NHRA
Bristol: Morgan Lucas Racing Saturday notes
After testing their limits, Langdon and Lucas ready for race day BRISTOL, Tenn. (May 16) -- Temperatures soared Saturday at Bristol Dragway giving the professional set their first real taste of summertime conditions. In the end, most of them ...
Published: Jun 19, 2009, 7:55 PM
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After testing their limits, Langdon and Lucas ready for race day
BRISTOL, Tenn. (May 16) -- Temperatures soared Saturday at Bristol Dragway giving the professional set their first real taste of summertime conditions. In the end, most of them struggled to make it down Thunder Valley under power, with Top Fuel teammates Shawn Langdon and Morgan Lucas certainly no exception.
Absolutely nothing changed from Friday's cool nighttime session so Langdon and Lucas will enter eliminations as the Nos. 5 and 11 qualifiers, respectively.
Langdon's Lucas Oil/Dixie Choppers dragster was the quickest of the two, running a best of 3.892 at 309.70 mph. He'll open race day against Dom Lagana, who is making his professional debut this weekend. Lagana's best pass showed a 3.995 at 297.02 mph.
"It really got hot out there, hotter than any time we've run this year, and I think that's why you saw so many teams overpowering the track," Langdon said. "Everyone needs to start adjusting to their hot weather tune-ups because there won't be very many cool rounds until the fall.
"With the limitations on testing the NHRA has in place, you have to try things during the race itself, and that's what Stewie (crew chief John Stewart) was doing today. We tried a few different things and some of them look very promising and some didn't work at all.
"We'll be ready for tomorrow. It's crazy, but they're saying it's going to get cool again overnight so we'll see how it turns out. I know Lagana and that group are living the dream and they'll take a shot at us so we need to be ready."
A winner last month in Atlanta, Lucas qualified mid-pack here with a 3.952 at 300.53 mph in his GEICO Powersports/Lucas Oil dragster. That places him opposite Clay Millican, who ran a 3.897 at 307.23 mph.
"If it does get cool like they're saying, that will play right into our hands because our cool weather set-up has been just about perfect the last few races," Lucas said. "Either way, I think it's time to burn up one of the four testing days we're allowed because we need to make sure we're ready for the summer. We're after the championship this year so we need to run strong no matter what the conditions are.
"Clay's a great driver and always cuts good lights. That car is coming around and we'll need to be ready for them if we want to win."
Lucas entered the weekend fifth in the Full Throttle points, while Langdon is seventh.
Sunday's eliminations are scheduled to begin at noon.
-credit: mlr
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