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On a day that seemed far removed from the actual race it was part of, Del Worsham finally got on the track to attempt the improbable on Wednesday, but violent tire shake ended his bid to win the Toyo Tires Nationals from the No. 1 qualifying spot. After waiting through days of rain and fog, the anticlimactic finish left Worsham both drained and disappointed.
At nearly noon on Wednesday, after a full morning of track work by the unparalleled NHRA Safety Safari, Worsham and Pedregon lined up as the first pair of Funny Cars in the semi-finals, after they watched a slew of sportsman cars take to the track. Despite the rain and the humidity, the track was in impeccable shape, or as Worsham saw things, it as actually too good for what his car had to offer.
"It's just a shame, but the truth is that track was unbelievable, and we just couldn't get off the line without shaking," Worsham said. "We got a lot of rain, but the rubber at the starting line hung in there, and after they prepped the track today it was so tight you could barely walk on it. We knew shake would be an issue, because a lot of people shook back on Monday and this track felt even tighter than it did then.
But, we also didn't want to give the lap away by jumping all over the tune-up and smoking the tires right at the hit. If you shake, you can usually pedal your way out of it and give yourself a chance, but if you blow them off at the starting line, you're pretty much dead in the water.
"So, we put what we thought was a good tune-up in it, definitely stepping on it some compared to Monday, but that was the most severe and violent tire shake I've ever experienced, and I've been driving long enough to have ridden through a lot of it. It shook so hard it broke the cap off one of the magnetos, so when I did pedal it the car was probably, at that point, running on one mag. I mean it was gigantic, it felt just like the tires were square, and the reason for that is we didn't quite have enough pop at the hit and with the track that tight, the tires couldn't get out of their own way."
Pedregon was the only one of the four Funny Car drivers left in the event to make a clean pass without tire shake. His 4.789 was a thing of beauty, and a good indicator of how his crew chief, Dickie Venables, had tuned the car.
"I'll give credit to Dickie and his guys right now, because that was great run they made," Worsham said. "They obviously went for it, and knew they were going to be on the edge, but it worked and they crushed us. I was at the top end, so I didn't see the other pair, but the guys told me both (John) Force and (Tim) Wilkerson shook at the hit during their race."
In the end, after qualifying No. 1 and making a serious run at the final Countdown berth, Worsham came up 38 points shy of landing in the playoffs. The long delay until Wednesday was a challenge shared by all, but the Checker, Schuck's, Kragen driver felt the weather did more to hurt his chances than any other factor.
"On Monday, when we got the first two rounds in, I felt like it was our day," he said. "We came in No. 1, we had a great deal of momentum, and we were totally dialed-in to what the track could handle and what it wanted. I really felt like we could go out there and outrun everyone, and that the car would go right down the track all day long.
"Two days later, it was like all that stuff was ancient history. Qualifying at the top seemed like something from another race altogether, actually. And we came out here today, basically, as four teams taking an educated guess at what was really a new track. You couldn't rely much on the data from rounds one and two, because it was a different day and the traction was different. Heck, on Monday I was way more worried about some bald spots at the starting line, thinking they might be the biggest hurdle to get by. Today, it was kind of like unloading the car at some strange new place and rolling the dice.
Our momentum was really gone, and we didn't find a way to get it back."
Looking back over the "regular season" Worsham was quick to point out that nothing was lost in Reading.
"We didn't miss the Countdown because we failed to win the race in Reading," he said. "We missed it in Pomona and Phoenix, where we didn't qualify, and we missed it in the month of June, when we didn't win a round. It's not hard to look back over 17 races and see way more than two rounds that got away. It's all a learning experience, just like this whole season has been. Now we'll stick around here and test for a day or two, and then we have a match race in Cordova, Ill. this Saturday. After that, it's the Mac Tools U.S. Nationals in Indy. We'll go there with the intention of messing up the first race for the eight Countdown teams, because we're going there to win."
There was no Mike Eruzione slapshot, no Michael Jordan buzzer-beater, no Doug Flutie "Hail Mary". No miracle finish at all, just a No. 1 qualifying spot and a solid semi-final result. It's still enough to build on for the rest of 2007.
