NHRA

Phoenix: Cruz Pedregon final summary

Cruz Pedregon Comes Up A Little Short CHANDLER, Ariz. (Feb. 27, 2005) -- Cruz Pedregon, driver of the Advance Auto Parts Monte Carlo Nitro Funny Car, was narrowly edged at the top end during his first round match in this weekend's NHRA National ...

Edited: Mar 1, 2005, 1:47 PM

Copy link

Share on Viber

Add as a preferred source

Cruz Pedregon Comes Up A Little Short

CHANDLER, Ariz. (Feb. 27, 2005) -- Cruz Pedregon, driver of the Advance Auto Parts Monte Carlo Nitro Funny Car, was narrowly edged at the top end during his first round match in this weekend's NHRA National Event at Firebird International Raceway.

Pedregon lapped the quarter mile in 4.861-seconds at 310.98 mph, just falling short of Phil Burkart's 4.854-second pass at 316.15 mph. Pedregon talked about his day.

"(Crew chief) Wes (Cerny) made the right calls on the set up," Pedregon said. "It was a little softer (the clutch) than we wanted -- after we looked at the numbers. But we only made one of our four qualifying runs -- even though that one, was a good one.

"Our goal now is to get our percentages a little more consistent down the track," Pedregon continued. "We didn't want to smoke the tires and we felt we ran as good as we cold have without going over center. It just came up a little short. The guy in the other lane had a great reaction time and we got beat at both ends. It hurts for a little bit, but when you've been doing this for as long as I have, you have to look at what we did right and know that we have one of the top-flight cars out here. We qualified in the top half of the field for a second-straight race."

Pedregon also commented what the team wants to accomplish heading to the next event in Gainesville, Fla.

"We're going to try to be more consistent in our qualifying, so that we have that confidence going into race day," Pedregon said. "In drag racing, each session is its own qualifying challenge. We would like to have the top three or four elapsed times in every round. Every time you go up to the starting line, it's a different time a day with a different track temperature. We weren't among the top cars this weekend. I'm confident we'll get this thing back to where it needs to be."

-PedregonRacing.com-

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

Share Or Save This Story

Copy link

Share on Viber

Previous article Phoenix: Tommy Johnson Jr final summary

Next article Phoenix: Kalitta Motorsports final summary

Top Comments

There are no comments at the moment. Would you like to write one?

View More & Comment

Latest news

Max Verstappen on GTWC Europe debut: “We’re here to win”

GT World Challenge Europe Endurance

WCEE GT World Challenge Europe Endurance 6 h

Max Verstappen on GTWC Europe debut: “We’re here to win”

How to watch NASCAR at Phoenix II: Weekend schedule, start time, entry list, TV

NASCAR Cup

NAS NASCAR Cup

Phoenix II

6 h

How to watch NASCAR at Phoenix II: Weekend schedule, start time, entry list, TV

Ryan Ellis signs multi-year NASCAR O'Reilly deal with Alpha Prime Racing

NASCAR O'Reilly

NOAP NASCAR O'Reilly

Phoenix II

6 h

Ryan Ellis signs multi-year NASCAR O'Reilly deal with Alpha Prime Racing

Ayao Komatsu: Rafael Camara chosen for F1 2027 seat on speed, not Ferrari links

Formula 1

F1 Formula 1

Singapore GP

13 h

Ayao Komatsu: Rafael Camara chosen for F1 2027 seat on speed, not Ferrari links

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