For Melanie Troxel, the 28th annual Mopar Mile-High Nationals at Bandimere Speedway, is a true homecoming for this high-profile drag racer. She built her career at the famed Colorado quarter-mile following in the footsteps of her father, Top Alcohol racer, Mike Troxel and grew up working on his car honing her skills in the world of drag racing.
“I grew up running at Bandimere Speedway, so it’s always nice coming back home to get to race there and to see family and friends, ” said a cheery Troxel. “We’ve been so busy with the constant racing schedule and things going on in the off-season that I don’t get the opportunity to make it back there very often. I enjoy it very much! ”
After reunions, Troxel will get back to her racing business. She has adapted to the shift of crew chiefs in the midseason and has accepted all the tasks that have befell her in getting her season turned around.
“We basically started over in midseason with the changes we made, ” said Troxel. “It takes a little while to work through all this to get some rhythm going again. We’re seeing improvements with the car, but we’re not getting the results we want on Sunday. We know it’s just a matter of time before we see that turn around. ”
Out of the 12 previous NHRA races in 2007, Troxel has two final round appearances and her third victory of her career in May at St. Louis. If she can just manage to move out of her series of first round doldrums, her record speaks loudly that she will most likely proceed to the finals.
“That’s definitely been the situation this year, ” said Troxel. “We’ve struggled and gone out in the first round a lot this year, but when we do get past first round we perform very well and I can’t think of a better track to continue that trend than my hometown track in Denver. ”
With the hot temperatures surely to be expected at Denver this weekend, the team will have to battle the ultra-thin air in building performance for a great race.
“It’s always tricky to run at altitude and that makes it something of a challenge for the team, ” she said. “We don’t get to run our normal tune up at this track, so again, we’ll be making some changes. We know the track surface itself will be good. I think all the teams have made some big strides in the past five years on compensating for the thin air up there. I think we can look forward to some good elapse times.
“What we need is a healthy weekend. We’ve surprisingly haven’t fallen back in the points standings as much as we could have. Even with our first round losses, we haven’t dropped out of the top eight, so we need to take this opportunity to go out and put in a solid finish that will move us up a spot or two in the NHRA Countdown to the Championship. ”
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