Words compiled from team press releases by Kay Burk
Photos by Tim Marshall and Ron Lewis

John Force continued his comeback run by racing to the Funny Car victory Sunday, April 18, at the SummitRacing.com NHRA
Nationals at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. Larry Dixon and Mike Edwards also were winners in Top Fuel and Pro Stock
respectively.

Goodyear released a new tire for the nitro cars, which was used by Funny Car drivers Del Worsham and Ron Capps as
well as Larry Dixon in Top Fuel. Worsham and Dixon were the low qualifiers in their classes.

However, most teams opted to use the D2550 tire, which has been in use for the past two seasons. Both the old and
new tires will be available at the next NHRA event at St. Louis the end of April.

TOP FUEL

In Top Fuel, Dixon claimed his third win of the season and 51st of his career and in the process took over the series points lead by outrunning Cory McClenathan in the final round. Dixon powered his Al-Anabi Racing dragster to a 4.016 at 313.37 to hold off McClenathan’s FRAM dragster, which lost traction near mid-track and finished in 5.113 at 158.41.

“We had a great car all weekend,” said Dixon, who beat Steve Faria, Shawn Langdon and Doug Kalitta in earlier rounds. “The car was unbelievable all hrough qualifying, just very strong. We qualified second and made up a bunch of points on Cory in qualifying. Then, we knew that if we could make it to the final round,
if we beat him we’d get the points lead, and we got both. It’s just a great, great weekend all around for everyone on the Al-Anabi team.”

Cory McClenathan was Top Fuel runner-up and slipped to second in the
NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series class point standings, just one
point behind leader Dixon. This was his 60th career final round and
third of the season.

Qualifying fourth, the driver of the FRAM Top Fuel dragster
enjoyed lane choice throughout the day until the final round,
having dismissed Terry Haddock with a 3.906-second lap
at 312.35 mph in the first round, then his Don
Schumacher Racing teammate Tony Schumacher
with a 3.987/303.64 in the quarterfinal.