Scelzi Bounced by Force at Gateway (NHRA)

DON SCHUMACHER RACING
NHRA POWERade DRAG RACING SERIES
ROUND 12 OF 23
SEARS CRAFTSMAN NHRA NATIONALS
GATEWAY INTERNATIONAL RACEWAY
MADISON, ILL.
RACE DATE: JUNE 27-29, 2003

MADISON, Ill. (June 29, 2003) - Gary Scelzi knew he had a tough first round
against John Force today in his Oakley Time Bomb Dodge Stratus R/T. He did
his job at the Christmas Tree, nailing it with a .035 reaction time to
Force's .065, but lost a cylinder at 700 feet, allowing Force to take the
win by only a .0340 (of a second) margin with a 5.128/300.20 to Scelzi's
5.192/286.50.

Scelzi dropped to 10th in the POWERade Drag Racing Series Funny Car point
standings, with 515 points.

"In that run against Force it did pretty much everything that we wanted to
do," the three-time Top Fuel champion said. "We were a little scared at the
hit of the throttle hoping it wouldn't smoke the tires, so we were probably
a little conservative there. It ended up dropping a hole (cylinder) about
700 feet and that's where our speed went. Normally the Oakley Dodge runs
300-some miles an hour and it was way off because of the dropped cylinder.
John didn't get by me until the finish line.

"We didn't smoke the tires, we just didn't have enough," he added, "but I
feel really good where we're headed right now, because the stuff we had
wasn't going to work. To go to the next level, we're going to have to have
these new parts we've been waiting for. We're going to have all the new
stuff by Denver and there's a possibility that we could test in Indy
(Indianapolis Raceway Park) this next week, so I'm thinking by Sonoma you're
going to see a whole new Oakley car that you're not going to want to park
next to. 

"I felt that after yesterday's testing with the stuff we put on there. I
still feel that today. I don't normally talk like this, but I feel like good
things are coming and it's just around the corner."