Gainesville: Melanie Troxel final summary

SURPRISING FIRST ROUND FINISH FOR TROXEL

GAINESVILLE, Fla. (March 18) -- Melanie Troxel raced Tony Schumacher in the first round of eliminations at the 38th annual ACDelco Gatornationals at the Gainesville Raceway and unfortunately lost traction on her run to experience the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Top Fuel dragster's second first round loss in the early part of the 2007 NHRA POWERade drag racing season, despite being the runner-up in Phoenix, NHRA's previous National event.

Troxel left the starting line first (.059 - .106) and recorded an elapsed time of 6.497 seconds, 137.33 mph after spinning the tires to Schumacher's time of 4.526 seconds, 311.56 mph.

She is presently tied with David Grubnic for seventh in the NHRA POWERade point standings with 157 and trails points leader, Rod Fuller by 114 points after the completion of three of 23 National events.

Troxel and the Vietnam Veterans dragster will receive their opportunity to regain their championship status in two weeks for the running of the 20th annual O'Reilly Spring Nationals at Houston Raceway Park in Baytown, Texas.

ESPN2 will be showing the final round results of the Gatornationals today at 5 p.m. EDT.

-credit: lor