Championship Drag Racing

O’Reilly NHRA Spring Nationals
Houston, Texas
(March 28-30)

EVENT HOME
   Event Info
   Tickets
   Event schedule
   Results
   Team Reports
   Audio Broadcast
   Photo Galleries
   Video highlights
   Entry List

Driver Profile

Doug Kalitta Mac Tools dragster

Houston, Sunday: Sunday during eliminations at the annual running of the O’Reilly NHRA Spring Nationals in Baytown, Tex., just a few miles out of the Houston city limits, Doug Kalitta, driver of the “Big Red" Mac Tools Top Fuel dragster, picked up his first and second round-wins of the 2008 NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series in his march to the semifinals in the Lone Star State.

Kalitta, the No. 9 qualifier (4.606 seconds, 317.87 mph), faced his Kalitta Motorsports teammate Hillary Will, the No. 8 qualifier (4.599 sec., 316.45 mph) in the opening round of the 16-car eliminations. Kalitta defeated Will in a great side-by-side lap for both cars, 4.607 sec., 317.19 mph to 4.619 sec., 310.84 mph. In round two, Kalitta and his Mac Tools machine blasted to the finish line in 4.635 seconds at 311.13 mph to get the quarter-final win over Urs Erbacher (4.785 sec., 309.70 mph).

In the semifinals, Kalitta raced against Antron Brown. Kalitta was away from the starting line first (.044 sec., to .056 sec.), but his 4.689-sec., 311.56-mph run was not quite enough to keep Brown from getting the win light in a good race, 4.570 sec., 321.88 mph.

“Making the semifinals is a big, big step for our Mac Tools team,” Kalitta, a 43-year old resident of Ann Arbor, Mich., said. “We’ve been struggling for a while, so this was a really good weekend for our team. I think we’ve turned the corner now, and hopefully you’ll see the Mac Tools car in more and more rounds now.”

With his semi-final showing, Kalitta moves up from 14th to 11th place in 2008 POWERade Top Fuel championship points.

E-mail this article   Print this article