Second No. 1 Qualifier Position of the Season for Hagan and 2015 Mopar Dodge Charger R/T;
Don Schumacher Racing Takes Top Three Spots in Qualifying at Las Vegas
Hagan earns his second pole position of the season with No. 1 Qualifier honours for the 16th annual SummitRacing.com NHRA Nationals at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway
Three Don Schumacher Racing 2015 Mopar Dodge Charger Funny Cars atop the eliminations ladder with Hagan, Beckman and Johnson
Hagan’s No.1 seeding and eight bonus points helps him regain lead in Funny Car standings
Allen Johnson and his Magneti Marelli Dodge Dart seeded eighth for Pro Stock eliminations
Las Vegas (Saturday, April 11, 2015) – Don Schumacher Racing’s (DSR) driver Matt Hagan earned his second No.1 Qualifier honour of the season in his Mopar Express Lane Dodge Charger R/T with four very consistent qualifying passes at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway for the SummitRacing.com National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) Nationals event. His DSR teammates Jack Beckman and Tommy Johnson Jr. rounded out the top three spots with their efforts aboard their own 2015 Mopar Dodge Charger R/T Funny Cars.
Hagan was quickest in both Friday qualifying sessions, posting elapsed time passes of 4.067 seconds at 313.88 mile per hours, and then a 4.007 sec/318.02 mph pass that withstood any competition in Saturday’s two sessions to give him the No.1 qualifying position, adding a second pole position to the one earned at Phoenix from which he won the national title in February. He was fourth quickest in the third session with a 4.181/300.33 and then added two more bonus points to his tally with the second quickest run of the final session with 4.075/315.71. Those eight points and his pole position propelled him back into the lead in the Funny Car standings.
The driver of the Mopar Express Lane /Rocky Boots entry contributed the first two of four national title wins that DSR has had with the new 2015 Mopar Dodge Charger R/T since it premiered in this season’s opening event in Pomona following a year of development. But while the team and the new body have been undefeated in the first four events of the NHRA Mello Yellow Drag Racing Series season, Hagan’s last two events both ended early and he’s looking to redeem himself on Sunday.
“My last two races were human error by myself (disqualified after he timed out) and then by making some bad decisions up there (with set-up) but while everyone can makes mistakes, we have a great race car,” Hagan said. “We have a really good shot to come out here tomorrow and do big things. We’re going down both lanes and putting up good numbers for the conditions.”
“The competition is so tight out there,” added Hagan who will see Jeff Arend as his first round opponent. “We just have to be there every Sunday turning on as many win lights as we can, making minimal mistakes and making sure that when you have a car like we have now, you have to capitalize on it because it doesn’t always stay like that. When you have a great racecar you better do something with it. I’ve been to a couple of finals (at Las Vegas) but I’ve never won this race and I’m looking forward to trying to do that tomorrow and have some fun.”
All four DSR entries qualified in the top half of the ladder with Beckman seeded second after posting a 4.014 /315.64 on Friday to line up next to Cruz Pedregon as his first round match-up. As winner of the Four-Wide Nationals in Charlotte two weeks ago, Beckman is hungry for more and echoed Hagan’s comments about having the car to make that happen.
“I am extremely happy,” said the driver of the Infinite Hero Dodge Charger R/T. “We got some bonus points in qualifying. We ended up second, we have a favorable set of match-ups tomorrow and we have a great running hot rod.”
Rounding out the top three in qualifying is Johnson aboard his Make-A-Wish Dodge Charger R/T after posting a 4.020/313.07 pass to meet up with Gary Densham in the opening round of eliminations.
DSR teammate Ron Capps, title winner in March at the Gatornationals, qualified seventh overall with his Friday pass of 4.075/316.15, but also closed out qualifying with a last lap effort of 4.082/308.07 that was third quick in the session to give him a bonus point. Capps will battle Robert Hight in the first round.
Saturday’s Pro Stock qualifying sessions doubled as the annual K&N Horsepower Challenge, the race-within-a-race with a lucrative $50,000 payout. Two-time winner (2008, 2013) Allen Johnson was seeded fourth but encountered tire-shake off his start against Vincent Nobile in the first round to end his hopes of taking the “Magneti Marelli Offered by Mopar” Dodge Dart any further in the Challenge. Nobile went on to face defending K&N Horsepower Challenger champion Erica Enders-Stevens, who scored back-to-back wins and the cash prize.
With the focus back on preparing for Sunday’s elimination rounds, Johnson’s last qualifying lap was a good, clean pass at 6.683/ 207.21 and the seventh quickest run of the session. AJ ended up in the top half of the qualified field on the basis of Friday’s 6.645/208.39 effort to put him eighth on the eliminations ladder where he will see Drew Skillman as his first round opponent.
“It was disappointing to not to battle for another K&N Horsepower challenge win, but we fought a worn out set of tires that we didn’t know were worn out and that bit us the first three runs,” said Johnson. “We put another set on for the last run but then the set up was way conservative. I think we have something to work with and to be able to get after it. We’ve been a little behind the eight ball this weekend, but the positive going into tomorrow is we have lane choice.”
Fellow HEMI®-powered Dodge Dart driver V. Gaines remained 11th overall with his best qualifying run of 6.682/207.91 posted on Friday. He’ll see Shane Gray in the first round. The No.1 qualifier position was retained by Jason Line with a low E.T. of 6.606 at 208.75.