Leah Pruett can still vividly recall the first time she stepped foot inside Auto Club Raceway at Pomona.

The sights. The sounds. The smells.

She remembers her first race here as a fan. She remembers her first race as a competitor. She even remembers singing the national anthem at a race as a youngster.

So when the now 33-year-old placed her Sparkling Ice dragster on the provisional pole Friday night in the NHRA Camping World Drag Racing Series’ first trip back to Pomona in a year and a half, she admits that all of those old feelings came flooding back.

“Me coming here to Pomona puts me in the mindset of when I was 13 years old at section 24 going, ‘I want to do that,’” Pruett said. “My first race was here. The first time I was ever in this tower I sang the national anthem. It has been a while since our team has felt this and it is not by accident. It is by diligence. But there is a whole new day tomorrow.”

On a tricky track made all the more difficult by months of inactivity on its surface, Pruett was one of only two drivers to dip into the three-second zone in Top Fuel on the first day of qualifying at the Lucas Oil NHRA Winternationals presented by ProtectTheHarvest.com.

Following abandoned run after abandoned run by her competitors, Pruett put together the first - and only - quality run of the evening in her Don Schumacher Racing-backed dragster with a 3.780-second pass at 321.88 mph. Her lane partner, Mike Salinas, was the only other driver to put together a noteworthy run, recording a 3.840 at 308.35 mph slotting him in second behind Pruett.

“After that run I stayed down (on the top end) and watched on the monitor,” Pruett said. “You don’t get those moments very often to be in the hunt for things like this and, yeah, we are provisional No. 1 tonight, but tomorrow is another day. Usually Steve (Torrence) is behind us and goes out there and rips it out from underneath you. So you enjoy it. Steve’s team has really given us something to strive toward.”

Buddy Hull qualified third after one of three sessions over the course of the weekend, recording a 4.105 at 278.69 mph. Shawn Langdon and Steve Chrisman rounded out the top five.

Torrence, whom Pruett referenced as the proverbial qualifying grinch, sits 12th out of the 13 cars to qualify on Friday. He is looking to become the first pro driver on the NHRA tour to sweep the Western Swing since 2009 after winning the first two legs.

All of the teams will have two more qualifying sessions on Saturday.

If her time holds, it will be Pruett’s first pole position of the year and her first since 2019. She is coming off of her best performance of the season one week ago in Sonoma with a runner-up finish.

“I really feel like with the last race and coming in here now, I am a true believer in Benjamin Button. Maybe our season is now going the other way,” Pruett said with a laugh. “That is what we are working toward. What brings me the most happiness between pulling the parachutes and turning off is that we are inching more and more toward our own expectations.

“That is what brings me the most happiness. For us it is all about perspective on our own car and on our own team. The happiness is in finding that success in what we are doing and knowing we are going in the right direction.”

After failing to make it out of the first two rounds at the season’s first eight races - and flirting with the bottom half of the Countdown to the Championship field - Pruett feels her young team is beginning to gel at just the right time after a tumultuous offseason and rough start to the year.

“The power is in your people. We took a step back in the offseason with a number of experienced individuals. The beginning part of our season had an extra load on our guys getting the new guys up to speed,” Pruett said. “Now that everyone is pulling the rope in the same direction with the same amount of force, that is really what it took. We’ve had our highs and lows, but the core of us know what it is like to win here. That is what professionals do, they read and they adapt. That is what I feel like is the variable to our recent success.”