Ty Tutterow waited until the final qualifying session Friday night to make his move, and when he did, nobody in Pro Boost had an answer.
Tutterow fired off a 3.556-second pass at 209.79 mph to lead a 28-car Pro Boost field during a rain-delayed day of qualifying at PDRA DragWars at Darana Motorsports Park. Ryan Bush joined him atop the qualifying sheets in Pro Nitrous, while Tim Essick led Pro Street.
Intermittent showers pushed Friday’s program deep into the evening and eventually forced Pro 632 and Super Street to stop after two qualifying sessions because of the track’s curfew.
Tutterow’s final-session run came as conditions improved and the bump spot became a moving target behind him.
“We always plan to go up there and better our last run, and there were a couple people that went up there and ran pretty close to the same run that we did earlier, or maybe a little better,” Tutterow said. “But the weather got a lot better. We were able to really stand on it and give it everything we had for that last run, and it worked out. I really figured it would run a low .56. I didn’t think it was going to dip quite into a .55, but that was great.”
Johnny Camp, second in the championship standings entering the event, qualified No. 2 with a 3.576 at 210.80. Carson Perry was third at 3.578 and 210.34.
Bush made his first PDRA Pro Nitrous appearance count.
The Mid-West Drag Racing Series regular qualified No. 1 with a 3.629 at 209.56, edging defending world champion Marcus Butner’s 3.631 at 207.69. Fredy Scriba was third with a 3.640 at 207.94.
“It feels good,” Bush said. “It was a long trip out here, but we’ve been running all year in the Midwest, so we knew the car would be competitive. Obviously I’ve got a great tuner in Jeff, so we felt pretty good coming in. The air’s not great, but we knew if the track got good, it’d be fast.”
Essick had considerably more work involved in getting to the top of Pro Street.
After damaging a center section in the previous session, Essick and his team thrashed to make the final qualifier. The two-time world champion responded with the only run in the 3.80s, a 3.893 at 195.65.
“It feels terrific, especially, like the round before we blew up a center section, so it was a thrash,” Essick said. “Ron Green came over and gave us a hand to try to make it. We made it just in the nick of time. We figured the conditions are right, let’s throw a big one at it, so that’s what we did. It makes all that pain worth it. It was well worth trying to get.”
Green qualified second at 3.914 and 198.00, followed by Mikey Sasina’s 3.917 at 199.79.
Pro 632 points leader J.C. Beattie Jr. ended the abbreviated qualifying program No. 1 with a 4.130 at 172.89. Connor McGee led Super Street with a 4.484 at 164.43.
Sportsman No. 1 qualifiers were Jamie Fowler in Elite Top Sportsman, Alan O’Brien in Elite Top Dragster, Ronnie Proctor in Top Sportsman and Bruce Holland in Top Dragster.
Ashton Halas and Carter Hayes were the provisional leaders in Pro Jr. Dragster and Top Jr. Dragster, respectively. Halas combined a perfect .000 reaction time with a 7.900-second run against the class’ 7.90 index, while Hayes posted a .007 reaction time.
Saturday’s program begins with final Jr. Dragster qualifying at 8:45 a.m., with professional eliminations scheduled to begin at 11.
