McMillen’s crew chief) drop dead date in his mind and he was going to make these changes if the car wasn’t going to give us what we wanted to see. Ultimately, the goal is to be in the Top 10. We need to start going rounds that’s the key.”

McMillen’s fastest run Friday was 5.504 seconds, but that didn’t make the top 12, and Saturday he clocked 9.343 seconds on his first pass and his final qualifying run was slower.

Despite McMillen’s troubles, he made the field at No. 16 because there were only 16 cars in the field.

McMillen faces No. 1 qualifier Steve Torrence in first round Sunday


FUNNY CAR

WORSHAM KEEPS FC POLE – Del Worsham’s stout 4.051-second elapsed time Friday made him even happier Saturday.


The veteran nitro Funny Car driver’s lap won him the pole at the O’Reilly Auto Parts SpringNationals at Royal Purple Raceway in Baytown, Texas.


“I thought (Friday night) my time would hold up,” said Worsham, who won NHRA’s Top Fuel world championship in 2011 driving for Al-Anabi Racing. “Then, I woke up (Saturday morning) and saw all those dark clouds everywhere I thought maybe not. I was a little nervous about it. We got lucky, it was a great run (Friday night) and it was enough.”


This was Worsham’s 14th career pole position, seven in Funny Car and seven in Top Fuel. This was Worsham’s first pole this season.

 
STRESSFUL DAY FOR JOHN FORCE – After Friday’s two qualifying sessions Friday, John Force was No. 16 in the field with a best run of 5.416 seconds. On Saturday’s first qualifying session, Force didn’t improve as he clocked a 5.716-second lap, leaving himself with the final qualifying session to get in the field.

Force responded under the pressure.

The 17-time world champion clocked a 4.112-second run at 297.94 mph to get in the field at No. 7. Force extended his qualifying streak to 127 races.

“I went up there and had fun and I got to hear the cheer of the crowd. I would be giving the same interview if I hadn’t qualified. It makes things more exciting when you don’t have a lot of success. This makes you get your ducks in a row,” Force said.

Force meets No. 10 qualifier Cruz Pedregon in first round action Sunday.

“There is always pressure but when you get in the car you turn it off. Sure you sweat it, but if you go up there not ready Jimmy can give you a good car, and then you are the only one that can screw it up. I wasn’t planning on doing that, so I turned on the switch,” said Force.


WILKERSON OVERCOMES ADVERSITY - When veteran nitro Funny Car driver/crew chief Tim Wilkerson rolled into the O’Reilly Auto Parts SpringNationals he knew he was going to face some challenges.


“Our biggest problem is we don’t have enough data on our new tune-up parts that we have here, so we are kind of fighting that,” Wilkerson said. “The water in the air is really causing us some problems.”

Wilkerson’s two runs Friday were 4.220 seconds and 4.131 seconds, leaving him No. 6 in the field.

Wilkerson’s elapsed time on his second run was especially impressive for unexpected reasons.

“We had a little bit of a snafu (Friday) in between rounds when the generator decided it was going to stop working,” Wilkerson said. “That was kind of a mess. It (the generator) was banging up a storm. Of course it was right in between rounds and we were trying to figure out the tune-up for the next round so I had to do it all on a piece of paper. It looked like shorthand. We had no computers. I knew it wasn’t tuned up enough so how do I want to do this and not be on the wrong side and then I watched everybody shaking and I thought ‘oh crap I know I didn’t do a good enough job here,’ but it still waddled down through there.”

Wilkerson, who started driving a nitro Funny Car in 1996, felt old-school with his pencil and paper.

“That was fun,” Wilkerson said. “Outlaw computers in the pits. We are tapped into Tasca’s (generator now). Can’t live without Tasca it looks like forever.”

On Saturday, Wilkerson didn’t improve his elapsed time in the first session, but had a strong 4.118-second run in the final qualifying session to qualify No. 8. Wilkerson meets No. 9 qualifier Chad Head Sunday.

“There are three or four ways you can make a nitro car run, and which way is the best way for it to be more consistent (Sunday) that’s kind of the approach we are trying to figure out,” Wilkerson said.


CAPPS EXPECTS TO WORK SIDELINES AGAIN - When the 2014 NFL schedule came out April 23, Ron Capps was quite interested to see what the San Francisco 49ers calendar looked like.

In the past, Capps and Tommy DeLago, the crew chief for Alexis DeJoria’s nitro Funny Car at Kalitta Motorsports, have worked the parabolic sideline microphones at a couple of San Francisco 49ers games for KNBR radio, a sports talk station in San Francisco.

“I’m sure we will get to a couple of games (in 2014),” said Capps, who drives the NAPA Dodge for Don Schumacher Racing. “I want to get to the 49ers’ new stadium. I’ve worked the parabolic microphone for KNBR and NFL Films used the sound for the Super Bowl (between the 49ers and Baltimore Ravens).”

Levi's Stadium is a football stadium under construction in Santa Clara, Calif., as the new home of the San Francisco 49ers. Completion is expected in time for the 2014 season.

The Super Bowl Capps and DeLago were at was at the Superdome in New Orleans.

“The Super Bowl was last minute,” Capps said. “Tommy and I shared a room at this big ol’ studio apartment. It had a bar with a laundromat attached to it. It was called Igor’s Lounge. I bought a shirt there and we had a blast.”

According to Capps, he has been trying to get Jim Harbaugh, the 49ers’ head coach, out to an NHRA race.

“I don’t know Jim, but his mom (Jackie) and dad (Jack) came to the Denver race (the Mile-High Nationals, last July),” Capps said. “They were the guests of somebody and I was able to meet them. Jim and Jack both love cars and we will see if we can get them out to a race. It is just so tough.”


JOHNSON GRATEFUL – Tommy Johnson Jr. has bounced all over the place looking for a permanent ride in NHRA.

Prior to the 2014 season, Johnson was tabbed to drive the Make-A-Wish Don Schumacher Racing Dodge Charger funded by Johnny Gray and his sister Terry Chandler.

