Tony Pedregon and his Nitro Fish Funny Car team are showing positive signs of shucking their early-season slow start in NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series action.
Although he lost in the first round of the Tire Kingdom Gatornationals at Gainesville Raceway, Pedregon believes the team continues to become more competitive. He qualified 11th but dropped his first-round race against Bob Tasca III when the car lost traction off the starting line. Tasca’s time was 4.331 seconds to his 8.339.
“We had a couple of small glitches (at the line), and they really amounted to excessive clutch temperature and the idle was too high,” Pedregon reported.
“And we have some new people in new positions. It’s just going to take a little time.
The team has an extra week to prepare for the next race at Las Vegas (April 1).
“On a positive note,” he continued, “I think we’ve made enough progress that we should be able to put ourselves into a good qualifying position early at Las Vegas. What that will allow us to do is get more runs, which is going to enable us to accumulate data.
“I think we made some progress here. We just need to build on it.”
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