David Baca drove his David Powers-owned Matco Tools dragster to a quarterfinal effort Sunday at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. After qualifying fifth, the veteran nitro racer advanced to the second round of eliminations before falling to teammate Rod Fuller.
Baca, competing for the first time this season, earned his first round win since the Richmond, Va. event last October by knocking off 29-time NHRA Top Fuel winner Cory McClenathan in the opening round of eliminations. Baca used a Lee Beard tune-up to race the Matco Tools dragster to a run of 4.594 seconds at 325.45 mph. McClenathan was on a solid pass until the engine exploded on his FRAM dragster.
In the quarterfinals, Baca and teammate Rod Fuller used nearly identical reaction times before the Matco Tools car lost traction. Fuller sped to low elapsed time of the round, 4.557 at 327.90, to advance to the semifinals for the 14th time this season. Baca slowed to a run of 9.615 at 78.83.
“We were aggressive, flat out, ” Baca said. “We were out there and I didn’t see him for the first couple hundred feet. I was ready to pedal, but they had a flawless run. They had low E. T. of the round, it was a great run and would have been tough to beat. It certainly wasn’t a lay down. I’ve owned my own cars for many years and you don’t want to hurt parts if the guy is running away from you. If he would have had trouble, we would have gotten back on it. Overall, it was a great weekend and it feels awesome to be back in a race car. ”
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