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Matco Tools Top Fuel pilot, Antron Brown has taken his second win in three finals in Denver, defeating Brandon Bernstein, who continues to search for his first win with the MavTV team.
Brown defeated Steve Torrence to get into the final, whilst Bernstein accounted for Australian, Dave Grubnic in the first round. Khalid alBalooshi caused a major upset in the opening round, recording his first round win ever over Tony Schumacher.
Spencer Massey continues to lead the Top Fuel standings, however Brown is now a mere 11 points from him.
FUNNY CAR
Courtney Force assisted team-mate Robert Hight to maintain his points lead when she made the final of Funny Car by accounting for Ron Capps – who’s been on a hot streak aboard the NAPA machine.
Force lined up against Jack Beckman – who earlier eliminated her father, John when he red lighted during the semi-final. Beckman won by the narrowest of margins – a 4.277 second pass to Force’s 4.289.
Aside from Capps, Force had a tough meeting, accounting for Tim Wilkerson and Hight on her way into the Finals.
Beckman was delighted with his victory, but admitted he had some luck fall his way.
“At the end of the day, we took the race car that qualified No. 1 and got it down the racetrack on every single pass,” Beckman said. “We weren’t perfect today — we dropped a hole on our semifinal run and had two people red-light against us — but I like to think that we forced some of the other cars to try to beat us, and that’s why we got the win lights. To win in nitro Funny Car in any one season is hard to do. To already have two at just past the midpoint of the season, I think we put a stamp on it that says this team is going to contend for the rest of the year.”
PRO STOCK CAR
Allen Johnson edged ahead of the Pro Stock standings with his fourth Mile High Nationals win, getting over V Gaines in the final. On the way to the final, Johnson had to push out Greg Anderson and Jason Line.
Gaines beat Kurt Johnson, Larry Morgan and Vincent Nobile on his way to the Final, whilst Erica Enders was a big name casualty from the opening round
Johnson now leads the points standings by a minuscule 19 points over Anderson with Line a further 31 behind.
PRO STOCK BIKE
Eddie Kraewic extended his points lead in Pro Stock Motorcycle by defeating Championship rival Andrew Hines in the final. Hines red lighted, which paved the way for Kraewic to open his points advantage to 44.
Kraewic had to get around LE Tonglet and Hector Arana Jnr on his way to the final, whilst Hines accounted for surprise semi-finalist, Karen Stoffer on his way to the decider.
Kraewic was humble in victory:
“This race shouldn’t have been ours this weekend,” he admitted. “Not that you should always count yourself out, but we were a little down on ourselves as a team, we were struggling on Friday and Saturday. It really sucks when you’re that far behind. For us, we just dug hard and went after it.”
The busy period continues for the NHRA teams with the next Full Throttle Series event being next weekend at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma.
