Wilkerson qualifies twelfth in Topeka heat

TOPEKA, Friday: It was hot and humid for the opening day of qualifying at the

O’Reilly Summer Nationals Heartland Park Topeka. Funny Car points leader, Tim Wilkerson had a little trouble with his Levi, Ray & Shoup Chevrolet and looks for tomorrow to bring better runs.

On both of his runs today, Wilkerson dropped a cylinder approximately two seconds into the run. In the first session, Wilkerson ran 5.079 at 283.97 mph. and in the second session, he improved but only to a 4.979 at 305.56. This put him in the No. 12 qualifying position at the close of the day.

“The car dropped a cylinder on both runs,” explained Wilkerson, “so I need to figure out what’s going on. I just don’t think I have it tuned up enough, so we’ll work on it. I think my fuel curve is a little off for how hot it is, and the altitude here is not good for our deal. So, we’ll get it fixed up for tomorrow and see if we can get it to run better.”