Reading: Cory McClenathan Saturday report

MCCLENATHAN SLOTS INTO NO. 2 IN READING QUALIFYING

MOHNTON, Pa. (Oct. 9, 2010) - In today's final qualifying session for the 26th annual NHRA Nationals at Maple Grove Raceway, Cory McClenathan improved on the No. 1 elapsed time he set on Friday, but was knocked out of first place by NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series Top Fuel class points leader Larry Dixon.

Despite hot ambient temperatures, Dixon pulled out a track-record run (elapsed time and speed) of 3.786 seconds at 322.42 mph. McClenathan, who had conceded No. 1 in today's earlier session to his Don Schumacher Racing teammate Tony Schumacher, answered with a 3.815/381.54, placing him ahead of Schumacher's 3.823/319.14.

"Dixon had a great run," said McClenathan, second in the point standings behind Dixon, with three races remaining in the season. "I looked over at the scoreboard (before his run) and I thought, Oh my God, is it really saying what I think it is? Then I asked Todd (Okuhara, crew chief) at the starting line, How much are we going to push it? He said we can't run that. I said, All right, I'll take that. So, I figured we'd run an .82, .83, and it runs an .81. I'll take that, too. I think that's a pretty stout run.

"We earned a couple more small qualifying bonus points; we ended up with five for qualifying. That's good. We need those extra points as long as Larry keeps going toe-to-toe like that and Tony (third in points) is running that strong. It's just going to come down to Sunday."

McClenathan faces Dominick Lagana in the opening round of Sunday's eliminations.

-source: dsr