Championship Drag Racing

ACDelco Las Vegas NHRA Nationals
Las Vegas, Nev.
(October 30-November 2)

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Cory McClenathan Rapisarda Racing

Las Vegas, Sunday: Cory McClenathan drove the FRAM Top Fuel dragster to a quarterfinal finish today at the eighth annual Las Vegas NHRA Nationals at the Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. It was the sixth time McClenathan has advanced to the quarterfinals in the 2008 NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series.
 
The No. 5 qualifier kicked off eliminations by defeating No. 12 qualifier Morgan Lucas with an elapsed time of 3.859 seconds at 310.63 mph to Lucas’ 3.967/299.13. The quarterfinals featured a match-up between McClenathan and Larry Dixon. Dixon got the jump off the starting line, which he held to the finish, taking the win with a 3.827/311.99 to McClenathan’s 3.841/314.39, his quickest run of the weekend.
 
“We’re better than a second-round team,” said McClenathan, who remained fourth in the Countdown to 1 point standings. “We should be going to the semis and finals at this point. The FRAM car just wasn’t on this weekend. We just had one solid run that got us qualified in a good spot. It seems like when we don’t make a good run on our first qualifying attempt that it throws us off for the rest of the weekend.

"I think Larry Dixon took quite a while staging up there and it’s something I’m going to have to talk to him about on my own. When somebody takes a long time to stage it seems like a very long time when you’re in a fuel car. I don’t know if that threw me off on my light. He had a great light and I had a crappy one, my worst all weekend, even during qualifying.
 
“We’ve let the points get away from us. We’re not going to be able to finish one and two in the points with the DSR cars (Tony Schumacher claimed his sixth Top Fuel championship this weekend) unless we get our stuff together. Everybody is worried too much about what’s going on at the end of the season, including myself, so I just need to go to Pomona and do my job and not worry about anything else.”

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