Memphis: Doug Herbert Saturday notes

Herbert Takes Fifth Spot in Memphis

Racing at the O'Reilly NHRA Mid-South Nationals from the Memphis Motorsports Park this weekend, Doug Herbert has qualified the SnaponFranchise.com dragster in the No. 5 position for Sunday's eliminations.

During Friday night's qualifying session the dragster ran its second quickest elapsed time since the NHRA shortened racing for nitro cars to 1,000 feet. This race marks the sixth time in the past seven races that Herbert and the Snap-on team have qualified in the top half of the field.

Herbert, the 1999 winner at Memphis Motorsports Park, also qualified fifth for this race last year. During that event he went all the way to the finals but had to settle for the runner-up spot.

This weekend marks the halfway point of the Countdown to 1 as it is the third of six events in the playoffs. Herbert is still eighth in the Top Fuel point standings.

For Round 1 of eliminations on Sunday morning, Herbert will go against the No. 12 qualifier Clay Millican. The two have faced each other only once this season, which took place at Indianapolis and resulted in Herbert getting the win.

"When we went up against Clay at Indy a few weeks ago we were able to beat him so I'm just hoping for the same result. We had a good car in qualifying and we made good runs all weekend. We definitely have a car that's competitive so I think we have a shot at winning tomorrow."

-credit: dhr