GAINESVILLE, Fla. (March 12) - Morgan Lucas and the GEICO/Lucas Oil Top Fuel team enter this weekend's 44th annual NHRA Gatornationals at Auto Plus Raceway in the of the best ways possible - defending Top Fuel champs.
Last year at the rain delayed Gators, Lucas earned his second of four No. 1 qualifiers and, after action was pushed to Monday, earned his first of three victories on the season. It's the kind of weekend Lucas wouldn't mind repeating, minus the rain delay of course.
"It's really exciting to get back to Gainesville," Lucas said. "The weather report seems like it's going to be similar to last year but if we can skip the delays for the fans, that would be the best-case scenario."
All similarities aside, Lucas said he knows the rest of the field isn't going to roll over because he won the race last year.
"As close as the competition is in Top Fuel, you never know what the outcome is going to be," Lucas said. "You can't let things like being the reigning Gatornationals champ cloud your judgment. You don't want to try too hard and do anything stupid."
Lucas and the GEICO team are also coming off a runner-up finish a few weeks ago in Phoenix that saw him rise to fifth in the Top Fuel standings. He said the team has spent much of the last two weeks working hard in order to capitalize on the early season success.
"I know the GEICO dragster is close to winning after what happened to Phoenix," Lucas said. "We need to get better with our consistency but we've got a car that's capable of doing a lot of damage at this race.
"We tested Monday after Phoenix and learned a lot. When we got home we went through our inventory and got our parts and personnel freshened up for the road trip ahead. After this race the season is going to get more hectic, with the three- and four-in-a-row stretches of races ahead it's easy to get behind on certain aspects of maintenance if you don't plan ahead. We took this opportunity to get ahead to keep that stuff from happening
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Last year at the rain delayed Gators, Lucas earned his second of four No. 1 qualifiers and, after action was pushed to Monday, earned his first of three victories on the season. It's the kind of weekend Lucas wouldn't mind repeating, minus the rain delay of course.
"It's really exciting to get back to Gainesville," Lucas said. "The weather report seems like it's going to be similar to last year but if we can skip the delays for the fans, that would be the best-case scenario."
All similarities aside, Lucas said he knows the rest of the field isn't going to roll over because he won the race last year.
"As close as the competition is in Top Fuel, you never know what the outcome is going to be," Lucas said. "You can't let things like being the reigning Gatornationals champ cloud your judgment. You don't want to try too hard and do anything stupid."
Lucas and the GEICO team are also coming off a runner-up finish a few weeks ago in Phoenix that saw him rise to fifth in the Top Fuel standings. He said the team has spent much of the last two weeks working hard in order to capitalize on the early season success.
"I know the GEICO dragster is close to winning after what happened to Phoenix," Lucas said. "We need to get better with our consistency but we've got a car that's capable of doing a lot of damage at this race.
"We tested Monday after Phoenix and learned a lot. When we got home we went through our inventory and got our parts and personnel freshened up for the road trip ahead. After this race the season is going to get more hectic, with the three- and four-in-a-row stretches of races ahead it's easy to get behind on certain aspects of maintenance if you don't plan ahead. We took this opportunity to get ahead to keep that stuff from happening
More...
