Baytown: Rod Fuller Friday summary

FULLER POWERS NEW COLORS OF CATERPILLAR/MUSTANG CAT TO PROVISIONAL NO. 3 POSITION AT HOUSTON

BAYTOWN, Texas (March 30, 2007) -- The tandem of Rod Fuller and crew chief Rob Flynn continued their strong performance in NHRA drag racing's elite category, Top Fuel, Friday at Houston Raceway Park. The four-time NHRA Top Fuel winner sported his new yellow and black colors of Caterpillar/Mustang Cat and powered to the provisional No. 3 qualifying position with a run of 4.533 seconds.

The current POWERade points leader paced the Top Fuel field during the first qualifying session. Fuller used a Flynn tune-up to blister the Houston Raceway Park quarter mile with a crushing run of 4.561 seconds at 317.64 mph. It was the quickest and fastest run of the opening session. Fuller's 4.561-second elapsed time was five hundredths of-a-second quicker than No. 2 qualifier J.R. Todd's 4.61-second burst. For the night cap, the Las Vegas racer bettered his previous run by powering to the third quickest run of the day, 4.533 at 326.56. Fuller sits third in the 16-car order, while Matco Tools teammate Whit Bazemore is the provisional No. 1 qualifier after clocking a run of 4.514 seconds.

"Our first run was stellar," Fuller said. "We had the field covered pretty good. That makes you feel good about yourself. We wanted to be No. 1 tonight, but we're happy with two solid runs. The nighttime session is more for show. We race in the day on Sunday. I feel that we can improve on Saturday, but my goal is to be the fastest during the daytime conditions. It was a good day for our two cars."

Top Fuel qualifying resumes with sessions scheduled for Noon and 3 p.m. (CT) at the ultra quick Houston-area track.

-credit: dpm