Gainesville: Tony Pedregon Friday summary

Gainesville, Fla., March 19, 2004 -- Defending Funny Car champion Tony Pedregon sits sixth after two rounds of qualifying for the NHRA Gatornationals at Gainesville Raceway.

The Quaker State Chevrolet Camaro, tuned by Dickie Venables ran an elapsed time of 5.075 seconds at 269.29 mph in the first session to earn a spot in the top half of the field.

"With the warm temperatures the set ups on these Funny Cars can be tricky," said Pedregon. But we were able to get the car down the track in that first session and got a lot of data to work with. Tomorrow we're going to work on getting the car to be consistent and go for the pole."

"This weekend Quaker State is having their first hospitality event of the year, and we're having a lot of fun with them. They are a great group of people and I'm glad they are here experiencing the weekend."

The final two rounds of qualifying are scheduled for Saturday, March 20, at 12:00 p.m. and 3:30 p.m. Final eliminations will be on Sunday, March 21, beginning at 11 a.m.

Qualifying coverage of the NHRA Gatornationals can be seen on March 21st from 2:30 a.m. - 4:30 a.m. on ESPN2. Final eliminations can be seen on March 22nd from 11:30 p.m. - 1:30 a.m. on ESPN2.

-pr-