Topeka: Ron Capps Friday summary

Capps Qualifies 12th on Friday at Topeka

TOPEKA, Kan. (May 28, 2004) - Ron Capps qualified his green Skoal RacingSM Chevy Monte Carlo in the No. 12 position Friday after racing to a run of 4.918 seconds at 314.53 mph at Heartland Park Topeka.

Capps raced to a run of 6.271 at 143.34 on his first run of the weekend, before using a Roland Leong tune-up to claim the No. 12 position when his Chevy raced to the 4.918 at 314.53 performance. Leong, who served as Capps' crew chief from May 1997 through the 1999 NHRA season, was named crew chief of the green Skoal Racing Chevy Funny Car this past Tuesday.

"We're going to have to sacrifice a little bit until Roland (Leong) learns what this car likes and doesn't like," Capps said. "We could have hung things out and went for a low 4.80. There's only 16 cars and we had no pressure to qualify, which is a great scenario for Roland. He has a real methodical approach and we're going to take it one run at a time."

Capps, who won at Heartland Park in 1998, hopes to move into the top half of the Funny Car order when qualifying resumes with nitro sessions at 12:30 and 3:30 p.m. (CT) on Saturday.

-www.snakeracing.com