“It is nice to have a home,” Johnson said. “It’s nice to know what you are going to be doing the entire season, and not worry about carrying your helmet in a bag and trying to find a seat to get in and what country you are going to be racing in. It takes a lot of pressure off, but at the same time adds pressure because now you have to perform. The spotlight is on you now. You got chosen to do this, to do it well, and I’m enjoying every minute of it. I appreciate it more now than I did before just because I know the alternative, and I soak in every moment now.”

Johnson qualified No. 3 at 4.068 seconds at 312.21 mph for Sunday’s race at Baytown. He meets Jeff Arend in the first round.

HIGHT BOUNCES BACK SATURDAY - Mello Yello Funny Car points leader Robert Hight  did not let two sub-par runs on Friday distract him on Saturday. 


Hight made the quickest runs of both sessions Saturday, grabbing six qualifying bonus points and serving notice that his Auto Club Ford Mustang will be one of the cars to beat during eliminations on Sunday at Royal Purple Raceway.

“(Saturday) was a really good day for this Auto Club Ford Mustang. We didn’t make good runs (Friday) but today’s conditions are race day conditions and we were quickest of both sessions. I have a lot of confidence in Mike Neff and this team,” said Hight. “There was no panic over here last night. We are just focused on the task at hand. Right now that is getting a first round win tomorrow morning. You don’t know what the weather will do but I am excited to be No. 4 and have lane choice.”

After the first session Hight and crew chief Neff looked at the data and made another strong run of 4.085 seconds at 313.22 mph. Two strong runs in both lanes gives the Auto Club team a lot of confidence going into race day. Hight has advanced to the last four finals in a row with two wins so far in 2014.

Hight meets Bob Tasca III in first round.


COURTNEY FORCE IS NO. 16 IN QUALIFYING – Courtney Force will race from the No. 16 spot on Sunday facing No. 1 qualifier Del Worsham in the opening round.

“Our Traxxas team has made the show even though we’re in the No. 16 spot. I’m proud of my guys for working so hard. We’re just trying to work out the kinks in this race car. It’s been a challenging track for us, but I have a lot of confidence in Rob Douglas and Dan Hood that we’ll get this car turned around for eliminations,” said Force.

Force posted a 4.413 second run early on Friday at only 213.50 mph and that held through the next three qualifying sessions to put the Traxxas Ford Mustang Funny Car No. 16. This is the first time ever that Force has qualified in the No. 16 spot. In fact, in her three-year professional Funny Car career, the 25-year-old driver has never qualified worse than the No. 14 spot.

“We’ve got Del Worsham in the first round. It’s going to be tough for us; going up against the No. 1 qualifier, but we’re going to give it all we got. We have nothing to lose from the No. 16 spot. If I have to pedal my heart out, that’s what I have to do,” said Force.

In three years, this is the ninth time Force and Worsham have met on race day and the fourth time they have met in the first round. The 2012 rookie of the year is 1-7 to the DHL-sponsored driver in previous events.

“I know we have a good car over here. We just need to work out the kinks and get back to where we’re comfortable. Hopefully we’ll have a good day tomorrow. I’m happy to be out here. The fans here in Houston have been amazing and I just hope we can go some rounds (Sunday),” said Force. 


FAST JACK IS FAST – Jack Beckman unveiled the colors of the Infinite Hero Foundation this weekend.

The  black and purple Infinite Hero Foundation Dodge Charger R/T Funny Car will compete at five other events on the 2014 NHRA schedule (Englishtown, N.J., Denver, Charlotte 2, Dallas and Las Vegas 2). The team also earned Best Appearing Crew Honors. 



Beckman drove to the No. 2 qualifying spot behind the guidance of crew chief Rob Flynn, who tuned Bob Vandergriff, Jr. to the Top Fuel crown at the Houston race one year ago. 



"That's why they pay the crew chiefs," Beckman joked. "They have a pretty good handle on what changes to make. When you get that many water grains in the air, that won't burn so we up the compression ratio and do a few things with the supercharger. It's the nice thing about a seven car team here with DSR. We have enough data and enough smart people to bounce things off of, so typically we don't get lost."

Beckman powered to the provisional No. 2 spot on Friday evening under the lights in Baytown with a lap of 4.063-seconds, just a tick behind pole-winner Del Worsham's 4.051-effort and made three full pulls behind the wheel of the IHF Dodge during qualifying.

Beckman meets No. 15 qualifier Terry Haddock in the first round Sunday.


HAGAN STARTS NO. 11 – Matt Hagan didn't have a spectacular qualifying outing for the NHRA SpringNationals at Royal Purple Raceway.

But crew chief Dickie Venables feels he has a better handle on the tune-up of the Rocky Dodge after four rounds of qualifying on the tricky race track that, combined with muggy weather conditions, compounded the complexity of racing 10,000-horsepower race cars.

Hagan’s 4.19-second run left him No. 11 in the field. He gets his Don Schumacher Racing teammate Ron Capps in first round.

The first qualifying run on Friday was a challenge to nitro teams and Venables chose a conservative tune-up for the typically quick Friday night session. But the track proved to be better than most teams thought.



"It was such a challenge the first run and it got so much better Friday night we were just off on the set up on the second run and it shook the tires," Venables said. "We way underestimated it Friday night.

"(Saturday) there were kind of two sessions in one because of the oil down in the first session and we were in the good part of the session but we didn't really run that well. We made a lot of headway in our clutch department with what we learned."


DEJORIA CONTINUES TO SHINE – Nitro Funny Car driver Alexis DeJoria has had a breakout 2014 season, winning two of the five races so far.

DeJoria continued to display her skills at Baytown, qualifying No. 5 at 4.076 seconds.

DeJoria meets Tony Pedregon in the first round.


 

OUTSIDE LOOKING IN – When the qualifying was complete Saturday evening, two drivers, Gary Densham and Todd Simpson, failed to qualify for the SpringNationals.

 

PRO STOCK

PULLING AWAY - It hasn't happened much this season yet, but Allen Johnson said he's starting to notice it at the O'Reilly SpringNationals at Royal Purple Raceway.

