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QUALIFYING SESSIONS RECAP

PRO STOCK Q1 (2:05 p.m.): At least one experienced Pro Stock driver predicted that a 6.64 would be a great run in Q1 and he was right on the money as reigning Mello Yello world champion Jason Line posted a 6.647 to take an early lead. Line was more than two-hundredths quicker than his teammate, Bo Butner, who is second with a 6.671 and rookie Tanner Gray picked up a bonus point after wheeling his Camaro to a 6.673. Several drivers struggled to get down the track including Allen Johnson, Chris McGaha, and Matt Hartford.

FUNNY CAR Q1 (2:55 p.m.): Courtney Force set a new track record of 3.867 to lead the pack after one session, breaking the old mark of 3.871 set last fall by Jack Beckman. Tim Wilkerson grabbed two bonus points for his 3.876 while Ron Capps, who failed to qualify at this event last year, assured himself a spot in this year’s field with a 3.917. Only five cars made it to the finish line under power.

TOP FUEL Q1 (3:45 p.m.): Steve Torrence led the field with a 3.720 pass after the first session. Gainesville winner Tony Schumacher wasn’t far behind, picking up a pair of bonus points by running a 3.753. Brittany Force rounded out the top three with a 3.76. Steve Chrisman oiled the track, causing a brief delay that sent the NHRA Safety Safari onto the track. Leah Pritchett closely followed Force in fourth place with a pass of 3.78 and Clay Millican notched a 3.781. 

PRO STOCK Q2 (5:23 p.m.): Through two of four qualifying runs, Jason Line is halfway to his goal of a fourth-straight Low Qualifier award. Line made the best run of the session with a 6.650, just missing his earlier 6.647. There was a lot of improvement throughout the field including Jeg Coughlin Jr., who moved into the second spot after a 6.652 in his Elite Motorsports-powered Camaro. The top half of the field is tightly bunched with Greg Anderson, Vincent Nobile, and Bo Butner all running 6.66 or quicker.

FUNNY CAR Q2 (6:25 p.m.): A difficult Funny Car session saw only one car make it down the track; but it was a solid one for the Mopar Express Lane Dodge, driven by Matt Hagan. That’s a credit to crew chief Dickie Venables, who helped tune the only successful car in the class in the second qualifying session. The 3.868 run by Hagan moved him all the way from dead last to second place behind only Courtney Force’s pass of 3.867. 

TOP FUEL Q2 (6:50 p.m.): Much like in the second qualifying session for the Funny Cars, the second-place driver had the best pass in the second session for Top Fuel. Unfortunately for Tony Schumacher, his 3.734 wasn’t enough to pass current leader Steve Torrence’s 3.72 for the lead. He was the only driver to complete his run in the second qualifying session, something else the Top Fuel drivers had in common with their Funny Car colleagues. 

FEATURES

There’s a lot of frills and fame that come with having a well-known national sponsor as well as being the early-season points leader, and Leah Pritchett has kept busy in the 10 days since the Amalie Motor Oil NHRA Gatornationals and her trip this weekend to Las Vegas.

Pritchett’s close ties with Dodge earned her a spot in commercials for Dodge and promotions for the upcoming film, The Fate of the Furious, the eighth in the Fast & Furious series that were shot on the West Coast. The film opens April 14 and Pritchett will be at the New York City premier, where she will walk the red carpet at the premier.
 
Pritchett also braved sub-freezing wind-chill near her home in Indianapolis last week filming a national commercial for Papa John's Pizza with "Papa John" Schnatter that will be released this summer.

Antron Brown has enjoyed recent success in Las Vegas, as the 2016 Top Fuel champion clinched his title at the fall event. He also won the spring event at The Strip and will look to leave Las Vegas with a smile on his face once again while seeking his first victory of the 2017 campaign. 

"It's always one step at a time," Brown said. "For us as a whole, we want to win every race that we go to. We qualified in the top-three at the first three races, we've been to the semis and the final at Gainesville and we really felt that was our race to win. The Army team just did an incredible job. We had something that bit us but we're growing from it.” 

