Crooked run costs Coughlin a few spots in early qualifying action

ENGLISHTOWN, N.J. -- Old Bridge Township Raceway Park usually offers competitors two great sessions of qualifying action. The first one comes Friday night under the lights. The second comes Saturday morning before the sun beats on the track for too long.

After a less-than-perfect start to the 39th annual Lucas Oil NHRA SuperNationals, reigning POWERade Pro Stock Jeg Coughlin Jr. will look to the Saturday morning session to make his mark.

Coughlin opened qualifying action Friday afternoon with a competitive 6.654 at 206.43 mph that placed his JEGS.com Chevrolet Cobalt fourth in the field. But when conditions ripened for a big nighttime session, Coughlin and Co. weren't able to capitalize, only improving to a 6.637 at 207.82 mph after getting slightly crooked shortly after his launch.

When the round had ended, eight racers passed Coughlin on the grid, relegating him to 12th place overall. He's still comfortably in the field, but he was hoping for more.

"We are in pretty decent and the car is consistent, so we can't complain too much," he said. "The biggest problem we need to tackle first is the car didn't go straight. When I knocked off that kind of ET that early in the run, I knew it wasn't going to be anything too exciting.

"We thought we would be a low 6.60, but obviously we were a bit off. Overall the track was absolutely killer but the combination of the car not going straight and us missing it the little bit on the tune-up, which we did, left us wanting more."

Saturday's session are scheduled to begin at noon and 2:30 p.m.

"I am looking forward to Saturday and hopefully the conditions will be right for us to improve," said Coughlin, a 52-time national event winner. "We all know Saturday morning can be a great round here so hopefully it holds up for us."