The 2012 Pro Stock champion and this weekend's top qualifier, said he and No. 2 starter Erica Enders-Stevens "have separated ourselves a little bit from the field, which is pretty [unheard of]. The top 10 cars have been tied together."

Johnson maintained his advantage over early Friday leader Enders-Stevens and the rest of the lot Saturday as his 6.555-second, 211.63-mph pass in his still-new Dodge Dart held up as quickest. She followed with a 6.562, 211.36 and a class-fastest 211.79 mph in her Elite Motorsports Camaro.

Actually, the field is extremely close, with No. 10 Chris McGaha just .044 of a second slower than Johnson.

But Johnson noted that he and Enders-Stevens "both made good runs both runs today."

He said he wasn't surprised that his E.T. from Friday carried him and his Magneti-Marelli Dodge Dart to the top Saturday, because "the humidity is so much worse today. It really affects these Pro Stock cars."

He said he and his team, including crew chiefs Mark Ingersoll and dad Roy Johnson, are beginning to understand the new car.

"I think we got a good handle on the Dodge Dart. The crew chief has a real good comfort level here this week, and actually it's probably the first time he has. Even though we won Gainesville [in the car's debut weekend], we were all over the board."

He seemed relieved about the car's consistency, which he said is the key element for a victory, one that would be his first at this racetrack.

"All we've got to do is be consistent," Johnson said. He'll meet Greg Stanfield in the opening round.  
   

V. GAINES READY FOR SUNDAY – After taking delivery of his new car a few weeks ago V. Gaines debuted his brand-new Kendall Dodge Dart at Royal Purple Raceway for the NHRA O’Reilly SpringNationals.


Gaines qualified No. 9 at 6.597 seconds at 210.31 mph.

“I love the car, it’s doing all the right things” Gaines said. “It just takes a while to get a tuned in and that’s what we’re working on right now, just getting it faster and faster.”

Gaines did shake down his new Dodge Dart before he came to Baytown.

“We got 13 partial laps on it,” Gaines said. “We were in Denver for a few laps and then we stopped at Tulsa on the way down here (Royal Purple Raceway) and put some more laps on it.”

The Dart and his old Avenger are different to drive.

“The biggest difference is the vision inside because the windshield is a lot smaller,” Gaines said. “It comes down further on top, up further on the bottom, and the sides are in further so the vision is quite a big difference, but otherwise everything else is about the same.”

    

HAPPY HEMI DAY! - In tribute to the Gen II 426 Race HEMI, which celebrates its 50th anniversary this season, Mopar designated Saturday (April 26) as "HEMI Day." A video that features all the Mopar drivers wishing enthusiasts a "Happy HEMI Day" is available on the Mopar YouTube channel at www.youtube.com on www.facebook.com/Mopar.


AI-YI-YI . . . - Owner-driver Larry Morgan has been battling his own Lucas Oil Mustang lately as much as any opponent. In the previous race, at Charlotte, he used three engines. Mechanical problems caused him to miss two qualifying sessions. Valve springs have been giving him a particular fit.
 
"We have been tearing them up," Morgan said. "V Gaines runs the same ones I do, and he's been having trouble, too. There were a lot of issues [at Charlotte]. We had some trouble with our tune-up. I just don't think we have enough fuel. Our sensors are giving us false readings, and we keep adding fuel to it and it picks up power, so we're going to keep adding fuel to it."
 
Early 2014 testing seems to be of little help, he said, because "the results of what our testing tells us, we're not interpreting right or something. We don't want to believe what the O2 says. This has happened to me before, so hopefully we get it figured out."

 
LOVES CHEST PROTECTOR - Greg Anderson has a special addition to his equipment that he's recommending for every driver. In returning to the cockpit for the first time since preseason heart surgery the Pro Stock veteran is using a custom-made chest protector from Simpson. It's patterned after the smaller Top Dog version that children who race go-karts use. Simpson made a mold of Anderson's chest and fashioned the carbon-fiber protective gear. 

"It's bullet proof. It protects my chest, and I don't feel a thing," Anderson said. "I can yank down on the seatbelts as hard as I want, and I don't feel any pulling on my chest. It's definitely a great product that Simpson now has, and I'm telling you, everybody who drives a car should have something like this."

He's the lone driver to use such a device at this time. He said his seat time at Houston has been hassle-free in every way.

"It felt perfect. I felt at home," he said following Friday qualifying. "There was not one inkling of pain, and I didn't even have to think about it going down the racetrack. It was just like it's always been. From the minute I started that car to the turnoff at the finish line I never once thought, 'Does my heart hurt? Is my heart racing? Is there any pain? Is there any issue?' Not one time. Quite honestly, I didn't even know I had heart surgery today. It was very smooth and way ahead of what I expected. The chest protector I built certainly helped, but there is no question that the surgeons did a good job."


ROYAL ROMANCE? - Jeg Coughlin, who has said before, "I'm a lover, not a fighter," said he's looking for some romance at Royal Purple Raceway this weekend – the on-track kind. The multi-time Pro Stock series champion got his first professional victory at the Baytown, Texas, in 1997. Since then he has won here in1998, 2000, and 2010. He also reached the final round in 2009 and was No. 1 qualifier here in 2007 and last year.

"Throw in the win we had here in Super Stock in 1994, in what I believe was just my second race in that car, and it's obvious this track has been very kind to us," Coughlin said. "I'd love to rekindle our professional romance this weekend."

He entered this race ninth in the standings but said, "We're not really panicking or trying anything different. We're not doing anything differently than when we won it all last year. We know what we're doing, and we'll be just fine. I'm ready to race in Houston." His first test will be Greg Anderson in the first round Sunday.

 
MY NEW STUFF VS. YOUR NEW STUFF - Jonathan Gray stepped up to Pro Stock racing at Gainesville and will be making his third start Sunday against wily veteran V Gaines. Gray, the No. 8 qualifier, and Gaines, the No. 9 racer, are evenly matched. Gray's best time was a 6.595-second run and a best speed of 210.14 mph, and Gaines clocked a 6.597, 210.31 with a top speed of 211.33 mph. Both are showing off something new, Gray a new paint scheme along with the power of his new engine combination and Gaines his new Dodge Dart.
 
