SEATTLE, Wash. – This weekend, Doug Kalitta driver of the 8,000-horsepower, “Big Red” Mac Tools Top Fuel dragster, looks to get a breakout win in the 2008 NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series at one of the few venues that he has not visited the winner’s circle during annual running of the Schuck’s Auto Supply NHRA Nationals at Pacific Raceways in Kent, Wash., just a few miles from Seattle.
Kalitta has reached the final round three times in his 11-year career at scenic Pacific Raceways, 2003, 2000, and 1999.
“We’ve had some good runs in Seattle, but we’ve just not been able to go the distance there, ” Kalitta, a 43-year old resident of Ann Arbor, Mich., said. “Our Mac Tools team has been struggling a little lately to get our car to put up the numbers we know we are capable of, but I’m not worried. I have a great team and a great car, and I’m sure we’ll get it figured out. It would be great to breakthrough and get our first win of the season this weekend in Seattle. “
Kalitta is currently in 9th place in POWERade championship points.
Beginning with the previous event in Denver, the NHRA instituted a new racing distance for the nitro-fueled classes of Funny Car and Top Fuel dragster to 1,000 ft., as opposed to the traditional distance of 1,320 ft., or a quarter of a mile, as a temporary safety solution to help the drivers of the world’s quickest and fastest racing safely bring their cars to a stop more efficiently. The unprecedented action is in response to the tragic death of Kalitta Motorsports’ Scott Kalitta, Doug’s cousin, who died in a high-speed Funny Car qualifying accident in Englishtown, N.J., June 21.
Kalitta, unofficially, recorded the quickest 1,000-ft. elapsed time in NHRA history, 3.758 sec., in Joliet, Ill., in 2004.
Since winning the NHRA’s equivalent of Rookie of the Year, the Automobile Club of Southern California’s Road to the Future Award after the 1998 drag racing season, Kalitta has driven his dragster to 30 Top Fuel national event titles, which places him in sixth in career wins for the sport’s quickest and fastest class. In the past five NHRA seasons, Kalitta has solidified his place among the best Top Fuel pilots of all-time. In 2006, he won a career-high five national events in 2006 and led the POWERade points for almost the entire second half of the season. After finishing just 14 points shy of his first NHRA championship, Kalitta garnered his third career runner-up points finish in 2006. He was also points runner-up in 2003 and 2004. In 2007, he won one event – the event held in Richmond, Va.
The Schuck’s Auto Supply NHRA Nationals begins Friday for the nitro-fueled classes with two qualifying sessions. Two more qualifying opportunities take place. The top sixteen qualified cars will race Sunday in final eliminations beginning.
The Schuck’s Auto Supply NHRA Nationals is the 14th event of the 2008 NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series.
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