Denver: Doug Herbert final report

Herbert Goes to Quarter-Finals at Mile-High Nationals

Doug Herbert and the SnaponFranchise.com Top Fuel team advanced to the second round of eliminations Sunday afternoon at the Mile-High Nationals at Bandimere Speedway in Morrison, Colo., the 13th of 24 races in the 2008 NHRA POWERade Series.

Round One:

Herbert, the number seven qualifier, had lane choice versus No. 10 qualifier Brandon Bernstein in the first round of eliminations. Herbert drove down the left-hand lane to victory with a 4.035 second elapsed time versus Bernstein's 5.24 second run. Herbert has now defeated Bernstein in the last two events.

Round Two:

The quarterfinals pitted Herbert and the Snap-on team versus Top Fuel points leader and No. 2 qualifier, Tony Schumacher. Herbert had an excellent reaction time of .034-second at the starting line, but lost traction midway down the new 1,000-foot distance. Schumacher won the round with an ET of 4.04 seconds at 300.96 mph versus Herbert's 4.29 second run at a top speed of 231.40.

"A good weekend overall," said Herbert. "We qualified in the top half of the field, won a round and gained in the points on those in front of us and pulled away from the guys behind us. At this altitude, you have to do everything completely different than you usually do -- so I'm happy we were solid on nearly all of our runs this weekend."

Herbert remains in the eighth position in Top Fuel points, but gained points on sixth-place Brandon Bernstein and seventh-place Hillary Will.

-credit: dhr