Dropped cylinder ended Matt's day in the finals
Race Recap:
Defending event champ Matt Hagan opened race day with a first-round win over Tim Wilkerson. He clocked a 3.908-second E.T. in his chrome Pennzoil Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat Funny Car, the quickest of the round. Next up for the No. 9 qualifier was teammate Tommy Johnson Jr., and Hagan once again paced the field with a winning 3.919 E.T.
In the semifinals, Hagan trailed early but was able to reel in Bob Tasca III with a 3.928 at 323.89-mph run, edging out his foe at the stripe in a close race to advance to his seventh final round of the year and 54th of his career. The two-time Funny Car world champion left first in the final round with a 0.037 reaction time and briefly maintained the lead over J.R. Todd before a dropped cylinder slowed Hagan’s momentum and ended his drive for a fourth win on the season, and 150th Funny Car win for DSR.
Quotable:
“It’s unfortunate that we couldn’t get that win light in the final round. We had such amazing sponsorship support with the folks from Pennzoil, Shell, and Mopar and had so many key clients rooting us on here in Las Vegas. We have the SEMA show this week here in (Las) Vegas and we wanted nothing more than to take the Wally trophy to the Mopar booth to show off with our chrome Pennzoil Funny Car.
"At the end of the day, we went to the final round and it was a good day. That’s just drag racing and sometimes we lose. It wasn’t our day, but we’ll go to Pomona with a strong race car. I’m proud of our guys. They did great all weekend and we were just pressing hard trying to run in the high 80s and the track just wouldn’t hold it.”
Vegas "We got us a good race car to go race with"
Qualified: No. 9
The Competition: No. 8 Tim Wilkerson
The Results:
Q1: 4.022 E.T. at 320.13 MPH
Q2: 4.828 E.T. at 164.11 MPH
Q3: 3.966 E.T. at 324.36 MPH
Q4: 3.949 E.T. at 322.65 MPH
Quotable:
“I feel great man. You know we got us a real race car that’s going down the race track. It has been down both lanes. You know my lights are pretty good other than that last one, I was dead late, I didn’t even want to look at it. Other than that, we got us a good race car to go race with.”
CHARLOTTE II POST-RACE RECAP
Qualified: No. 6 (3.903 E.T. at 325.14 MPH)
The Results:
E1: 3.891 E.T. at 328.62 MPH defeated Shawn Langdon 9.638 E.T. at 78.22 MPH
E2: 3.903 E.T. at 323.58 MPH defeated by Tim Wilkerson 3.910 E.T. at 328.46 MPH
Race Recap:
After qualifying sixth for the NHRA Carolina Nationals, two-time event champion Matt Hagan drew No. 11 qualifier Shawn Langdon in round one. Hagan flexed his Mopar muscle by powering his Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat straight down the groove in 3.891-seconds to take the win over Langdon’s immediate tire smoker.
In the quarterfinals, the Mopar machine ran another solid pass, but Hagan gave up the win when he suffered an uncharacteristic holeshot loss, allowing his opponent Tim Wilkerson to set off the win light with his 3.910 E.T. versus Hagan’s quicker 3.903.
Quotable:
“We definitely got a car that’s going down the race track now. We found a king pin that was seized up in the front A arm, fixed that and the thing is driving like a dream now so that’s a huge thing as far as confidence and everything else goes.
“(Tim) Wilky handed me my ass up there. He had a 0.052 light to my 0.072 light. At the end of the day, it falls on me. We outran him but I didn’t do my job on the starting line. It’s hard to be upset with a 70-something light but it’s one of those things where you’ve got to step it up. It’s just the way it is nowadays. Every round counts, every round matters. At the end of the day, I’m just glad we’ve got our race car back, our tune-up is working out, it’s going down the track again. We’re getting more laps and feeling more confident in what we’re doing. We’re turning a corner, it’s just at the end of the season.”
Next NHRA Event 2018
FC Mello Yello Points
Funny Car (Unofficial)
1. J.R. Todd (2553)
2. Robert Hight (2479)
3. Ron Capps (2388)
4. Tim Wilkerson (2367)
5. Tommy Johnson Jr. (2362)
6. Courtney Force (2324)
7. Matt Hagan (2321)
8. Jack Beckman (2283)
9. John Force (2277)
10. Shawn Langdon (2204)