Gray has been consistent. He was seventh overnight after meeting his top-half goal. He had said before the first pass of the weekend, "I think if we can go out there and just be conservative in the first qualifying session on Friday and make a decent run, we have a good chance of ending up in the top half." He did, and he stayed there, as did brother Shane Gray, who's fourth in the order.
 
"I have a pretty good feeling," Gray said of his ability to adapt to the new set-up, which is similar to what teammate Dave Connolly ran at the season's first couple of events. "The car is set up a little bit different now, but between our crew chiefs, Tommy Lee, Tommy Utt and Justin Elkes, they'll get it going. We should be fine."
 

Shane Gray will race Steve Kent in the first round.
 
As for his new look, Jonathan Gray said, "It was a neat car being matte black, but I just felt like it was time for a change and decided to put a little color in it. The folks at Fine Line came up with a design, and I think it's going to look really nice on the racetrack." Or in the winners circle.


WHEW! - Pro Stock racer Rodger Brogdon is a Houston-area contractor, but he had almost nothing to build on as he tried to get into the field this weekend. He was one of five Friday who didn’t make it into that protected top 12 and among the ones who didn’t have to start all over with fresh elapsed times Saturday. He messed up at the starting line in Saturday's first chance, in the third overall session.

That left him with only one more opportunity to avoid being the odd man out in the group of 17 entrants. The pressure of that on any given week is tough enough, but Brogdon had the added burden of being one of the hometown favorites with a large group of supporters watching.

He improved to No. 14 in his last shot and has the daunting task of facing dangerous Dave Connolly, the No. 3 qualifier, when eliminations open Sunday. Missing the cut was Deric Kramer.


MORE PRO STOCK PAIRINGS - Enders-Stevens (No.2) will start her day against Matt Hartford (No. 15). Vincent Nobile (5) and Larry Morgan (12) will square off, and Jason Line (7) and Chris McGaha (10) are matched.

 

FRIDAY NOTEBOOK - 

TOP FUEL

THE UNLIKELY STAR - Bob Vandergriff talked about his 2013 victory at Royal Purple Raceway as being the material that inspires Hollywood movies.
 
Fellow Top Fuel driver Richie Crampton might agree after Friday's wild day of qualifying for the O'Reilly Auto Parts NHRA SpringNationals at the Baytown, Texas, racetrack.
 
The GEICO/Lucas Oil Dragster-driving rookie – who won his first professional elimination round at the season-opening Winternationals then has lost every round since in the first five races – stole the spotlight.
 
With a 3.807-second blast at 322.11 mph on the 1,000-foot course in the evening session, Crampton vaulted from the No. 13 position to the provisional No. 1 spot.
 
It came despite a 40-minute oildown from Vandergriff's engine explosion that cooled temperatures and opened the door for a better performance from his last four rivals.
 
"We've been working hard this season and haven't quite qualified the way we'd have liked to. So to get in the No. 1 spot tonight was a payoff for all the hard work," Crampton said afterward.
 
Even before the team left the shop at Brownsburg, Ind., the Australian said, "I think we can do well in Houston. We know we don't have to do a lot of different things to show the potential of this team. It's just a matter of time that we start going rounds like we're supposed to. It should be a big turnaround once things start going our way.


"When [crew chief Aaron] Brooks and this team get everything running the way we can, it's a great race car. We have a competitive car and a competitive team, and it's just a matter of time until that potential shows."
 
He said Friday evening, "It's still surreal for me to get to do this in general, let alone sit on the pole. It's a tribute to Aaron Brooks and this GEICO team. I don’t know what to say, apart from it’s a great deal."
 
Performing so well Friday, though, was a bit of a surprise for Crampton because he said he was "skeptical" after watching the Funny Car class struggle getting down the lanes that he could even make it to the finish line under power. Then he nearly convinced himself that his time wouldn’t hold up as the low E.T.: "We were thinking [conditions] were getting better and better."
 
Watching the Funny Car contingent made him doubt, but he said, "We kind of had a feeling that left lane would be a little better. So that kind of fell in our favor tonight."
 
What also fell in his favor was the fact Brooks was paying close attention.
 
"Aaron's adjusting everything to the last second," Crampton said. His mind's always running. He can watch the Funny Car category and learn something about the racetrack. He has such a big history with that type of race car, as well. He was leaning in the box and making adjustments. Evidently it worked out."
 
Crampton and the crew have been working on a number of ways they can perform their best. And the way the driver saw it, he needed to be sure he could see well. So in an effort to – as he said – "to get better in general . . . and to be better in any way possible," the PitFit gym devotee made the appointment in the Indianapolis area this past week and found out his vision is 20/20. So he and Brooks kept looking for other ways to get the car to perform to its potential.
 
The crew redistributed some weight in the chassis, adding about 20 pounds around the driver compartment, Crampton said.
 
"Putting the weight there is one of the options we have," he said. "We have the ability to put it wherever we like, so we put it there with the idea of trying to simulate having Morgan [Lucas] still in the race car."
 
It performed splendidly Friday with Richie Crampton in the seat.

MILLICAN REMAINS EVER OPTIMISTIC - When Clay Millican joined Dexter Tuttle and Tuttle Motorsports in December it was a scramble to get things in place for the 2014 season.

“For as late as we got everything put together I think we are hanging in there pretty well,” Millican said. “It was a lot of different parts and pieces that Dexter (Tuttle) and Jimmy (Walsh, Millican’s co-crew chief with Tuttle) have never worked with. We didn’t have any people until one week before Pomona (Feb. 6-9). These things take time sometimes, but overall I’m super happy with everything.”

Millican entered the O’Reilly Auto Parts SpringNationals Friday at Royal Purple Raceway in Baytown, Texas, 12th in the point standings.

“This car is going to run good,” Millican said. “This weekend we want to go out and make nice clean runs on eight cylinders and go a couple of rounds. We would be really happy with that and I don’t see any reason why we can’t do that. We are trying to not take giant bites and go over center. We are trying to work our way to it.”

