Cannon posts strong pass for No. 8 on Rainout Friday at U.S. Nationals

DON SCHUMACHER RACING
NHRA POWERade DRAG RACING SERIES
Round 17 of 23
U.S. NATIONALS
INDIANAPOLIS RACEWAY PARK
Rainout Race Date: Sept. 5-7, 2003

INDIANAPOLIS (Sept. 5, 2003) - Buoyed by a revamped Oakley Funny Car race
team and a productive test session this week at Gateway International
Raceway in Madison, Ill., just outside of St. Louis, Scotty Cannon posted a
strong 4.822/316.60 lap in tonight's third round of U.S. Nationals
qualifying, following last week's rainout of the event. His 4.880/313.07
effort last week wasn't too shabby either.

"We did good. The whole team did good," Cannon said, after qualifying No. 8.
"It wasn't just me. Everybody is just coming together. We're thinking we
made some progress coming into this weekend. We left here during the week
and went to St. Louis and the crew chief on the Yankees (Top Fuel) car has
been helping me and consulting with me. We actually tuned it together, with
the guys. We're taking everybody's input.

"Zippy (Mike Neff, Gary Scelzi's crew chief) has actually given us a little
input on some stuff and bouncing some stuff off of us. I still have the last
say-so," added Cannon, who is also the crew chief. "I don't really like the
title of crew chief, but it's my baby when I pull up there. For once it has
done good.

"It's the first time the Oakley car actually burned itself up and slowed
down to an .82 rather than to something way slower. It was running good
enough to have run a .78, so that's a good thing for us.

"If we get the motor a little bit happier maybe in the early session
tomorrow we will try to run a little quicker."

Two more qualifying sessions are on tap for Saturday, with final
eliminations taking place on Sunday.