NHRA

Indianapolis: David Wells Saturday wrap up

CLERMONT, Ind. - Tire shake in drag racing can be defined as when the tire tries to overlap itself, many times per second. Violent tireshake can be devastating to a race car, and such was the case for NHRA Federal Mogul Dragster driver David Wells.

Edited: Apr 15, 2002, 11:45 PM

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CLERMONT, Ind. - Tire shake in drag racing can be defined as when the tire tries to overlap itself, many times per second. Violent tireshake can be devastating to a race car, and such was the case for NHRA Federal Mogul Dragster driver David Wells. During today's final qualifying session of this weekend's Mac Tools U.S. Nationals, Wells encountered tireshake so severe that it broke his wing in half. Wells was forced to abort the run.

"We got pretty aggressive with the thing with the way the track was yesterday," said the LeMars, Iowa, resident. "The track was pretty good today, but we just got after it too hard. It got the wheelspeed up too fast, and it shook real hard and broke the wing."

Wells cites that the severe tireshake is what made him decide to shut it off, potentially preventing Wells attempting to drive the car without the downforce of the wing.

"I just shut it off because I knew we were in the field," commented Wells. "The wheelspeed was so high, it had the car off the ground. I felt it do that, and just shut it off. I knew we weren't going to go faster, so I just shut it off."

After the final session, Wells ended up in the tenth position. In tomorrow morning's first round, he will face No. 7 qualifier Brandon Henkelman.

-Plain Vanilla Racing

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