While Millican’s Top Fuel team tries to speed up its learning curve, he did provide some news about his son Dalton, 21.

“He spent a little time last year with LE Tonglet’s Pro Stock bike,” Clay said. “He made some license runs in Belle Rose (La.) last year toward the end of the season. He did that with Gary (Tonglet), LE, and GT (Tonglet). Dalton has his E.T. license for riding a motorcycle and he had never even ridden a motorcycle before. He made seven runs and got his E.T. license and we’re hoping to go back and put a faster motor in for the next time he goes. Dalton was a national champion in 2011 on ATVs. He feels like some of the sponsorships he has in the ATV world would kind of relate to the motorcycle thing.”

Millican’s 4.057-second run left him No. 12 in the field after Friday’s two qualifying sessions.

ANOTHER CHAMP RETURNS – Greg Anderson wasn’t the only NHRA world champion returning to action at Baytown

Larry Dixon, who won world titles in 2002, 2003 and 2010, returned to the track behind the wheel of Bob Vandergriff Jr.’s second dragster.

On his first qualifying run, Dixon recorded a solid 3.856-second lap at 314.97 mph.

“It is a lot hotter than it was in that air-conditioned tower,” said Dixon, who did some commentary at several races since 2012. “What a blessing. Thanks to Bob Vandergriff, C&J Energy, Texas Equipment and Casedhole Solutions for giving me this opportunity to drive their hot rod. It’s a great car obviously. I didn’t do anything good up there other than keep it off the cones. Great car, and we will try to pick up from there.”

On his second qualifying pass Friday night, Dixon clocked a 3.828-second run at 319.14 mph, leaving him fourth in the qualifying ladder. Dixon competed in nine races last season and three in 2012.

“We’re excited to be in the backyard of our sponsors and being the defending champion,” said Vandergriff, who won at Baytown last year. “Larry was at the shop every day and he said he made about 1,000 runs in his mind. We don’t have to worry about Larry Dixon in the seat of that car. He’s obviously a three-time champ and he knows how to drive that thing and he hit the ground running with no problems.”

Vandergriff’s best run Friday was 3.947 seconds, and he didn’t improve on his second pass as he oiled down the track, delaying qualifying for 44 minutes.
 
KICKING OFF TEXAS SHOWDOWN – A couple of years ago at Dallas, a reporter said to Top Fuel owner-driver Steve Torrence, "Hey, you’re from Kilgore, Texas. Have you ever thought about having the Kilgore Rangerettes coming out to your pit?" The Rangerettes, who represent Kilgore College, are famous for their high-kicking Radio City Music Hall Rockettes-style performances. Torrence, a handsome 31-year-old bachelor, grinned and said, "I'm thinking about it right now!"

Finally the Kilgore College graduate got together with the Rangerettes this past Tuesday. He impressed the chorus line by starting up his 8,000-horsepower Capco Contractors Dragster during a promotional function for the O'Reilly SpringNationals here at Baytown, Texas.

Torrence wasn't quite as inspiring with his attempt at blending in with the drill team and its limber moves. But he hopes he'll be kicking the competition aside at Royal Purple Raceway this weekend. He knows he'll need to step it up, for he ended Friday at No. 15. Only Terry McMillen trailed him.

"It was a fun deal," he said of the Rangerettes event, "but now it’s back to business."  With four consecutive semifinal appearances to start the season, he said, "We had a pretty good streak going until Charlotte, and we need to get back to that level of performance this week. That third round has been a problem for us, for sure, but as long as we keep putting ourselves in that position, they’re going to have to deal with us."

He's seeking his first Houston victory. Larry Dixon owns the track record elapsed time at 3.772 seconds, but Torrence matched that in 2012, when he lost the No. 1 qualifying position on the top speed tie-breaker. He reached the semifinals here that year.

PEAS AND CARROTS - It's hard today to imagine Tony Schumacher racing without Mike Green as his crew chief. But it wasn't all that long ago – just five years, the blink of an eye in the storied history of drag racing – that many wondered how many more races Schumacher could win without Alan Johnson calling the tuning shots. But Schumacher and Green won the first of their 17 Wally trophies together here at this Baytown, Texas, racetrack March 29, 2009.

Schumacher and Johnson combined to earn 49 of the U.S. Army Dragster driver's 73 victories. But that 2009 final-round victory over Cory McClenathan was a pivotal one for Schumacher, he said.

"When I think of Houston, I think of winning with Mike Green for the first time in 2009. We had a lot of pressure. So many people were out there saying we wouldn’t be able to win without Alan Johnson. It took us four races, and getting that first win was huge," he said.
 
"Mike has proven over the years that he is absolutely one of the best at getting these cars right. He assembled an incredible crew with guys like Neal [assistant crew chief Strausbaugh] who continue to learn more and more. We thrive when it's pressure time, and that all started back in 2009. That Houston win proved we could do it, and we're still winning. Hopefully we'll be winning a lot more."
 
He notched his first of this season last month at Las Vegas, underscoring what he said all along – in much the same situation as in 2009. "Like I keep saying, I just think we've got all the right people, and we've all been in place long enough to really understand each other. We approach every single weekend with the feeling that it's going to be hard to beat us. But this is a very humbling sport, as everybody knows. Every time you pull up to the starting line, you can see the goal. It's like a football player who knows exactly what yard line, or the goal line, that he needs to reach. It's like a baseball player when he's up to bat. Most people have normal jobs and can't say they have jobs like we do. Our job is the same each and every week: to win races and to win championships. That's a lot of pressure, especially when there's never just some average Joe lined up next to us. They’re all great. They all have nine guys working with them who are also great at their jobs – all pretty special people. No matter who we're lined up against, we would be foolish to think we’re going to have it easy. It's all about what you do to prepare for that moment that makes our job really cool. It's one of the Army values we keep talking about."
 
