Worsham Has Simple Goals For Reading Race (1 Viewer)

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WORSHAM HAS SIMPLE GOALS FOR READING RACE

READING, Penn. (September 11, 2006) -- Drag racing is an incredibly complicated endeavor, despite the fact the basic principle of a side-by-side acceleration contest seems simple enough. Once you factor in the highest of high-tech machinery, hardware, and software, along with some of the most advanced chassis construction and aerodynamic work in the world, not to mention the sheer stress of exploding from zero to 300 mph in about 4-seconds, the overall complexity of the sport is impossible to miss.

Del Worsham, driver of the Checker, Schuck's, Kragen Monte Carlo Funny Car, knows all about the technology and brain power involved. He not only drives his car, he also helps build it and tune it, but his mission for this weekend's Toyo Tires Nationals at Maple Grove Raceway is as simple as it comes. A) Get qualified. B) Win round one. Anything else, like advancing to the final, or winning the race, can't happen unless A and B are accomplished.

"We're coming to Reading after doing something that seems incomprehensible to me, even though I just lived through it," Worsham said. "We've missed the cut at two races in a row, including Indy, and we have a lot to prove to ourselves and a lot of other people right now. To be honest, I'm not even thinking of 'Item B' yet, I'm just thinking of getting out there on Friday and putting the red CSK car in the show.

"I've answered the questions about our new car, and our new tuning approaches, so many times it all sounds rehearsed now, but the truth is we have a new car and it's very fast. Conditions at Reading can be very good, and when they are people can run all-time numbers, so I'm eager to get out there and race. Had we not had some parts breakage in Indy, I think we'd be coming to Reading with a new career best on our stats page, and who knows what would have happened in eliminations, but that's all hypothetical because it didn't happen. The goal this weekend is to do something real, and make it be a good thing."

Worsham's mention of parts breakage referred to his well-documented run on Friday night in Indianapolis, during which his incremental numbers to beyond half-track were quicker than any run he's ever made. A sheared blower pulley near 1,000-feet ended the run, however, and Worsham went on to miss the Indy race field by 5-thousandths of a second.

"The final result at Indy was horrible, and it looks and feels like a big black mark on my record, but I know better than to let it get me down," Worsham said. "We had a home-run lap going, but lost it, and then we made one of the best laps in the class during the final session, compared to everyone else, but we just missed the 16th spot by a hair. We're going to come right out of the trailer in Reading and go for it. We might as well, because we have a fast car and we plan to show that to people."

As Worsham prepared to depart for eastern Pennsylvania, the thought occurred to him that 2006 may be the last time he, and his NHRA colleagues, will again experience the emotional link between Reading and 9/11. In 2001, Worsham and his crew were preparing to pull out of their shop in a caravan of transporters and SUVs, heading for Maple Grove Raceway, when word of the 9/11 attacks came through. The next few days were spent in a fog of disbelief and confusion, and the Reading event was postponed. In 2007, the NHRA POWERade schedule will be revised in a number of ways, including the swap of the Reading and Memphis race dates on the tour. That move was made in an attempt to avoid the oppressive August weather in Memphis, but it also moves the Reading race away from the 9/11 weekend for the first time since the attacks occurred in 2001.

"I just thought of that today, because of all the 5-year anniversary stuff that's on TV," Worsham said. "Every year since 9/11, we've come back to Reading and it's been kind of automatic to think back and remember all of that. The race in Reading and the memory of the attacks are kind of intertwined for all of us. We were ready to leave, literally ready to pull out of the shop, when it happened. It's always been kind of appropriate to go back to Reading at this time of year, and next year it won't be that way.

"Of course, getting us out of Memphis in mid-August is a good thing no matter what, so I'm not complaining at all. It will just be weird, next year, to go to Reading then, instead of right around September 11th. And, we don't know what the weather in Pennsylvania will be like in August, so I think we should try to get the most out of this year's race, while we can."

Doing that, getting the most out of this year's race, takes us right back to the basic elemental building blocks of Del Worsham's weekend. A) Get qualified. B) Win round one. Then, and only then, will Worsham even consider the final piece: C) Win race.
 
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