John Coughlin opens 2009 Lucas event with semifinal finish

INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. April 26, 2009: The Team JEGS entries of John and Troy Coughlin Jr. made their 2009 season debuts during this weekend’s opening round of the North Central Division NHRA Lucas Oil Drag Racing Series at O’Reilly Raceway Park in Indianapolis. John unveiled his new Mullis Race Cars dragster with an impressive semifinal finish in the Top Dragster and also posted a round two finish with his JEGS.com Super Stock Cobalt. Third-generation racer Troy Coughlin Jr., began his second season of NHRA competition with a round two finish in the highly competitive Super Comp class.

In Top Dragster qualifying, John was ninth quickest with a 6.79 elapsed time. He won the first three rounds of eliminations before dropping a close race against eventual race winner James Monroe in the semifinals. John also qualified well in Super Stock but lost to Michael Lyons in round two.

“Obviously, it would have been nice to open the season with a win, but anytime you can bring out a brand new race car and make it to the semifinals, you’ve got to be happy about that,” said John. “I’m extremely pleased with the way my new JEGS.com dragster ran this weekend. We’ve got a whole new engine and chassis combination and it ran exactly the way we expected it to. I was also very pleased with the way I was driving, especially since I haven’t had much practice this year. Overall, this was a very encouraging weekend.”

Troy Jr’s first round win of the season was a memorable one as he drove his JEGS.com dragster to a perfect 8.900 run in the opening round of Super Comp eliminations. Troy was primed to make a deep run into eliminations but a mechanical problem ended his day early.

“I was getting ready for the second round and we broke a rocker arm and some pushrods,” said Troy. “We managed to fix it the best way we could, but the engine still had very bad miss. I cut a good light and felt like I could have won the round but we were down on power so I ended up losing the race.

“It was a disappointing way to go out but overall, I’m really happy to be out here racing again,” Troy said. “I got some more seat time which is really important to me right now. It makes a big difference when you are in the car as opposed to having to mentally picture each run, which is what I did during the off-season. I’m still pretty new to this [Super Comp] stuff so I’m trying to get all the practice I can get.”

The JEGS team won’t have to wait long for additional seat time as John and Troy Jr., along with John’s brother Mike, plan to compete in the next North Central Division Lucas Oil Series race in Norwalk, Ohio, May 15-17. The team is expected to field four entries with John once again pulling double duty in Top Dragster and Super Stock, Troy Jr., in Super Comp, and Mike making his first runs of the season in his Mullis Race Cars built Top Dragster entry.