LUCKY, TRICKY FOR BROWN - Matco Tools/U.S. Army Dragster driver Antron Brown called winning at Charlotte "crossing a big one off the bucket list." But this facility, where he won his first Top Fuel event victory in 2008, won't be an easy place to score back-to-back triumphs for a class-best third of the season.
 
"The weather can always be an equalizer in Houston," Brown said. "You've got some lower elevation, so there is an opportunity to use more horsepower, but it just depends on how hot it gets. You can usually count on two qualifying sessions where you can – what I like to say – 'throw down.' That means you can really get aggressive and go for it."
 
Since last September at St. Louis, Brown has won four times in nine events and advanced to six final rounds. Since his uncharacteristic first-round defeat at this year's season opener at Pomona, Calif., Brown has improved to second in the standings, 25 points behind leader Doug Kalitta. Brown beat Larry Dixon in the 2008 Houston final, then lost to him in the 2010 edition. Brown was runner-up here to Morgan Lucas in 2012.
 
He closed Friday in 10th place.
 
READY TO MAKE HIS MARK - Bob Vandergriff said his C&J Energy Services Dragster "has been very good this season and we've already had more runs in the 3.70s in the first few races than we did in the previous two years. We set a personal speed record at more than 328 mph and our second quickest run ever at 3.743." But the owner-driver has gotten past the first round only once in the season's first five races. Still, he said he has confidence he'll get past what he calls "some freak parts breakage and bad luck."

"I feel we are getting ready to go on a run and we have a car that's more than capable of not only winning a race but winning multiple races. We just have to keep moving forward. The car is capable, and it's time to start showing it," he said before taking the No. 11 slot Friday evening.

Vandergriff can look back at his 2013 trip to Houston for reassurance. He remembered that victory here as "great memories, Hollywood movie type stuff. Winning at your sponsor’s home track with their employees and customers rooting you on was incredible. If it had been a movie, people would have said, 'Yeah right, it would never ever happen like that,’ so it was pretty exciting.' "

Indeed, it might have been an unlikely ending. "Last year was a huge curveball because of the huge amount of rain they had and what it did to the track," Vandergriff said. "I knew it was going to be one of those races where just going down the track was going to be a challenge. We didn't make it down fully until the final round, but they gave us enough chances and we ended up winning the race."

He defeated Shawn Langdon in that final. And the current champion is one reason Vandergriff said, "You just don't get a round off in this class. There are at least 12 cars at each race fully capable of running 3.70s, and if you don't have your act together each round, you can plan on going home real quick."

ETCHED IN HER MIND - Brittany Force learned last year at Houston just how critical it is to qualify among the top 16 on Friday, for she took her first of two DNQs because rain washed out Saturday's activity.  This time the field has just 16 entries, so she's guaranteed to compete in eliminations. Still, that memory sticks with her. "I remember leaving the track that Saturday without any runs and without being qualified. It was definitely frustrating and was not what I expected. We’re confident that won’t happen this year and if anything, the Castrol EDGE Dragster will be qualified in the top half of the field," she said.

Force turned her resolve into results Friday, grabbing the No. 3 spot in the first session with a 3.852-second pass with a 317.05-mph speed that was faster than No. 2 J.R. Todd's. Although she improved slightly with a 3.846, 321.27, she'll start Saturday's qualifying from the No. 9 position.

"It feels good to come out to Houston Raceway Park, and on the first pass end up running a 3.85. We got a bonus point for that, which is pretty exciting," Force said. "Our second run out, it cooled down quite a bit later in the evening, as there was 40-minute oildown ahead of us. We ran a 3.84, so we improved -- and I couldn’t be happier for the Castrol EDGE team.

"To have an awesome first run out the door, which was a great pass, and then improve from there says a lot about where we're heading. Especially from last year, as we didn't even qualify and it was such a bummer. I feel we're in a much better place than last year, and can’t wait for tomorrow," Force said.

TEXAS-SIZED HOPES - Spencer Massey got his IHRA Top Fuel license at Royal Purple Raceway just after this race in 2008, and he headed the next week to San Antonio, where he won that sanctioning body's season-opener en route to the championship. So the former sportsman racer and mechanic got his dragster-driving start here.
 
"I've been to Royal Purple Raceway a lot, going back to when I was a kid and working on my friend's dragsters and even now helping out my Division 4 buddies," he said. "I've actually already made one stop [here] this year, back in March. There's nothing quite like racing somewhere that you consider home. You try not to put any extra pressure on yourself, but I really want a Wally trophy from Texas. It would be unbelievable. I really don't think I can describe what I think it would feel like. It would be huge for me."

What was huge was his improvement in the second session Friday. He jumped from 15th to second in the tentative lineup. "Man, that was close," Spencer said. "I've never been No. 1 in a Top Fuel car in Texas so that would've been awesome. It's going to be hot tomorrow so I don't think we'll be able to get after it and try to improve but that was a great lap by the Battery Extender team. We needed that."

BUFF'S CREW MAKING STRIDES - Troy Buff made it into the top 12 early Friday, despite losing traction in Bill Miller's BME/Okuma Dragster. The Spring, Texas, resident said his young crew has stepped up this season: "They're smart. They're on it. They're figuring it out really quick. What's cool is Bill's teaching them the way he wants it. Of course, we've got veterans, too: Terry Manzer . . . John Harford, who's been doing bottom end forever . . ." Meanwhile, since the part-time team competed at Las Vegas, Buff and dad Willard Buff, an NHRA Hall of Famer, have been busy preparing to move their automotive machine shop from their location of 20 years or so to a new facility. "My dad said, 'We're going to find all that stuff we couldn’t find!' “Buff said. This weekend, he's just looking for a way to move into the top half of the order for Sunday's eliminations. He ended up out of the protected 12 Friday, at the provisional No. 14 spot.  

