Championship Drag Racing

ProCare Rx NHRA SuperNationals
Englishtown, NJ
(June 21-24)

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Driver Profile

Hillary Will KB Racing dragster

Englishtown, Sunday: For Hillary Will, driver of the KB Racing LLC-owned, Kalitta Motorsports-managed Top Fuel dragster, she and her team did what they had to do today – go rounds – during eliminations at the 38th annual NHRA ProCare Rx SuperNationals.  Will advanced to the semifinal round before tire smoke (loss of traction) ended her day.

In the opening round, Will downed Bob Vandergriff, Jr. in a match up that saw both cars haze the tires.  Will recovered quickly to take the win light in 4.865 seconds, while Vandergriff tried to hook back up but the engine gave up the battle, putting some oil on the track.  For Will, who was born and raised in Fortuna, Calif., and now lives in Ypsilanti, Mich., it was her fourth career round win over Vandergriff.

In the quarterfinals, Will’s opponent Rod Fuller had lane choice, but lane choice didn’t matter.  Will was out first at the green and never looked back, leading the entire Old Bridge Township Raceway Park quarter-mile.  Will recorded an elapsed time of 4.679 seconds, to 4.748 seconds for Fuller.  Will ran the second best E.T. of the round in the heat of the day, just behind Larry Dixon who she would face in the next round of competition.  He clocked a 6.669 second pass in the quarterfinals.  On paper it should be a feature match up.

After the quarterfinal win, Will expressed her appreciation to her team.  “This (win) is huge,” said Will at the top end of the track.  “Like I’ve always said when times get tough this team never gets down.  They just work harder.  Sometimes I feel bad for the guys but we just work hard.  We needed that (win).   For KB Racing we want to win this thing.”

It wasn’t the semifinal that Will had hoped would propel her to the second final round of her career.  At the hit of the throttle, the two 8000-plus horsepower dragsters left together.  About the 300-foot mark, the day ended for the KB Racing LLC-owned, Kalitta Motorsports-managed dragster; Will lost traction and smoked the big Goodyears, as Dixon raced away to the win light in 4.662 seconds.  Will slowed to a 6.619 seconds.

In the Countdown to the Championship, Will narrowed the gap between her and the No. 8 position to 51 points with seven races left in the first segment of the Countdown.  Through 10 races, Will has now accumulated 421 points.

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