NHRA

Sonoma: Kurt Johnson Friday summary

Sitting Fifth in Sonoma on Friday, KJ Sets his Sights High For Saturday Having battled unseasonably high temperatures during the last two races, Kurt Johnson and the ACDelco Cobalt Racing team welcomed the cooler temperatures at Infineon Raceway ...

Edited: Jul 29, 2006, 7:12 PM

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Sitting Fifth in Sonoma on Friday, KJ Sets his Sights High For Saturday

Having battled unseasonably high temperatures during the last two races, Kurt Johnson and the ACDelco Cobalt Racing team welcomed the cooler temperatures at Infineon Raceway on Friday, with temperatures remaining in the 70's for most of the day. Taking advantage of the improved conditions, the Johnson crew opened their qualifying attempt for the NHRA Nationals in Sonoma, CA with two consistent, quick runs.

On his first attempt on Friday afternoon, KJ posted a fourth-best 6.715-second elapsed time. He then came back in the evening session with a 6.669-second, 206.80 mph run to earn the provisional fifth position midway through the qualifying procedure. Feeling his position in Sunday's field is fairly secure, the second-generation racer will be setting his sights extremely high during his final two attempts on Saturday.

"After opening with a pretty good pass, we made a few changes for tonight and picked up about five hundredths. It was really good in the first sixty feet, running a .984, so now we'll work on being just as strong for the rest of the run. The bottom line is that we went into the night session fourth and came out fifth, which is a pretty good starting point, and we're going to be swinging for the fences tomorrow morning.

"I think our '.66 will keep us in, but we'd like to get the extra points for getting the top spot and setting the (national elapsed time) record. I think it's a realistic goal, because the conditions in the morning session will be a couple hundredths better than they were tonight, but we'll definitely have to pick up about fifteen thousandths to be in the hunt. I believe someone is leaving Sonoma with the record, and we'd certainly like it to be our ACDelco Cobalt."

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