QUICK LEARNER - JR Todd did it again. Since joining Kalitta Motorsports, he has hovered around the top of the qualifying list. In his debut at Charlotte two weeks ago with the Ypsilanti, Mich.-based team, he zipped to the No. 1 position in the opening session, and Friday at Houston he opened with a No. 2 effort. Todd started the Four-Wide race from the No. 2 slot, and so far he's sixth with two Saturday chances remaining. Doug Kalitta led the way in Q1, and Todd was only four-thousandths of a second behind him with a 3.824-second elapsed time. Todd had some fun, strategizing how he might get around his new teammate, who's gunning for his third top-qualifying honor in six events. But neither fared as well in the second session. Kalitta was quickest and fastest in the class after the early session with a 3.828-second, 321.50-mph run but fell to third in the night run.
 
DIXON RUNS STRONG – In his first pass of 2014, three-time series champion Larry Dixon raced to the No. 6 position and moved up to No. 4 in the evening session. Driving Bob Vandergriff's second dragster, the Caseholed Solutions entry, Dixon started his weekend with a 3.856-second, 314.97-mph clocking and found a little more power in Q2 for a 3.828-second pass at 319.14 mph. Dixon, with three Houston victories, and Tony Schumacher with two, are the only active Top Fuel drivers with multiple victories at this facility. 

FUNNY CAR

WORSHAM SETS FC PACE - When it seemed like every nitro Funny Car driver was having trouble getting down the track Friday night during the second qualifying session, Del Worsham had no problems at all.

Worsham, driving the DHL Toyota Camry for Kalitta Motorsports, blistered the track for a 4.051-second time at 314.68 mph to grab the provisional pole at the O’Reilly Auto Parts SpringNationals at Royal Purple Raceway.

“It affects everybody’s runs here,” said Worsham about the muggy conditions. “We are very close to sea level here, and this track has great horsepower and there is humidity you have to deal with. The first run getting down the track was really the key to being able to run good on your second run. We didn’t have to pull back (on the second run). We were able to go out there and run pretty hard and if we did make a mistake we still had our 4.13 to fall back on. It was kind of a free run out there and we took a little bit of a shot at the track and it stuck.”

HADDOCK GETTING A TEAMMATE - Terry Haddock, an NHRA nitro Funny Car and former Top Fuel driver, told Competition Plus Friday his wife Jenna will finish her requirements to get her Top Fuel license Monday at Royal Purple Raceway in Baytown, Texas.

“She has been driving that Top Fuel car for the last couple of years, but I never let her finish the license because once she has the license she’s going to be as bad as the rest of us wanting to go racing,” Terry said. “She only needs to make one full run, but I will make her do two or three. Whenever you teach someone to drive the rules say you need these many runs and I say you need a lot more

Terry said Jenna will make her runs Monday following the completion of the O’Reilly Auto Parts SpringNationals Sunday at Royal Purple Raceway, which he is competing in.

“We are going to run that (dragster), but you only get one first impression and she’s a very attractive young lady and I don’t want her to have the black eyes I’ve got in the sport for trying so hard,” Terry said. “When it’s funded correctly she will get to run. She will run it once guaranteed this year, and maybe twice. We are probably going to run Denver (July 18-20) for the first one and Seattle (Aug. 1-3) for the second one, but it still all up in the air. The (dragster) runs real good and it is upstairs in our trailer.”

Haddock’s top run Friday was 4.47 seconds which was No. 17 on the ladder.

NO SHOW OF FORCE – The John Force Racing stable of Funny Car drivers Robert Hight, John Force and Courtney Force struggled in Friday’s two qualifying sessions.

Courtney had the top run of three drivers at 4.413 seconds, leaving her No. 11 in the field. Hight was No. 15 at 5.403 seconds and the elder Force was No. 16 at 5.416 seconds.

“It puts you behind the eight-ball a little bit for (Saturday),” said Hight, who is leading the season points standings. “I think we just had clutch things bite us a little bit (Friday). Mike Neff and this team will get it and we will be fine (Saturday). (Saturday) is what the conditions are going to be like for Sunday. (Saturday) is the day we really have to shine.”

It’s worth noting that Brittany Force was No. 9 in Top Fuel qualifying at 3.846 seconds.

“Our second run out, it cooled down quite a bit later in the evening, as there was a 40-minute oil down ahead of us. We ran a 3.84 so we improved and I couldn’t be happier for the Castrol EDGE team,” said Brittany Force.

GOOD MEMORIES - Jeff Arend is in his second season driving for Jim Dunn and he’s hoping this weekend will be his first win with the team.

“This track has always been pretty good to me,” Arend said.

Arend speaks the truth about Royal Purple Raceway in Baytown. He won at Baytown in 2011 and was runner-up in 2010.

“This is a track where if you go 4.20s all day long on race day you look pretty good where normally if you go 4.20s you don’t have a chance,” Arend said. “We got a good idea about the conditions on the first run (Friday). (Saturday) will give us a good race day tune-up. But, if you told me right now I could have a 4.20 in the first round I would take it.”

Arend’s team has troubles Friday as his best elapsed time was 7.221 seconds on his first run. Arend, who has four career wins, has yet to get past first round in the first five races this season.

PRO STOCK

JOHNSON GRABS PRO STOCK PROVISIONAL POLE - Allen Johnson is an NHRA world championship Pro Stock driver with the utmost confidence in his team

On Friday night, Johnson and his Mopar Dodge team clicked, and the end result was him capturing the provisional pole at the O’Reilly Auto Parts SpringNationals at Royal Purple Raceway at Baytown, Texas.

Johnson clocked a 6.555-second time at 211.63 mph.

“We have a very professional team that has been here many times, we have raced so many times in humidity, and we usually do really good in humidity,” Johnson said. “We are still adapting to the new Dodge Dart, we just have three races under our belt with it, so each track and each situation presents a new set of difficulties with a new car. So, we adapted well with it and we made a really great run on that last run.”

WELCOME BACK GREG - This past off-season was one Greg Anderson will never forget.

Anderson, a four-time NHRA Pro Stock world champion, had heart surgery Feb. 6.

Following the surgery, Anderson sat out the first five races of the 2014 season. Jimmy Alund replaced Anderson in the seat of Ken Black’s Summit Racing Equipment Chevy Camaro and won the Four-Wide Nationals April 13 in Charlotte.

Anderson returned to the seat Friday at the O’Reilly Auto Parts SpringNationals in Baytown, Texas, and he couldn’t have been happier.