Brown’s first win of his title year came in Vegas a season ago and he’ll look to take a similar path in 2017. He has captured three wins in Sin City and a pair of them at the spring event. 

Brown finished as the runner up to Tony Schumacher in Gainesville and took second in Pomona to start the season. He’s finished in the top three in qualifying in all three races and exited in the second round in Arizona. 

"You don't get better by doing the same things, you only get better in life by doing things that are different. Brian and Mark, that's what they do. We are always innovating and making new things and now we're starting to see traction from it earlier. Last year it was later but this year we're already seeing the benefits of it. We just have to keep grinding. This class is not going to be easy in Top Fuel this year, it never is. It gets harder every year but we're ready to go out there and battle."

Despite still searching for his first win, Brown finds himself in third place with 243 points. He’s 57 points behind Top Fuel leader Leah Pritchett and 36 behind Schumacher. Brown topped Troy Buff in the final round at the spring event in 2016. 

It looked like Steve Torrence got his groove back at The Strip last fall. After starting the Countdown in third place, Torrence had dropped down to sixth before winning the Toyota NHRA Nationals to propel himself to second. Things didn’t progress so nicely from there. 

Torrence lost in the second round in the Auto Club NHRA Finals and finds himself in sixth place entering the Denso Spark Plugs NHRA Nationals at The Strip, the spring event in Las Vegas as looks to get his mojo back.  

“The DSR cars have been kicking our butts so far,” Torrence said, “(but) maybe we can start giving them some payback (this week).  You can’t just go forward with whatever worked a year ago.  You have to keep getting quicker.  We made some changes and it just takes some time to get it right.

Torrence’s luck may be turning around. The 2015 Alcohol Dragster champion put together his best finish of the season in Gainesville, falling in the semifinals to eventual champion Tony Schumacher. He cranked out the top qualifying time in the first round, notching a 3.720.

Most drivers pack their own parachutes and the reasons vary. Ron Capps likes to get his hands dirty. It reminds him of a time before he was a driver, back when he was a just a guy working on a car. Beyond that, there’s a level of comfort knowing he packaged the chute.

“What am I gonna do, yell at the guy who packed it?” Capps asked.

It also reminds him of another racer, the late Blaine Johnson. Capps learned a parachute-packing trick from Johnson he uses to this day. After the chute is packed Capps shows the knot and pin that connects them.

“If you put the pin in here and pull on it it takes a little bit of [the knot] it rubs that loop,” said Capps. “That loop is also where the cable goes in. Every time you do that, and you don’t see it up top, it’s taking a little bit of string and people have [the string] break on a run because you can’t see underneath how much has worn away because it has that covering.

“So Blaine taught me a long time ago you just wrap [the string] around once and give it a tug and now it’s under the pin as I tug. It’s stupid simple and it’s something he had taught me one time.”

Capps finished as the runner-up in Phoenix and is still looking for his first win of the season. He crossed the centerline and lost to teammate Matt Hagan in Gainesville.

John Hale, who left the saddle of Jim Dunn’s Funny Car at the end of last season, is back behind the wheel at this event, driving for Steve Plueger. Plueger’s usual driver, Jeff Arend, is driving at this event for longtime friend Peter Russo, so the seat became available. Hale is well familiar with the team, having licensed in Plueger’s car in 2013

“It’s fun to be back here and see all the guys. I love driving for Steve because everybody here is friends, it’s low stress, and everyone is working for the same goal: to help Steve out,” he said. “We want to make this deal work for him and see his car go down the track. I’m just here to help.”

Hale drove his Nostalgia Funny Car at the recent March Meet in Bakersfield, but this is his first even back in a “big show” car since last year’s Auto Club NHRA Finals.  “You need to drive one of these cars fairly often to keep your hand in it,” he said. “I wouldn’t want to go much longer than I have.”

