Rain Stole Friday’s Second Session — and Left Both Points Leaders Stranded at Pomona
The rain the forecast kept warning about finally did what it threatened to do at the 61st annual In-N-Out Burger NHRA Finals. Friday at In-N-Out Burger Pomona Dragstrip produced just one nitro qualifying session — the second Top Fuel and Funny Car session was canceled due to weather — and when that single session ended, both championship leaders were in trouble.
Top Fuel points leader Shawn Langdon is 14th, after an 8.006 at 87.90 mph. Funny Car points leader Matt Hagan is 11th, at 4.220 at 218.97 mph. And Hagan’s challenger, rookie Jordan Vandergriff, is worse off still: 21st, outside the 16-car field, with no representative run on the board. All three get two more chances today, and after Friday, those two sessions carry the whole championship.
The weather did exactly what this week said it would
Thursday evening’s forecast had Friday at 40 percent rain. Friday morning’s had it at 80 percent. The truth landed in between — enough rain to take the second nitro session, but not the first. Pro Stock and Pro Stock Motorcycle got both of their Friday sessions in. Top Fuel and Funny Car got one.
Today is the rescue day, and the forecast finally cooperates. Weather.com, checked Saturday morning, calls for a high of 71 degrees in Pomona, partly cloudy, with a 0 percent chance of rain during the day and 0 to 1 percent through the qualifying hours. Sunday, eliminations day, is partly cloudy, high 73, 0 percent rain.
Kalitta took the opening — and the points that came with it
Doug Kalitta, the reigning Top Fuel champion chasing his own teammate, made the most of the one session he got. He went 3.677 seconds at 340.39 mph in his Mac Tools dragster, the provisional No. 1 qualifier, which would be his seventh No. 1 of the season.
“I am glad we got one round of qualifying in today because at this last race, you never know,” Kalitta said in NHRA’s Friday report, carried by RACER. “I am still hoping we can pull off a championship. I have been part of a bunch of close ones, and we are just looking to go out there, throw down on every run and we are going to try to get every point we can every round.”
The low qualifier in a session earns four bonus points, and Langdon, 14th, earned none. On Friday’s bonus points alone, Kalitta trimmed Langdon’s lead from 107 points to 103. That still leaves Kalitta needing a near-perfect weekend — he must cut the lead to less than 90 points before eliminations begin, then advance three rounds further than his teammate — but Friday was the first cut, and it came free, on a day Langdon could not answer.
The rest of the Top Fuel sheet tells the same story of a session that rewarded the cars that got down the track. Maddi Gordon is second at 3.679, at a track-record 342.11 mph. Leah Pruett, from Redlands, California, in her final start of the season at her home track, is third at 3.698 at 334.65 mph. Antron Brown is fourth at 3.705.
Hagan’s lead did not move. Todd’s did.
Funny Car’s one session belonged to Ron Capps, the only driver in the 3.80s at 3.894 at 331.53 mph in his NAPA Auto Care Toyota GR Supra. Capps expects that number will not survive today.
“Tomorrow, it is going to be clearer, a little warmer, which will be faster. It will still be cold enough, and the atmospheric conditions are going to be stout, so it is going to be great. That .89 will probably end up being the bottom half of the field,” Capps said in NHRA’s Friday report, carried by RACER. “We are No. 1 right now, but we have to run better for sure tomorrow to stay top half.”
Behind Capps, J.R. Todd is second at 3.911 and Cruz Pedregon third at 3.931. Todd’s second-place run earned him three session bonus points while Hagan, 11th, earned none, so Todd trimmed Hagan’s lead from 104 points to 101. Hagan’s 39-point lead over Vandergriff did not move — neither man scored a bonus point Friday — but Vandergriff’s problem is more urgent than the points: he is 21st and not in the field at all. He has two sessions today to get in, and if he does not, the championship fight ends in qualifying.
Jeff Arend, the home-track story from this week’s preview, is fourth at 3.973 in Jim Dunn Racing’s Moon Beer Charger — his best qualifying position of the weekend so far, in his 264th career Funny Car appearance.
Glenn is one round from a bye, and a bye from the title
Dallas Glenn did in Pro Stock what Kalitta did in Top Fuel, only with both sessions to work with. He ran 6.512 at 208.42 mph in his RAD Torque Systems Chevrolet Camaro for the provisional No. 1 spot, ahead of Matt Latino at 6.516 and Greg Stanfield at 6.523, with Matt Hartford fourth at 6.535.
“We made two really nice runs and so far we have done exactly what we wanted to do. We have gotten our bonus points that we needed. Now, the next major goal for tomorrow is to hold on to that No. 1 spot, make sure nobody takes that away [to maintain a first-round bye],” Glenn said in NHRA’s Friday report, carried by RACER.
With the bonus points he collected Friday, Glenn opened up a three-round advantage over Hartford, according to RACER. If the No. 1 holds through today’s two sessions, Glenn would need only a first-round win on Sunday — with what would be a first-round bye — to clinch his second consecutive Pro Stock championship. “As long as I do my job and stay No. 1, then it will not matter [what anyone else does],” Glenn said.
The real race today is not qualifying. It is the final.
The most important run of Saturday is not a qualifying pass at all. At 1:00 p.m. PT (4:00 p.m. ET) today, during qualifying, Richard Gadson and Gaige Herrera — Vance & Hines teammates, first and second in the Pro Stock Motorcycle championship — finally run the Las Vegas final that wind postponed out of the Las Vegas Nationals.
Herrera led both of Friday’s Pro Stock Motorcycle sessions, running 6.673 at 201.76 mph for the provisional No. 1, ahead of Gadson at 6.713 and Matt Smith at 6.750. He gained two points on Gadson on Friday, according to RACER, so Gadson’s lead is now 53 points, not the 55 the two men arrived with.
That changes the arithmetic for today’s final. A Gadson win in the Vegas final is worth 20 points and would stretch his lead to 73. A Herrera win would cut it to 33 — and Saturday’s Pomona qualifying bonuses could then bring it under 30, setting up a possible winner-take-all meeting on Sunday, when each elimination round is worth 30 points. The 35 and 75 figures in earlier previews were calculated before Friday’s bonus points; the updated figures are 33 and 73.
“It is definitely an ideal start for sure to go out there and run 6.67 on both passes and get the bonus points,” Herrera said in NHRA’s Friday report, carried by RACER. “Mother Nature is going to mess with us this weekend, and it would not be Pomona if we did not have some rain. I feel very good this weekend.”
What today holds
Qualifying resumes Saturday at 11:30 a.m. PT (2:30 p.m. ET) for Top Fuel and Funny Car, with the second session at 2:00 p.m. PT (5:00 p.m. ET). Pro Stock and Pro Stock Motorcycle run at 12:30 and 3:00 p.m. PT (3:30 and 6:00 p.m. ET). The Gadson-Herrera Las Vegas final runs at 1:00 p.m. PT (4:00 p.m. ET), during qualifying.
Eliminations start Sunday at 11:00 a.m. PT (2:00 p.m. ET), with FS1 eliminations coverage at 5:00 p.m. ET.
Friday took a session off both title fights and gave the chasers the only points on offer. Today, in dry weather, Langdon, Hagan and Vandergriff have two sessions to take them back.
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