“It felt like the first run I ever made in Pro Stock,” said Anderson, who made his NHRA Pro Stock debut in 1998. “There were a lot of nerves, but I’m telling you what it feels great. Sitting on the couch is not for me. I don’t make a very good spectator I guess, but it feels great to be back in the car. The run was very smooth, very safe and it is just fantastic to be out here. I love it.”

Anderson clocked a 6.636-second run on his first lap at 209.92 mph. On his second run Friday night, Anderson had a 6.607-second elapsed time at 210.54 mph, which left him No. 11 on the qualifying ladder.

SAMPEY MAKES AN APPEARANCE – Pro Stock Motorcycle racer Angelle Sampey left her mark on the NHRA record books.

During her career from 1996-2010, Sampey won three world championships from 2000-2002, and won 41 races, the most wins for any female in both NHRA competition and professional motorsports as a whole.

Sampey is at the O’Reilly Auto Parts SpringNationals in Baytown, Texas this weekend as female competitors aim to get their 100th NHRA win. They are at 98 wins now.

“NHRA invited us all here with the women approaching the 100th win,” Sampey said. “I took the opportunity with the invitation from NHRA to bring out my little girl and come see everybody.”

Sampey’s daughter Ava Jane is three years old. Sampey has been married to Seth Drago for three years and they live in Mathews, La., about 45 minutes from New Orleans.

“I came here (to Baytown) two years ago when Ava was 1,” Sampey said. “It was for a couple of hours one day. I didn’t hardly even see anybody and nobody even knew I was here. We are spending the whole weekend this time. This is awesome. It was really hard for me to come to the race track before Ava was born because I’m not a race fan, I’m a racer. This is hard for me. I want to be on the race track, not watching. Now, that I have her (Ava) it is a lot easier because she fills that void for me and I’m introducing her to my friends and to the sport.”

DART DEBUT FOR GAINES – V.Gaines debuted his brand-new Kendall Dodge Dart at Royal Purple Raceway for the NHRA O’Reilly SpringNationals. In Friday’s opening qualifying session Gaines recorded a 6.610 elapsed time. at 211.16 mph. In Friday’s second qualifying session Gaines recorded a 6.605 E.T. at 210.21 mph. He is seventh on the qualifying ladder.

ENDERS-STEVENS STILL CHARGING AHEAD – Erica Enders-Steven has had a great start to the 2014 season in her first year driving for Richard Freeman’s Elite Motorsports team.

Enders-Stevens has one win at Las Vegas and a victory in the K&N Horsepower Challenge at The Strip. She also was in the finals in Gainesville before losing to Allen Johnson.

The veteran driver arrived at the O’Reilly Auto Parts SpringNationals at her hometown track in Baytown, Texas and she didn’t disappoint her fans. Enders-Stevens clocked a best run of 6.563 seconds at 211.59 mph to leave her second in the qualifying ladder behind Johnson’s 6.555-second run.

“There’s so many variables in getting the car down the race track but in my opinion it’s the six inches between your ears that’s most important,” Enders-Stevens said. “It’s all in your head and having a positive outlook, having faith in your team and confidence in yourself. We’re having a successful run at the moment and we hope to carry it along as long as we can.”

MGGAHA HAS DECENT DAY – Chris McGaha bought the Pro Stock operation of Mike Edwards in the offseason and the results are showing on the track for him.

The Odessa, Texas resident has driven his Harlow Sammons Chevy Camaro to two No. 1 qualifying positions at Phoenix and Charlotte and was No. 2 in Las Vegas.

On Friday in Baytown, Texas at Royal Purple Raceway, McGaha had a decent start to qualifying as his best time of 6.599 seconds at 211.26 mph left him No. 8 in the field.

“I think our season is going pretty good, all things considered,” McGaha said. “Two number No. 1s, a couple of semifinals, we’re pretty pleased. We want to win, but you have to take the steps to get there and we are getting there. We are making progress.”

MORGAN SLIDES IN AT NO. 12 – This wasn’t the ideal start to qualifying for veteran Pro Stock driver Larry Morgan Friday, but did get in the top 12 with his 6.610-second run at 209.56 mph in his Lucas Oil Ford Mustang.

"I always enjoy going there because Houston was one of the first super racetracks that we had," Morgan said. "It has a good barometer all the time because you're at sea level. We enjoy going down there and it's a great place to test. The Angel family is a great family, too."

Morgan is trying to bounce back at Royal Purple Raceway after suffering four consecutive first round losses. Morgan’s lone round win 2014 came at the season-opening Winternationals against Allen Johnson.

Morgan’s best qualifying effort in the first five races this year was 10th at Gainesville.

CHAMP COUGHLIN HOPING FOR BIG WEEKEND – Six-time world champion Jeg Coughlin Jr.'s success at Royal Purple Raceway in the Houston suburb of Baytown is well-chronicled, with four Pro Stock victories.

Now the driver of the JEGS.com/Mopar Dodge Dart is hoping to get his 2014 season rolling at Royal Purple Raceway.

"The sport of drag racing, and Pro Stock in particular, can be brutal. Over the course of time, I know we've taken the greater share of those close-call races, and I'm sure it will tip back our way real soon. There's no doubt we're fully capable of winning every race we enter and Houston will be no exception."

Currently ninth in the world rankings, Coughlin has advanced out of the first round at four of the first five races of the NHRA season. Unfortunately, he hasn't made it past Round 2 at any point, dropping head-to-head matchups by agonizingly small margins.

Coughlin did get off to a solid start in qualifying Friday as his best run of 6.592 seconds at 210.47 mph left his sixth in the field.

OUTSIDE LOOKING IN – Hometown Pro Stock drivers Steve Kent and his teammate Rodger Brogdon are still trying to get things rolling this season.

Kent qualified No. 13 (6.612 seconds) and Brogdon was No. 14 (6.615 seconds) Friday.

Greg Stanfield, Deric Kramer and Matt Hartford were No. 15-17 on the qualifying ladder. The 16-car field will be set Saturday.