NHRA Friday: Friday Qualifying in Topeka finds WJ's New Car in 12th

 Friday Qualifying in Topeka finds WJ's New Car in 12th

Event: 15th annual NHRA O'Reilly Summer Nationals
Location:  Heartland Park Topeka
       Topeka, KS
Day/Date: Friday May 23, 2003 

Warren Johnson brought a new GM Performance Parts Grand Am to Heartland Park Topeka for the NHRA O'Reilly Summer Nationals.  Despite having limited on-track experience with this particular race car, Johnson felt the potential it had to offer outweighed the lack of tuning data.  

Although his dual qualifying attempts on Friday produced a best effort of 6.860 seconds and a top speed of 201.55 mph, which placed him 12th at the qualifying midpoint, Johnson was nevertheless encouraged by the progress his team made. 

"We were a little conservative on our set-up today, because even though we have a good idea where this car wants to be, we'd rather be conservative than go over the edge.  As a result, we weren't aggressive enough on either run today, and gave up a little bit.  However, I don't think we'll get bumped out, and that's all that matters.

"This new GM Performance Parts Grand Am is definitely smoother in the middle of the track than its predecessor, and we're just as good as anybody in the back half now, where we were giving up three hundredths before.  All we have to do is get it calmed down on the starting line, and we'll be in excellent shape."