Scelzi Loses Close First Round in Denver

DON SCHUMACHER RACING
NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series
Round 13 of 23
MOPAR MILE-HIGH NHRA NATIONALS
Bandimere Speedway
Denver, Colorado
Race Date: July 18-20, 2003


DENVER, Colo. (July 20, 2003) - Oakley Time Bomb Dodge Stratus driver Gary
Scelzi knew he had a major challenge in front of him in the first round of
Funny Car final eliminations at the Mopar Mile-high NHRA Nationals at
Bandimere Speedway. As the No. 16 qualifier, he would face the low
qualifier, Tim Wilkerson. Scelzi took off at the starting lights with a
reaction time of .085 to Wilkerson's .097. It was close, but it was
Willkerson first across the finish line with a 5.102/287.35 pass to Scelzi's
5.130/296.11, by a margin of victory of only .0166 of a second!

The three-time Top Fuel champion, however, was encouraged by the Oakley
Dodge's performance.

"For getting beat, we're pretty happy," said Scelzi, who's advanced to the
second round six times this season in 13 races. "We're using some of the new
clutch stuff. We actually got a little more aggressive with it early, but
when you get behind in qualifying and you don't have that shot to see where
you can go, that's what happens when you have to run the fast guy the first
round. Everything went right for Tim.

"We got the car to not smoke the tires," he added. "It ran 296 mph and
dropped a cylinder down there, which probably cost us the race, but it went
perfectly straight. The motor is perfect, the clutch is still soft on a hot
race track. The race track was 125 degrees, which is probably what we're
going to have in Seattle or Sonoma.

"I'm sure we're not done with this hot weather yet. So, that tells us that
we've got a really good baseline when we go to Seattle now or Sonoma -
either one - so that's going to work. I think the bugaboos are a little bit
behind us now. 

"We've had great luck with superchargers after we made the change to Drazy.
They go several runs, so that's not a problem that we're chasing. We fixed a
lot of the problems that cause us not to be consistent. We went .19 last
night with cylinders dropping, spinning the tires, doing some things. We
learned a lot. Mike Neff (crew chief) and Dan Olson (co-crew chief) got
together this morning early. They looked at all the runs; they compared
everything. They not only looked at the moves they were going to make but
the domino effect - if we make this change, what else can it affect. We
don't want to have any unknowns. Obviously, they did a great job. I am very
happy with Mike and Dan. They work together really well and they're really
putting their heads together. We're tired of getting beat and we're going to
get this thing handled."

Scelzi's Oakley teammate Scotty Cannon was the ultimate team player today
after defeating No. 1 in points Tony Pedregon in the first round, helping
his teammate Whit Bazemore, second in points, carve away at Pedregon's lead
in the NHRA POWErade Drag Racing Series Funny Car standiings. "That's
outstanding," said Scelzi. "Scotty made his car go down the race track -
obviously with a car with a lot less downforce than we have and that was
outstanding."

Scelzi remains 11th in the NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series Funny Car point
standings with 546.