Pro Stock rookie Carlson misses field in St. Louis

DON SCHUMACHER RACING
2006 NHRA POWERade DRAG RACING SERIES
Round 12 of 23
O'Reilly NHRA Midwest Nationals
Gateway International Raceway
Madison, Ill.
Race Date: June 23-25, 2006

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

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

PRO STOCK ROOKIE CARLSON MISSES THE FIELD IN ST. LOUIS

MADISON, Ill. (June 24, 2006) - Pro Stock rookie Shaun Carlson was
hoping to be racing against his peers this Sunday in the O'Reilly Midwest
NHRA Nationals at Gateway International Raceway, but a broken spark plug may
have cost him that chance in the final qualifying session. None of his three
earlier passes were quick enough to place him in the field, so the rare
parts breakage at that time was unfortunate.

Carlson, who drives the Team Mopar/SRT Dodge Stratus for Don Schumacher
Racing, thought his 6.779-second pass at 202.06 mph in that final session
was going to be stronger, but noticed a loss of power at the top end of
the quarter-mile. "It felt nice, the front end didn't carry too much and it
went straight off the launch. I was actually getting excited in the car
thinking, This is it, this is it. But, I put it in high gear and it seemed
like the car labored a little bit," said the Southern California native. "I
was pulling off the track and the officials were motioning towards me to
turn the engine over, so at that point I thought I might be on fire with the
headers. Sure enough, the left-side headers were on fire pretty good.

"That obviously threw up a red flag with something with the engine.
When we got back to the pit we found the No. 3 spark plug was missing
all of the porcelain. That explains our low speed, and it probably cost us a
chance of getting in," he said.

Carlson's best pass of the weekend came Friday night, when he ran a
6.777-second elapsed-time at 203.52 mph. His two other passes resulted
in a 6.812/203.82 on Friday, and a  6.816/203.37 in Saturday's first
session.

Crew chief and engine builder David Nickens is eager to get the engine
back to his shop in Conroe, Texas, for a closer look. "No. 3 is one of
the cylinders that is real bad about leaking water," he said. "If it's
getting water in there, then it will cause that to happen. It's just
something that we'll have to look at. We have an engine in Texas that just
got done that is supposed to be a little better, so we'll get it to Denver
for the test and go from there."

The entire Don Schumacher Racing Pro Stock team is heading straight to
Bandimere Speedway in Morrison, Colo., for testing next week. "It's going to
be awesome to get a lot of runs in at the track. Obviously the Mopar
Mile-High NHRA Nationals are a big deal for us, so going there early to
test will give us a grasp for what we need to do for the race," Carlson
offered.

Following a two-weekend break, Carlson will next compete at the Mopar
Mile-High NHRA Nationals at Bandimere Speedway (Denver), July 14-16.

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