Qualified: No. 9 (4.012 E.T. at 317.27 MPH)

The Results:
E1: 4.376 E.T. at 223.50 MPH defeated by Tommy Johnson Jr. 3.964 E.T. at 311.92 MPH

Race Recap:
Two-time world champion Matt Hagan continued his recent trend of running into fellow DSR Hellcat Funny Car racers during the early rounds of eliminations. After qualifying the MOPAR Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat ninth with his second round qualifying run of 4.012 seconds, Hagan was paired against Tommy Johnson Jr. to open eliminations. Both left the starting line with identical .080-reaction times, but Hagan dropped a cylinder early into the run and had to click it off when his machine made a hard move toward the centerline.

Quotable:
“This was a really tough weekend, and it all comes down to qualifying. We just have to have the results on Friday and Saturday to put us in a better position on Sunday. Top-half would have been huge today. We struggled with that left lane and kind of fell victim to it. We are going to test tomorrow and hoping we can make some runs to get ourselves squared away. That’s all we can really do is keep digging. We have a big responsibility to our sponsors in MOPAR, Pennzoil and Sandvik and all the people that make this happen. We are going to have turn things around and start making things happen.”