NHRA Saturday: Down to his last shot, WJ Steps Up to Start Eighth in Madison

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

Final Qualifying Results		

Down to his last shot, WJ Steps Up to Start Eighth in Madison

Event: Eighth annual Sears Craftsman Nationals
Location:  Gateway International Raceway
       Madison, Illinois
Day/Date: Saturday June 26, 2004

Warren Johnson entered the fourth and final qualifying session at the Sears Craftsman Nationals in an unfamiliar and unenviable position, as he was outside the top sixteen required to qualify for Sunday's final eliminations in Madison, IL.  His challenge was complicated even further by Saturday's slightly highly temperatures

Responding as expected, Johnson quickly erased any doubts about his participation on race day by rocketing down the quarter-mile in 6.750-seconds with a top speed of 204.29 mph.  This was the fifth quickest pass among the 33 Pro Stock attempts made in that session, and earned the GM Performance Parts Grand Am driver the eighth starting spot.

"We tried a different approach today that was similar to what we ran here last year, but different from what we had been doing earlier this year.  I know we left a little on the table, because we were slightly conservative with the clutch set-up, trying to ensure that we made it down the track and give ourselves an opportunity to qualify.  As a result, it didn't turn the tire quite as hard on the starting line, which got us off to the left.  If I hadn't taken the scenic route, we would have run a 6.73 or 6.74.

"There were a lot of teams that did not run as well as they did on Friday night, which shows the conditions were not as good tonight.  Realizing that we had not made a successful run down the track on our two previous attempts, we're fortunate to have run as well as we did.  

"We'll take today's results and build on them tomorrow.   Obviously, we will have to read the track to see what we're dealing with, but looking at what we were able to accomplish between the two sessions today, I think this GM Performance Parts team may have something we can capitalize on tomorrow."
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