Hale is also keeping busy with his personal business, Best of Texas Barbecue Sauce, which he’s close to getting into national chains like Ace Hardware in California and Albertson’s, but also has been talking to a number of nitro Funny Car teams about making more select events this season.
 

John Force has six combined wins between the spring and fall events held each year at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, including at last year’s fall event, where he defeated daughter Courtney in the final round. In fact, half of Force’s wins at The Strip have come after final-round conquests of teammates, also defeating Courtney at the fall event in 2013 and Robert Hight at the spring event in 2015.

Force enters the event with a lot of momentum after his victory two weeks ago at the Amalie Motor Oil NHRA Gatornationals and is looking 

“I’ve had a lot of big wins there,” said Force, who swept both the spring and fall Vegas events in 2010. “We’re hearing the music, and excited to be back. We won the race last year in the Countdown. All of John Force’s cars are hearing the music. Viva Las Vegas.” 

Hight is no slouch in Vegas either, and he ranks as the winningest Funny Car driver in the spring event with three victories. He also has two wins at the fall event, tied for second behind only team owner Force.
 

Drew Skillman could probably have come up with some bogus excuse to explain the early parachute on his Skillman Auto Group Camaro in Q1 but that’s not his style.

“I did something I’ve never done before,” Skillman said. “I accidentally hit the chute button early. I got to about 1,000 feet and my hand hit the button and the chute came out. It was totally on me.”

Skillman managed to run a respectable 6.703 at just 192.71 mph and he’s eighth after one run. By a conservative estimate, he could have run a 6.67 or quicker which would have been good for one of the top four spots.

The parachute incident aside, Skillman is happy to have made it to Las Vegas in time to race following an all-day adventure on Thursday. Skillman’s plane from Indianapolis was diverted to Southern California due to high winds in Las Vegas and he, and a good part of his crew, had to rent cars and drive across the Mojave Desert. He arrived in Las Vegas late Thursday night.

“We had high winds and sand storms on the drive and, of course, there was traffic but we did okay to get here. We all got here in one piece so it could have been a lot worse.”

As the top seed in tomorrow’s K&N Horsepower Challenge, Jason Line knew months ago that he was going to have to race whichever driver won the fan vote. That happened to be two-time world champ Erica Enders.

“That isn’t the way I’d have drawn it up,” Line joked. “Then again, if you look at the racers who were in the fan vote; Jeg Coughlin, Chris McGaha, Tanner Gray; there isn’t an easy draw in the field. Honestly, I think it would have been better to be the No. 2 seed like Greg [Anderson]. You’d get a better match-up. That all sounds good, but really, you have to beat three good racers to win the deal so that’s our goal no matter who is in the other lane.”

Line opened qualifying with a strong 6.647, a powerhouse run that has the rest of the field covered by nearly three hundredths of a second. Line has been the top qualifier at the first three events this season in Pomona, Phoenix, and Gainesville. He’s qualified on the pole 52 times in 311-career races and has not been seeded outside the top eight since the 2015 St. Louis event.

As one of the first Pro Stock drivers down the Las Vegas quarter-mile in Q1, Matt Hartford spun the tires and coasted to a 7.888 in his Total Seal Camaro.

“It was loose from the time I dropped the clutch,” Hartford said. “I decided to shut it off before I got into trouble. It wasn’t a good run at all but at least we got some data that we can use for the next run.”

Hartford remains convinced that he’s on the verge of a breakthrough weekend. Using engines from Warren Johnson Ent., he realizes he’s got the power to qualify in the top five. It’s just a matter of refining his combination.

“We ran great in Sonoma last year and we’re capable of doing that again,” he said. “The thing about Warren is that he’s never satisfied. He is a wizard who always wants to try new heads, manifolds, and camshafts. He never sits still and sometimes we have to take a step backward in order to take two forward. For a guy like me, that can get a little frustrating but it’s all for the greater good. After Gainesville, I told him not to touch the car. I put tape over the whole engine and wrote ‘Do not touch’. I think he got the message because when we got here, nothing was touched. That might be the first time he’s listened to me.”

