NHRA: Topeka NHRA Chevy Monday Eliminations Notes
5 October 1999
PRO STOCK TRUCK -- CHEVY S-10 PICKUP -- ELIMINATIONS SCOTT PERIN, NAPA DEVELOPMENT CORP. CHEVY S-10, was eliminated in the semifinal against BOB PANELLA JR., PANELLA MOTORSPORTS CHEVY S-10, when he red-lighted. Panella advances to face LARRY KOPP, SPEEDCO TRUCK LUBES CHEVY S-10, in the final round. Before the U.S. Nationals, where Perin was runnerup, he had not won a round. He now has five round wins in the last two events. PERIN: "We knew we had to make a good light. I didn't feel like it was as red as it actually was. I thought I drove it pretty good. I didn't know until I got down to the end that I had lost. I thought he red-lighted because it looked like my win light was on and it wasn't. I was just so focused on hitting the shift points. We're happy, we're glad we qualified in the top 8, finally. We'll get ready for Memphis. I'd like to qualify in the top 8, we're shooting to get in the top 10 in points. Right now we're 15th. I'm roughly 180 points out of 10th, so we have to do really well." ARE YOU DISAPPOINTED? "A little bit. I know we have to do real well in the semifinals and win an event to get into the top 10. It's a little extra pressure." DEFENDING WINSTON CHAMPIONSHIP LARRY KOPP defeated MIKE COUGHLIN, JEG'S MAIL ORDER CHEVY S-10, in the semifinal. Larry is the Comeback Kid following a dismal '99 season as reigning champion. He was a non-qualifier two times, his lowest qualifying position was a pair of No. 2s early in the year, he's had no final-round appearances, and has only five round wins. He also didn't arrive here until Friday, missing the first two qualifying sessions. He was awaiting the arrival of a new Chevy V8 engine built by Bill "Grumpy" Jenkins. FUNNY CAR -- CAMARO Z28 WHIT BAZEMORE, KENDALL OIL/SUPERWINCH CAMARO Z28, advanced to the semifinals of today's weather-delayed eliminations with a combination of luck and skill. After winning the first round on Sunday against Larry Huff when Huff red-lighted, he faced Frank Pedregon on Monday morning. When Whit's Camaro lost traction at the start, it looked like he would lose the round, but he quickly backpedaled and regained control, while Pedregon slowed, allowing Whit to power by for the victory. The semifinal matchup with Tommy Johnson Jr. saw Bazemore use his best reaction time of the day (.505) to gain a slight advantage at the start,but his chances of reaching his sixth final round of the year disappeared as he again smoked the tires soon after launching." BAZEMORE: "After the first run today against Frank it was clear that our Kendall Camaro was making too much power. I'm sure that Tim (Richards, crew chief) tried to calm it down for the semifinals. The conditions were just stellar today, and we couldn't take enough power out of the car to get it to go down the race track. We still had a lucky race. By all rights, we should have been beaten in the first round, so to get two round wins and make it to the semis showed that we definitely had some good racing luck, andwe'll take whatever we can get. We didn't make or break any ground with Tony (Pedregon, whom Bazemore is chasing for second place). We're going to have to be careful, because we're running out of time. But we'll go to Memphis and keep chipping away. We know the Camaro has the performance, since we ran that .88 on a less-than-perfect run. I felt at the time that there was a lot left in the car. It's there, but we just didn't find it this weekend."