Brainerd: David Baca Saturday summary

David Baca qualifies No. 5 at Brainerd

BRAINERD, Minn. (August 16, 2003) - Making the best of a hot and sticky track over two days of qualifying, David Baca, driver of the Henkelman & Baca Motorsports American Racing/Waterloo Tool Storage/Skill Clean dragster, qualified No. 5 at the Lucas Oil Nationals.

With consistent runs, Baca's best of four qualifying passes came in Friday's second session, in the cooling Brainerd air. The Brentwood, Calif. driver recorded a pass of 4.709 seconds at 303.98 mph on the Brainerd International Raceway quarter-mile. This is the 10th time this season Baca has qualified in the top half of the field.

Sunday's opening round of eliminations begins at 11 a.m. (CDT - local time). Baca will face Scott Palmer in the opening round. Palmer qualified No. 12 with an elapsed time of 4.861 seconds. The pair have not before in competition.

"We did pretty well all weekend. On that last run we expected a little bit more but I understand we lost a cylinder, although I don't know when. The good news is that run looked just like it did at Sonoma, I think the numbers are close. I'm glad we got that out of our system today and tomorrow we want to go rounds. Every round is critical this late in the season," said Baca.

For television highlights of qualifying, tune to ESPN2 from 10-11 p.m. tonight. With same day, tape-delayed coverage, Sunday's eliminations can be viewed on ESPN (early elimination rounds) from 6-7 p.m. and on ESPN2 (final elimination rounds) from 10 p.m. - 12:30 a.m. Television times are Eastern Daylight Time and subject to change.