The two days of qualifying for the O’Reilly NHRA Spring Nationals proved to be quite different for Greg Anderson and the Summit Racing team. On Friday, the team struggled to adapt their race car to the Houston Raceway Park surface, requiring they secure their spot in Sunday’s final eliminations during one of Saturday’s twin sessions. This assignment was further complicated by unexpected rains which drenched the track in the morning, postponing all on-track action for several hours.
However, once the opportunity was presented, Anderson and his KB crew took full advantage, opening with the third quickest-time of the session at 6.578-seconds with a top speed of 210.37 mph to place themselves well into the sixteen-car field. Anderson then concluded his qualifying effort on a high note, with his 6.560-second, 211.53 mph pass earning the fifth starting position. Although relatively pleased with the end result, the two-time Houston winner admitted his team might need to revisit their approach to pre-race testing in order to improve on this performance in future events.
“We seem to keep repeating the same scenario every weekend,” said Anderson. “Somehow, we’re not showing up with a great set-up, and we have to find one before the end of the weekend. I don’t know if it’s a by-product of the track where we test being so vastly different from the facilities we go to or not, but it’s definitely something we have to think about.
“When we came here and let the clutch out that first time, we were so far off, we were really shocked. Unfortunately, when that happens, you get so far behind, it sometimes takes all four qualifying runs to even get close. That’s something we definitely need to work on.
“On the positive side, we came back today, made two decent runs with our Summit Racing Pontiac, and put ourselves right back in the thick of things. In each session, we were within a couple hundredths of the top runs, and even though we’re certainly not satisfied with that, we are a lot better than we were last week, so we’ll just keep rubbing on it for tomorrow.
“I certainly don’t anticipate making any major changes before the first round. We’re going to keep our cool and be smart about things, trying to go rounds, picking up the performance on each run. That’s the game plan, and we have a lot of work to do if we want to execute it properly.”
| 
|