NHRA
Joliet: Team Mopar Saturday summary
Richie Stevens Jr. piloted the Team Mopar/Valspar Dodge Stratus R/T to four solid passes during Pro Stock qualifying for the Torco Racing Fuels Route 66 NHRA Nationals, ending up No. 5 in the 16-car field. Stevens set his quickest pass in Friday ...
Edited: Jun 10, 2007, 1:15 AM
Copy link
Share on Viber
Richie Stevens Jr. piloted the Team Mopar/Valspar Dodge Stratus R/T to four solid passes during Pro Stock qualifying for the Torco Racing Fuels Route 66 NHRA Nationals, ending up No. 5 in the 16-car field.
Stevens set his quickest pass in Friday night's session, a 6.645-second lap at 206.83 mph. His other three included a 6.669/206.51 in the first round, followed by a 6.660/207.40 and a 6.672/206.61 today.
He will face Greg Stanfield in first round of Sunday's eliminations.
"We ran really good," said Stevens, 10th in the NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series Pro Stock rankings. "I think we are finally getting a handle on the problem we were having with the car in the clutch department. And we made four really good runs during qualifying this weekend. It was probably top 10 on the page every run. That's what we need. We need the consistency to go out here and win rounds, and I think that's what we're knocking on the door with.
"We qualified fifth, which gets us lane choice tomorrow. I don't really think that matters out there. The lanes are pretty equal at this track. They always do a good job here with the track, but it's nice to have lane choice anyway.
"We'll go out there and try to go some rounds tomorrow and try to keep our hopes alive for the top eight (in the Countdown to the Championship). Mark (Ingersoll, crew chief) did a great job. I think we were fifth low for the round just now. Last round we were fourth quickest for the round, so the car's running good and I've been driving pretty decent.
"I'm going to try to buckle down tomorrow and get some good lights (reaction times), and see if we can go some rounds and gain some points. We need to get back in this game. Allen and I are on different sides of the ladder. It would be nice if we can go out there and pull off one of those deals like Summit does and get two blue cars in the final."
Driving the Mopar/J&J Racing Dodge Stratus R/T, Allen Johnson shot to the top of the field in the first qualifying session for the Torco Racing Fuels Route 66 NHRA Nationals and stayed there through the ensuing three rounds, landing in the No. 2 spot.
Johnson first recorded a 6.660-second lap at 207.18 mph, placing him third, then followed that with a 6.626/207.56 in the Friday night attempt, good for No. 2. In today's two rounds, which were also part of the King Demon Crown special event, Johnson registered a 6.658/207.43 and finally a slow 8.213/114.31. In this last pass against Greg Stanfield, he was also eliminated from the King Demon Crown competition.
"We made three great runs in qualifying," said Johnson. "Got the track figured out. Mark (Ingersoll, crew chief) is doing a great job with the J&J Racing Dodge Stratus, and Dad (Roy) has got the tune-up figured out. We're bad to the bone, if we can just get down the race track."
As for the mishap in the last attempt, "Transmission," he said. "There's a thing called dead-heading. It happens about one in every 100,000 runs. It's just a freak deal where all the stars are aligned, and it happened in that run. Just freak bad luck.
"That will never happen hopefully again for another year. Everybody experiences it every now and then and it just happened to happen on that run. We had the best car out here today and we were the one to beat."
Johnson faces Dave Connolly in the first round of Sunday's eliminations.
-credit: mopar/dsr
We want your opinion!
What would you like to see on Motorsport.com?
Take our 5 minute survey.
- The Motorsport.com Team
Read and post comments
Read also :
Share Or Save This Story
Copy link
Share on Viber
Previous article Joliet: Ashley Force Saturday summary
Next article ATS: Nico Verdonck on the Nurburgring summary
Top Comments
There are no comments at the moment. Would you like to write one?
View More & Comment
More from
Richie Stevens Jr.
Enders-Stevens all smiles after 'beating' husband in Indy's Q3
NHRA
NHRA
Indianapolis
Enders-Stevens all smiles after 'beating' husband in Indy's Q3
Enders-Stevens will have company in the Pro Stock field at Indy: Her husband
NHRA
NHRA
Enders-Stevens will have company in the Pro Stock field at Indy: Her husband
Enders-Stevens hopes to write some new history in Englishtown
NHRA
NHRA
Enders-Stevens hopes to write some new history in Englishtown
Latest news
Carson Hocevar posts 18-minute apology video: "I'm the bad guy"
NASCAR Cup
NAS NASCAR Cup
Homestead-Miami
9 h
Carson Hocevar posts 18-minute apology video: "I'm the bad guy"
Timmy Hill secures full-time NASCAR Truck ride for 2027
NASCAR Truck
NSTR NASCAR Truck
Homestead
11 h
Timmy Hill secures full-time NASCAR Truck ride for 2027
Kimi Antonelli admits he questioned himself throughout his rookie campaign
Formula 1
F1 Formula 1
Sao Paulo GP
11 h
Kimi Antonelli admits he questioned himself throughout his rookie campaign
F1 Brazil GP: Friday schedule, weather forecast and how to watch
Formula 1
F1 Formula 1
Sao Paulo GP
12 h
F1 Brazil GP: Friday schedule, weather forecast and how to watch
Subscribe and access Motorsport.com with your ad-blocker.
From Formula 1 to MotoGP we report straight from the paddock because we love our sport, just like you. In order to keep delivering our expert journalism, our website uses advertising. Still, we want to give you the opportunity to enjoy an ad-free and tracker-free website and to continue using your adblocker.
You have 2 options:
- Become a subscriber.
- Disable your adblocker.
Subscribe now Already subscribed? Sign in here
Already disabled your adblocker?
Reload page
Manage Alerts
Subscribe