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ROCKINGHAM, post-race: Nitro Funny Car driver Mike Smith endured a rough weekend at the IHRA World Finals at North Carolina's Rockingham Dragway. Mechanical problems limited Smith to just one qualifying attempt and he was unable to break into the 8-car field in the National Tire & Battery Funny Car.
Smith entered the final event of the 2007 IHRA season behind the wheel of the Paul Richards Racing NTB Camaro with plenty of confidence. After a runner-up finish in his Funny Car driving debut at the North American Nationals this past August, the veteran tuner and former Top Fuel winner missed the show at last month's President's Cup Nationals by a scant two-thousandth's of a second..
The team rolled into Rockingham after working overtime in the clutch area to improve their performance. But things started to go wrong before the NTB team ever got a chance to make a qualifying attempt when they encountered problems while warming up the motor prior to the opening round of qualifying Friday evening.
"We had some fuel management problems during the warm up," Smith said. "We got a hold of some bad nitromethane and it ate up one of the bottom end fuel hoses."
Undaunted, Smith and the team made repairs and rolled to the starting line Saturday afternoon to make their first qualifying attempt. The National Tire & Battery Funny Car left the starting line hard but dropped a cylinder early in the run. At the top end the car erupted into flames but Smith expertly brought the car safely to a stop and escaped unharmed.
Smith's 5.417 at 270.10 mph wasn't quick enough to break into the field and the NTB team returned to their pit area to repair the damage and prepare for the last round of qualifying Saturday evening.
"The run started off good to the 60-foot mark," explained Smith, "then it dropped a cylinder but it was still pulling hard. Coming up to the lights it threw the No. 3 rod out of the bottom of the motor and created a pretty good fire. I slide it to a stop in the shutdown area and the IHRA Track Safety team was right on me. They did a great job of quickly putting the fire out and limiting the damage. I want to give them credit for a tremendous effort and thank God for the safety equipment."
Unfortunately, the fire created too much havoc underneath the carbon fiber body for the team to be able to fix everything in time for the final qualifying session and their weekend at Rockingham ended early.
"The fire burnt a lot of lines and wires," added Smith. "We tried to slap things together and put another motor in it but things just weren't right. We're showing the car at a National Tire & Battery picnic down in Florida on Thursday and we couldn't risk going out there and burning up the car. It would have taken a career-best run for me to make the show and everything would have had to have been perfect. So we decided to it was better to be cautious and sit out the last session and prepare the car for our sponsors event."
Mechanical gremlins slow Smith and the NTB team at the IHRA World Finals
ROCKINGHAM, post-race: Nitro Funny Car driver Mike Smith endured a rough weekend at the IHRA World Finals at North Carolina's Rockingham Dragway. Mechanical problems limited Smith to just one qualifying attempt and he was unable to break into the 8-car field in the National Tire & Battery Funny Car.
Smith entered the final event of the 2007 IHRA season behind the wheel of the Paul Richards Racing NTB Camaro with plenty of confidence. After a runner-up finish in his Funny Car driving debut at the North American Nationals this past August, the veteran tuner and former Top Fuel winner missed the show at last month's President's Cup Nationals by a scant two-thousandth's of a second..
The team rolled into Rockingham after working overtime in the clutch area to improve their performance. But things started to go wrong before the NTB team ever got a chance to make a qualifying attempt when they encountered problems while warming up the motor prior to the opening round of qualifying Friday evening.
"We had some fuel management problems during the warm up," Smith said. "We got a hold of some bad nitromethane and it ate up one of the bottom end fuel hoses."
Undaunted, Smith and the team made repairs and rolled to the starting line Saturday afternoon to make their first qualifying attempt. The National Tire & Battery Funny Car left the starting line hard but dropped a cylinder early in the run. At the top end the car erupted into flames but Smith expertly brought the car safely to a stop and escaped unharmed.
Smith's 5.417 at 270.10 mph wasn't quick enough to break into the field and the NTB team returned to their pit area to repair the damage and prepare for the last round of qualifying Saturday evening.
"The run started off good to the 60-foot mark," explained Smith, "then it dropped a cylinder but it was still pulling hard. Coming up to the lights it threw the No. 3 rod out of the bottom of the motor and created a pretty good fire. I slide it to a stop in the shutdown area and the IHRA Track Safety team was right on me. They did a great job of quickly putting the fire out and limiting the damage. I want to give them credit for a tremendous effort and thank God for the safety equipment."
Unfortunately, the fire created too much havoc underneath the carbon fiber body for the team to be able to fix everything in time for the final qualifying session and their weekend at Rockingham ended early.
"The fire burnt a lot of lines and wires," added Smith. "We tried to slap things together and put another motor in it but things just weren't right. We're showing the car at a National Tire & Battery picnic down in Florida on Thursday and we couldn't risk going out there and burning up the car. It would have taken a career-best run for me to make the show and everything would have had to have been perfect. So we decided to it was better to be cautious and sit out the last session and prepare the car for our sponsors event."
