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Commerce: Warren Johnson Saturday summary

WJ Powers to No. 1 Starting Spot in Atlanta Warren Johnson put together four extremely quick and consistent runs at Atlanta Dragway to place his GM Performance Parts Pontiac in the No. 1 qualifying position at the 25th annual Summit Racing ...

Published: May 15, 2005, 12:42 AM

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WJ Powers to No. 1 Starting Spot in Atlanta

Warren Johnson put together four extremely quick and consistent runs at Atlanta Dragway to place his GM Performance Parts Pontiac in the No. 1 qualifying position at the 25th annual Summit Racing Equipment Southern Nationals. It was the 133rd "pole" position for the six-time NHRA Pro Stock champion, third of 2005 and tenth in twenty-five starts at the Georgia quarter-mile.

Starting with a class-leading 6.778-second pass on Friday, WJ was out of the top position only once throughout qualifying, when Ron Krisher's 6.757-second attempt on Friday evening edged the Sugar Hill, GA resident by one thousandth of a second. However, "The Professor" came back on Saturday morning to blast through the quarter-mile in 6.749-seconds at 204.54 mph to reset both ends of the track record and cement his place atop the Pro Stock field.

"We have quite a few people in the stands cheering for us with the shop being only a half hour away, so we didn't want to disappoint them. You always want to run faster, but in the grand scheme of things, it wasn't a bad effort by the entire GM Performance Parts Pontiac team. We made four solid runs, one of which was good enough to make us the No. 1 qualifier.

"Of course, there is always room for improvement, so we'll keep pecking away, but we're obviously getting better at it. But we're certainly pleased with our performance so far."

"The forecast is calling for cooler temperatures tomorrow, which will make the conditions closer to those we tested under last week, when I ran 6.68, so we would certainly be comfortable in that situation. In any case, we'll make the best of what is given to us and see if we can take the trophy home tomorrow night."

Some quick facts on Warren Johnson and the GM Performance Parts Racing team following their No. 1 qualifying performance in Atlanta:

-j2r-

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