Hartford improved to a 6.719 on Q2 and finished the day as the No. 11 qualifier in the field.

PHOTOS

Funny Car low qualifier Courtney Force's second pass didn't go as well as her first as her Advance Auto Parts Chevy shook hard, and got crossed up on two wheels (animated gif).

PREVIEW

Racing moves back out West at the Denso Spark Plugs NHRA Nationals in Las Vegas, Nev. The fourth race on the NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series calendar drops the humidity experienced in Florida and ramps up the elevation, giving drivers a new challenge to work with as the field starts to shake out.

Tony Schumacher (Top Fuel) and John Force (Funny Car) will look to build on their first wins of the season while Top Fuel defending champion Antron Brown attempts to get back on track in Las Vegas. Brown is still looking for his first win of the year and finished as the runner up in Gainesville last weekend.

A racer with mixed history in Las Vegas, Alexis DeJoria, is also looking for her first win of the season. She won the Spring race at The Strip, her second such victory at the early-season trip to Vegas, but crashed at the Fall race and suffered a season-ending concussion. DeJoria is hoping for the kind of Spring luck she’s experienced in the past to show itself again.

Looking to return to the winner’s circle in Vegas is Pro Stock driver Jason Line, who already picked up a victory this season in Pomona. Shane Gray brought KB Racing’s hot start to an end in Gainesville, but watch out for Line to try to get his team back in the win column at a track he’s won twice before (2016, 2008, both in Spring).

Schumacher is a four-time winner at the Spring race in Vegas (2004, 2009, 2013, 2014) and Greg Anderson (Pro Stock) has picked up three wins at the NHRA’s early season visit to Glitter Gulch (2003, 2004, 2007).

The Las Vegas race includes the K&N Horsepower Challenge on Saturday. Greg Anderson is the defending champ and will be pitted against seven challengers, including fan-vote winner Erica Enders, who won the event in 2014 and 2015. The winner picks up a $50,000 payday and a $25,000 bonus if they also win on Sunday.

Here's a look at the current NHRA national records:

Top Fuel

3.658 sec. by Leah Pritchett, Feb. ‘17, Phoenix;

332.75 mph by Spencer Massey, Aug. ’15, Brainerd, Minn.

Funny Car

3.822 by Matt Hagan, Aug. ’16, Brainerd, Minn.

335.57 mph by Hagan, May ’16, Topeka, Kan.

Pro Stock

6.455 sec. by Jason Line, March ’15, Charlotte, N.C.

215.55 mph by Erica Enders, May ’14, Englishtown N.J.

EVENT FACT SHEET

2016 EVENT WINNERS

Antron Brown, Top Fuel; Alexis DeJoria, Funny Car; Jason Line, Pro Stock; Anderson, K&N Horsepower Challenge.

MOST VICTORIES:

John Force, 6, FC: Larry Dixon, 4, TF; Tony Schumacher, 4, TF; Antron Brown, 3, TF: Robert Hight, 3, FC; Greg Anderson, 3, PS; Jeg Coughlin, 3, PS; Kenny Bernstein, 2, TF; John Force, 2, FC; Cruz Pedregon, 2, FC; Mike Edwards, 2, PS; Erica Enders, 2, PS; Allen Johnson, 2, PS.

MOST K&N HORSEPOWER CHALLENGE VICTORIES:

Greg Anderson, 5; Kurt Johnson, 4; Jeg Coughlin, 3; Bob Glidden, 3; Warren Johnson, 3; Larry Morgan, 3; Bruce Allen, 2
 Erica Enders, 2; Allen Johnson, 2; Jim Yates, 2;

TRACK RECORDS: 

Top Fuel

3.689 sec. by Steve Torrence, Oct. ’16

332.67 mph by Shawn Langdon, Oct. ’15.

Funny Car

3.871 sec. by Jack Beckman, Oct. ’16

331.94 mph by John Force, Oct. ’16

Pro Stock

6.559 sec. by Erica Enders, Oct. ’15.

210.28 mph by Erica Enders, Oct. ’15