DENVER—The temperature was hot and so was the racing at the Mopar Mile-High Nationals at Bandimere Speedway. Funny Car point leader, Tim Wilkerson is qualified No. 5 at the close of the first day of qualifying and is looking for his Levi, Ray & Shoup Chevrolet Impala SS to improve in the cooler temperatures in race.
Wilkerson wasn’t sure what to expect today with the hot temperatures, the high Denver altitude and the new 1,000 foot racing distance. But Wilkerson showed that none of the factors that were in play today were a stumbling block. On his first pass, he encountered a slight fuel problem and only ran 4.391 at 282.13 mph. Then on the evening pass, Wilkerson improved and posted a 4.250 at 281.07 mph.
“I think the day went pretty well, really,” said Wilkerson. “On our first run we had a malfunction of our slide control which shuts our fuel off which richens the motor. So, that’s why it only went 4.39. I had figured that it would have gone a little faster than that and when it didn’t, I was a little baffled until I figured out why. So, on the next run I really couldn’t tune it up quite as much as I thought I would because I didn’t have the data from the first run that I needed. But all in all I’m pretty happy with today. We ended up fifth and only four hundredths behind the fast guy. Our motor looks nice and we have more for them tomorrow. If the track holds up, you’ll see us swinging hard at it and you should see us run a 20.”
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