NHRA Monday: WJ's Roller coaster Ride Ends in the Memphis Quarterfinals

Contact: Jon G. Knapp
									TMG Sports Marketing 
									Phone: (704) 662-3121
   										          jgknapp@tmgsports.net

Final Results		
	
WJ's Roller coaster Ride Ends in the Memphis Quarterfinals

Event: O'Reilly Mid-South Nationals
Location:  Memphis Motorsports Park
       Memphis, TN
Day/Date: Monday September 22, 2003

Monday's final eliminations of the O'Reilly Mid-South Nationals proved to be a game of inches for Warren Johnson and the GM Performance Parts Racing team.   Starting from the third position after two solid qualifying runs on Saturday, Johnson opened his pursuit of victory with the quickest pass of eliminations in the first round, a 6.795-second, 202.24 mph blast in defeating Taylor Lastor.

In the second round, Johnson faced veteran Mike Edwards.  Although the two cars left the starting line in tandem, Johnson soon found himself fighting to keep his car headed down track, with the resulting 6.899-second, 201.28 mph pass allowing Edwards, who posted a 6.866-second elapsed time, to gain the narrow victory.

In reviewing the run afterwards, Johnson quickly discovered the source of his difficulties, and found the correction to be an adjustment of less than half an inch.

"We were certainly pleased with our run in the first round.  I think it showed that we were honing in on the set up for the race track, and that our GM Performance Parts Grand Am was a definite threat for the win.  Unfortunately, in the second round, the wheelie bars were set a quarter of an inch too low, which unloaded the car in second gear and shook the tires, and that was it.

"We have some work to do in the short week before next weekend's race in Chicago, including a tire test, but we'll take what we learned here and be ready to roll for the first qualifying session on Friday."



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