Sevens has hiccup in E-town second round

DON SCHUMACHER RACING
2005 NHRA POWERade DRAG RACING SERIES
Round 11 of 23
K&N FILTERS SUPERNATIONALS
OLD BRIDGE TOWNSHIP RACEWAY PARK
ENGLISHTOWN, N.J.
Race Dates: June 17-19, 2005

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Judy Stropus, 203-438-0501; cell 203-243-2438;
jstropus@earthlink.net

STEVENS HAS HICCUP IN SECOND ROUND IN E-TOWN

ENGLISHTOWN, N.J. (June 19, 2005) - Richie Stevens Jr.'s hopes of delivering
his dad Richie Sr. a win for a birthday present on Father's Day
disintegrated with a starting-line error in the second round of eliminations
at the K&N Filters SuperNationals in Englishtown, N.J.

The New Orleans native was on a trajectory to his second final round of the
year after defeating his teammate Jeg Coughlin Jr. in the first round with a
career-best elapsed time of 6.669 seconds and a career-best speed of 206.70
mph.

The 26-year-old Stevens had won twice before at Englishtown and was
encouraged by the performance here of the Team Mopar/Valspar HEMI-powered
Dodge Stratus tuned by legendary 10-time Pro Stock champion Bob Glidden. The
No. 3 qualifier may have been just a tad too eager, as he double-clutched at
the starting line against Larry Morgan, which resulted in a .309 reaction
time. Morgan claimed the victory with a 6.719/206.45 (.032 R/T) to Stevens'
losing 6.750/206.01.

"It was definitely driver error," said Stevens. "Nothing to do with anybody
but me. I was ready. I got there, staged and it took a while for the lights
to come down on the tree. I'm not blaming it on that totally, but several
other drivers came up to me and told me pretty much the same thing, that it
was a long light.

"I still should have been ready. I still should have been on top of things.
Larry waited for it, so I can't say that it was anybody else's fault except
mine.

"I'll have to swallow it down. It will take a little while.

"I was hoping to do well. We ran real good the first round. I was thinking
today might be the day (to win his first race for Don Schumacher Racing),
because of how consistently we ran in qualifying and first round. But, leave
it up to me to mess it up.

"That's part of it.

"It was a real good run; that's why I was excited about today. We had lane
choice going into second round and Larry had run four hundredths slower than
us. I pretty much had it in the bag on paper, but like they say, you don't
run the race on paper, you run it on race tracks. It didn't work out to my
benefit today."

Stevens leaves Englishtown sixth in NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series Pro
Stock points, 83 out of fifth place.

Next up are the NHRA Nationals at Gateway International Raceway in Madison,
Ill, just outside of St. Louis, Mo., June 24-26, 2005.

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