NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series Top Fuel points leader Cory McClenathan and the FRAM Top Fuel team made a stab at earning No. 1 in the final qualifying session, held in cooler conditions following a three-hour rain delay and a number of oildowns.
They came up short, posting a 3.851-second pass at 260.06 mph with a damaged engine at the finish line. He set his quickest lap of 3.831/317.27 in the third round today (the third quickest of the round), which followed his Friday laps of 3.856/318.54 (No. 2), and a 3.946/281.42 (No. 6). He earned three bonus qualifying points for his efforts.
“We’ve had one of those weekends where it’s an all-or-nothing-type deal,” he said. “We had a good run to get us in on Friday, then we went for it last night and hurt the car. We had to reel it back in this morning and posted another good run, a solid .83, but it was not enough to move us up in the field where we wanted to be.
“We had to go for it in the last session. Obviously, our teammate Tony Schumacher went for it too and he took No. 1 at the time (Larry Dixon and Antron Brown, in the final pairing took it away with a 3.772 and 3.777, respectively). But we had what I would think would have been low ET of the session in that run. The incremental numbers were really good, but it has to go from A to B and my FRAM guys know that and I know that.
“To be able to shut it off and run an .85 at 260 mph tells you it was on a good run. So, we need to come back tomorrow, reel it back in and start going from A to B.”
McClenathan faces T.J. Zizzo in the opening round of Sunday’s eliminations.
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