For just the third time this season, Rod Fuller and his David Powers Motorsports team were defeated in the opening round of eliminations following the completion of 19th running of the O’Reilly Summer Nationals at Heartland Park Topeka on Sunday. He qualified fourth this weekend with a 4.566-second elapsed time. Fuller now sits second in the NHRA Top Fuel standings.
Facing off against perennial Top Fuel title contender Doug Kalitta for the ninth time, the two elite drivers used solid reaction times as Fuller utilized a tune-up from crew chief Rob Flynn to power his all-white David Powers-owned dragster to a run of 4.581 seconds at 323.19 mph. Kalitta drove his bright red rail to the quickest and fastest lap of the round, 4.549 at 325.85, to score the win light in the left lane at Heartland Park. Fuller clocked his fastest pass of the weekend in the opening round loss. The Topeka track remains just one of two (Bandimere Speedway) on the 21-track circuit where Fuller has yet to win a round.
“I’m not disappointed about the weekend, ” Fuller said. “We raced smart all weekend long. That’s gotten us to the top, but it will get you sometimes. If you average our reaction time in, we had the second fastest package of the round other than Doug (Kalitta). It just wasn’t meant to be. We’re going to a track that we do really well at and it’s notorious for being fast. Today was just a matter of circumstances. It’s just part of racing. ”
The next NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series event is the 10th annual Torco Racing Fuels Route 66 Nationals, June 8-10, at Route 66 Raceway in Joliet, Ill. Fuller advanced to the final round of the Joliet race in 2005. There are 15 races remaining on the 2007 NHRA schedule.
| 
|