Robert Hight ended the two day PRO Winter Warm-Up with a thundering, 4.034 seconds at 316.67 mph run, which was the quickest and fastest Funny Car run of testing. Hight and the Auto Club Ford Mustang were also the quickest Funny Car in the first session posting a 4.071 second run at 315.49 mph.
“I know we have at least one more day, but I’m hoping maybe two more days that we can play around. We’re really learning a lot. We’ve got Ron Armstrong here helping us; kind of a new addition to our brain trust and when you’re not tuning a car, you look at things a little differently. He really looked at some things and brought them to Jimmy’s (Prock, Crew Chief) attention and man, it’s fixed this thing, so along with some of the new things that we haven’t run yet, I’m excited,” said Robert Hight. “And no matter what anybody out here tells you, you know, this is still a race. Okay, yeah, there isn’t a trophy and there’s no money, but you still want to beat those guys. Right now pretty much everybody’s done testing and we’re leaving here with low ET (elapsed time, at 4.034) and top speed (316.67 mph) and that goes along way for our confidence moving into Pomona.”
The PRO Winter Warm-Up got off to an exciting start with John Force squaring off with his youngest daughter Courtney Force for the first time. The standing room only crowd at Palm Beach International Raceway was eager to see one of the future stars of the sports race the winningest driver in history. They were not disappointed as both Force’s launched hard but smoked the tires. In a dramatic pedalfest the elder Force got to the finish line first as both Ford Mustangs were on and off the throttle going down the track.
“That was pretty exciting, getting ready to race side by side with her and watching her learn. I was learning too. Her Traxxas Mustang Funny Car and my car, we’re both struggling. We have complete new combinations and some new crew players, but we’ll work it out,” said John Force. “She got some night racing in, more of it, more side by side and that’s experience that she needs. We’re going to keep testing here for the next couple of days. We may even go to Vegas with one or two cars if we don’t get these straightened out.
“Mike Neff and Robert Hight- they were flying. Robert won last night for Auto Club- with an .05 (4.056 ET) and an .03 (4.034 ET) tonight so can’t complain about that.”
“For our sponsors, Castrol, Ford Racing, Mac Tools, BrandSource, Auto Club, and Traxxas, the fans were loving the show tonight. This was quite a show that Pro put on at Palm Beach International Raceway. They (the track) packed them in here. I’m excited about it and I have no complaints. We’ll figure it out and we’ll get ready to take these guys on in Pomona.”
Courtney raced Jack Beckman in the second round of the Winter Warm-Ups without incident as Beckman cruised to the finish line with a 4.096 second run at 305.70 mph while Courtney once again got valuable experience handling some tire smoke early in her run.
Championship contender Mike Neff and the Castrol GTX Ford Mustang took advantage of the hot and cool temperatures today to test a number of different parts and combinations. The driver and tuner gained valuable information that he believes will give his Castrol GTX Ford Mustang the consistency it needs to contend for the championship.
All four JFR Ford Mustangs will continue to test tomorrow and Monday as they prepare for the 52nd annual O’Reilly Auto Parts NHRA Winternationals, February 9-12, 2012 at Auto Club Raceway at Pomona.
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