NO MAPLE GROVE MIRACLE FOR WORSHAM
On a day that seemed far removed from the actual race it was part of, Del Worsham finally got on the track to attempt the improbable on Wednesday, but violent tire shake ended his bid to win the Toyo Tires Nationals from the No. 1 qualifying spot. After waiting through days of rain and fog, the anticlimactic finish left Worsham both drained and disappointed.
At nearly noon on Wednesday, after a full morning of track work by the unparalleled NHRA Safety Safari, Worsham and Pedregon lined up as the first pair of Funny Cars in the semi-finals, after they watched a slew of sportsman cars take to the track. Despite the rain and the humidity, the track was in impeccable shape, or as Worsham saw things, it as actually too good for what his car had to offer.
"It's just a shame, but the truth is that track was unbelievable, and we just couldn't get off the line without shaking," Worsham said. "We got a lot of rain, but the rubber at the starting line hung in there, and after they prepped the track today it was so tight you could barely walk on it. We knew shake would be an issue, because a lot of people shook back on Monday and this track felt even tighter than it did then.
But, we also didn't want to give the lap away by jumping all over the tune-up and smoking the tires right at the hit. If you shake, you can usually pedal your way out of it and give yourself a chance, but if you blow them off at the starting line, you're pretty much dead in the water.
"So, we put what we thought was a good tune-up in it, definitely stepping on it some compared to Monday, but that was the most severe and violent tire shake I've ever experienced, and I've been driving long enough to have ridden through a lot of it. It shook so hard it broke the cap off one of the magnetos, so when I did pedal it the car was probably, at that point, running on one mag. I mean it was gigantic, it felt just like the tires were square, and the reason for that is we didn't quite have enough pop at the hit and with the track that tight, the tires couldn't get out of their own way."
Pedregon was the only one of the four Funny Car drivers left in the event to make a clean pass without tire shake. His 4.789 was a thing of beauty, and a good indicator of how his crew chief, Dickie Venables, had tuned the car.
"I'll give credit to Dickie and his guys right now, because that was great run they made," Worsham said. "They obviously went for it, and knew they were going to be on the edge, but it worked and they crushed us. I was at the top end, so I didn't see the other pair, but the guys told me both (John) Force and (Tim) Wilkerson shook at the hit during their race."
In the end, after qualifying No. 1 and making a serious run at the final Countdown berth, Worsham came up 38 points shy of landing in the playoffs. The long delay until Wednesday was a challenge shared by all, but the Checker, Schuck's, Kragen driver felt the weather did more to hurt his chances than any other factor.
"On Monday, when we got the first two rounds in, I felt like it was our day," he said. "We came in No. 1, we had a great deal of momentum, and we were totally dialed-in to what the track could handle and what it wanted. I really felt like we could go out there and outrun everyone, and that the car would go right down the track all day long.
"Two days later, it was like all that stuff was ancient history. Qualifying at the top seemed like something from another race altogether, actually. And we came out here today, basically, as four teams taking an educated guess at what was really a new track. You couldn't rely much on the data from rounds one and two, because it was a different day and the traction was different. Heck, on Monday I was way more worried about some bald spots at the starting line, thinking they might be the biggest hurdle to get by. Today, it was kind of like unloading the car at some strange new place and rolling the dice.
Our momentum was really gone, and we didn't find a way to get it back."
Looking back over the "regular season" Worsham was quick to point out that nothing was lost in Reading.
"We didn't miss the Countdown because we failed to win the race in Reading," he said. "We missed it in Pomona and Phoenix, where we didn't qualify, and we missed it in the month of June, when we didn't win a round. It's not hard to look back over 17 races and see way more than two rounds that got away. It's all a learning experience, just like this whole season has been. Now we'll stick around here and test for a day or two, and then we have a match race in Cordova, Ill. this Saturday. After that, it's the Mac Tools U.S. Nationals in Indy. We'll go there with the intention of messing up the first race for the eight Countdown teams, because we're going there to win."
There was no Mike Eruzione slapshot, no Michael Jordan buzzer-beater, no Doug Flutie "Hail Mary". No miracle finish at all, just a No. 1 qualifying spot and a solid semi-final result. It's still enough to build on for the rest of 2007.
