NHRA

Sonoma: Rod Fuller Saturday summary

Fuller the toast of Saturday's qualifying action SONOMA, Calif. (July 29) -- Entering the final day of qualifying outside the field of 16 cars that will race on Sunday, "Hot Rod" Fuller and his David Powers/Valvoline Top Fuel dragster team came ...

Published: Jul 30, 2006, 10:04 PM

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Fuller the toast of Saturday's qualifying action

SONOMA, Calif. (July 29) -- Entering the final day of qualifying outside the field of 16 cars that will race on Sunday, "Hot Rod" Fuller and his David Powers/Valvoline Top Fuel dragster team came alive Saturday and powered to the No. 4 spot with the second quickest pass of the day. The pass helped Fuller quickly become a favorite to win the Fram-Autolite Nationals.

Conditions were near perfect for Fuller to put himself solidly in the field for Sunday's final eliminations. The Lee Beard-tuned machine roared down the quarter-mile in 4.569-seconds at 326.40 mph. Sunday's first-round match-up pits Fuller against Doug Herbert for the second time this season. On the way to his first victory of the 2006 season in Phoenix, Fuller sent Herbert packing in the first round.

"It really doesn't matter who we're up against first on Sunday," Fuller said. "The most important thing is that we win and that's exactly what we plan to do.

"We got a little behind the curve Friday. The weather conditions were so good Friday night [crew chief Lee] Beard felt we could make a run in the 4.4-second range but we gave it a little too much power and shook the tires. I think we put everybody on notice this afternoon though with low E.T. of the final session.

The last event of the famed Western Swing, the Fram-Autolite Nationals, is held at one of the most popular tracks on tour, Infineon Raceway. Nestled among the hills of Northern California's vaunted wine country, the track has also been known to yield low E.T.'s and big mph, and records have fallen this weekend in every professional category.

-dpm

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