Cruz Pedregon Third After Day One

Advance Auto Parts Racing Nitro Funny Car

Pedregon Racing
NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series
50th Annual U.S. Nationals
Friday Qualifying Notes & Quotes

A Great Start for Cruz Pedregon at Indy
Advance Auto Parts Funny Car Races to Third Slot

INDIANAPOLIS (Sept. 3, 2004) ­ Cruz Pedregon made the best of tonightıs
single session of qualifying, placing the Advance Auto Parts Monte Carlo
Nitro Funny Car in the provisional third position for this weekendıs U.S.
Nationals at Indianapolis Raceway Park.

With five sessions instead of the traditional four for the Nationals, the
team had a chance to get a head start on the weekend. Pedregon lapped the
historic quarter mile in 4.844 seconds at 315.93 mph. Two sessions are
slated for both Saturday and Sunday.

³It was a good run,² Pedregon said. ³(Crew Chief) Wes (Cerny) was a little
bit concerned about the track. It rained hard again last night, and he was
concerned about the 200-300 foot area of the track. He backed it off a
little bit and it made a good run.

³It takes a lot of pressure off of us,² Pedregon continued. ³Now, we feel
like weıre on pace for what we want to do. Iım so happy we tested here last
week, and we just had the payoff for our testing. We weıre out here working
and doing the right thing. This is definitely a tougvh field to crack with
more than 25 cars. The key out here is to be smart. When the track is quick,
we need to go quick.

Advance Auto Parts Notebook:

LEFT LANE: Cruz Pedregon was one of the few drivers to actually get down the
left side of the track tonight. The Advance Auto Parts Funny Car driver
talked about the challenge.

³We were also a little concerned about the left side of the track because no
one got down it during the session,² Pedregon said. ³Iım real pleased that
Wes made the right call. It was a little dark out there and the dew was
pretty hairy. I kept it between the lines and it was a good run.²

PedregonRacing.com