Capps hangs on to points lead, goes out in Denver opening round

DON SCHUMACHER RACING
2006 NHRA POWERade DRAG RACING SERIES
Round 13 of 23
Mopar Mile-High NHRA Nationals
Bandimere Speedway
Morrison, Colo.
Race Date: July 14-16, 2006

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

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

CAPPS HANGS ON TO POINTS LEAD, OUT IN DENVER OPENING ROUND

MORRISON, Colo. (July 16, 2006) - Ron Capps held on to his points lead in
the NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series Funny Car category today, despite
losing the first round of eliminations to Bob Gilbertson.

Capps and the Brut Dodge Charger R/T Funny Car simply overpowered the track
on the hottest weekend of racing this year, as temperatures rose to over the
century mark. Capps launched first with a .099 reaction time to Gilbertson's
.114 (.000 is perfect), but a loss of traction slowed Capps to a
6.085-second elapsed time at 230.65 mph. Gilbertson took the win with a
5.878/234.09.

When second-in-points John Force was eliminated by Capps' teammate Gary
Scelzi in the second round, Capps was able to maintain his lead and now
leads Force by 26 points.

"Obviously, Denver is a very difficult track to race on," said Capps, who
also receives support from Knoll Gas-Torco Race Fuels. "Most of the drivers
and crew chiefs are challenged by this mile-high track, and we figured we
were safe enough to go down the track today in the high temperature. We had
a cylinder go out yesterday and we tried to keep that from happening again
and basically we had too much power for the track."

As for the points chase, "To be honest with you, it's great to be in the
points lead and there's been a lot of talk lately of the competition between
John Force and us. But, there is just way too much racing left to worry
about the championship right now.

"At the end of the year we are all going to look back at the races we went
out early in and try to do better the next year. That's the reason we did so
well at the beginning of this year. It was important to have those points to
put in your pocket to make up for the races that you might struggle in, and
that's what we've done.

"There is not one team out here that will do well at every race all year
long. We're not going to dwell on our loss today. We'll just put it behind
us and go to the next race. But I would like to thank my teammate Gary
Scelzi for helping us today."

"Probably so," responded crew chief Ed "Ace" McCulloch when asked if this
was the toughest race to tune for. "Denver is in beautiful country. It's OK
to come here and look at the scenery. The race track is a nice facility. The
one thing we can't control is Mother Nature. I'm not making any excuses.
It's the same race track for everybody and some guys got it and some guys
didn't, and we didn't get it.

"Had it been a cooler race track, everybody would've been better, and there
would've been better races. It's Sunday, and at the end of the day somebody
is going to be a winner, and it's not going to be us."

Next up is next weekend's Schuck's NHRA Nationals at Pacific Raceways,
outside of Seattle, Wash., July 21-23.

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