NHRA

Reading: Jack Beckman Saturday notes

BECKMAN GRABS HIGHEST SPOT OF YEAR, NO. 3, IN READING QUALIFYING MOHNTON, Pa. (Aug. 22, 2009) - Jack Beckman grabbed his highest qualifying position of the year today, No. 3, in the rain-shortened qualifying rounds for the 25th annual NHRA ...

Published: Oct 2, 2009, 4:22 PM

Copy link

Share on Viber

Add as a preferred source

BECKMAN GRABS HIGHEST SPOT OF YEAR, NO. 3, IN READING QUALIFYING

MOHNTON, Pa. (Aug. 22, 2009) - Jack Beckman grabbed his highest qualifying position of the year today, No. 3, in the rain-shortened qualifying rounds for the 25th annual NHRA Nationals at Maple Grove Raceway, outside of Reading, Pa.

Only two qualifying sessions (of four) were completed between rain delays and cleaning up water seeping through the track surface, and Beckman and the Valvoline/Mail Terminal Services Dodge Funny Car team made the most of it. Beckman came out strong in the only round on Friday, with a 4.180-second pass at 296.83 mph, good for No. 10 at the time.

In today's only qualifying run, Beckman improved handily with a 4.134/297.68, catapulting him to No. 3. He will face his former Don Schumacher Racing teammate Jerry Toliver in the first round of Sunday's eliminations.

"This is where running good off the trailer makes all the difference in the world," said Beckman, safely in the Countdown to 1 playoffs for the top 10 in points, which begin after this event and the next one in Indianapolis.

"We were comfortably in the field on Friday, so we could afford to step on it a little bit today. We were two thousandths (of a second) away from the No. 2 spot. That's the best we've been all year, so that's cool.

"We're going to start out at the top, we're going to get a few more points for being No. 3, we'll have lane choice and, in theory, you get a more favorable pairing, but they're all tough on Sundays.

"I'm excited. I think that, in the last three runs that we did in Brainerd (Minn., last Sunday) and the two here, the car's done everything that we've told it to do, and that had been the missing ingredient from what we had last year.

"It just wasn't quite as predictable. I think now we're back in that zone where this car is predictable and now it's going to start getting quicker every run."

-credit: 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

Share Or Save This Story

Copy link

Share on Viber

Previous article Reading: Ron Capps Saturday notes

Next article Reading: First-round pairings

Top Comments

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

View More & Comment

Latest news

Lights, Camara, action: How Haas picked F1's latest rookie for 2027

Formula 1

Singapore GP

Lights, Camara, action: How Haas picked F1's latest rookie for 2027

WRC’s new champion Elfyn Evans celebrates title with Wales show run

WRC

WRC WRC 6 min

WRC’s new champion Elfyn Evans celebrates title with Wales show run

Who will win this year’s ultimate F1 dream ticket? You decide…

Sponsored

Sponsored 52 min

Who will win this year’s ultimate F1 dream ticket? You decide…

Ferrari promotes F2 racer to F1 reserve driver role

Formula 1

F1 Formula 1

Singapore GP

1 h

Ferrari promotes F2 racer to F1 reserve driver role

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