It’s a renaissance of action occurring at Morgan Lucas Racing. The addition of famed tuner, Richard Hogan to his Top Fuel program is showing signs of steady progress and at this weekend’s inaugural Summit Racing Equipment Nationals he’ll get his opportunity to display that development.
“We have all the right components in place and we’ll get this figured out, ” said an unwavering Lucas. “As time goes on, our new team will determine our best plans and with someone of Richard’s talents, it’s more of a ‘when’ rather than ‘if’. In many ways, we’re very fortunate to have a great crew. but this sport can be very humbling. ”
This being NHRA’s inaugural appearance at the Summit Motorsports Park, the Lucas Oil team considers itself on even ground with the other competitive teams feeling everyone is learning the ins and outs of this Ohio quarter-mile at the same time.
“It’s our first time racing there, so we really don’t know what to expect, ” said Lucas, curiously. “We’re hoping to find some great grip in the hot weather and make our Lucas Oil dragster go down the track. All we need to cure our situation is to have some consistent elapsed times over the weekend. Once we get that accomplished, then we can move on concentrating more on winning some rounds. ”
Lucas, the youngest professional driver on the tour at the fresh age of 23-years old, fully understands that 2007 hasn’t been the banner season he was expecting. He still remains unfazed by the unfortunate series of events of not qualifying, but more especially, the loss of his good friend and beloved Funny Car racer, Eric Medlen.
“We’ve all dedicated our season to Eric’s memory, ” he said. “That’s the reason we want to finish strong and turn our year around. It’s that sense of direction that keeps us going. Making good passes will completely change our frame-of-mind and we’ll be just fine. ”
The start of the inaugural Summit Racing Equipment Nationals begins at the Summit Motorsports Park on Friday, June 29 with two qualifying sessions starting at 5:00 p. m. (EDT) with a second session at 8:00 p. m. Saturday’s time trials start at 1:00 p. m. for the nitro classes followed by a second session at 3:30 p. m. The race starts promptly at 11 a. m. on Sunday, July 1.
LUCAS OIL RACING DRIVER NOTES:
Morgan Lucas has five runner-up finishes, which the Brownsburg, Ind. driver reached in only his seventh (04 Las Vegas2), eighth (04 Pomona2), 10th (05 Phoenix), 20th (05 St. Louis) and 21st (05 Denver) starts. He finished fifth in the 2005 NHRA Top Fuel Point standings with 1,357 points after completing his first full season on the competitive 23-race NHRA circuit. He finished 11th in 2006.
Lucas’ quickest elapsed time is 4.474 seconds, set on Feb. 12, 2005 at Pomona Raceway. He sped to his fastest top speed of 328.94 mph on May 29 in the first round of eliminations at the 2005 O’Reilly Summer Nationals in Topeka, Kansas. He won two Budweiser low qualifier awards. His first on May 14 at the Atlanta Dragway recording a time 4.541 seconds and Oct. 22 on ‘The Strip’ at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway setting the pace with his run of 4.508 seconds. Morgan Lucas’ first Top Fuel event came behind the wheel of the Joe Amato-owned dragster at the 2004 Lucas Oil Nationals at the Brainerd (MN. ) International Raceway on August 15, 2004. DOB: November 27, 1983.
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