Halsey defeated current points leader Kenny Lang in the first round, Steve Salvadore in the quarterfinals and Jason Hamstra in the semifinals to advance to the final round.

“Mike Castellana and that entire team work very hard and they’re good at what they do,” he said. “I think they had a motor that was a little less than perfect because they hurt it a little bit in the semifinals. And he cut a good light on me. He was way out in front of me…I saw a lot of that maroon car for a long time.”

Laurie Cannister  (Joe McHugh photo)

Most Alcohol Funny Car drivers have seen a lot of Laurie Cannister’s Kalbones ’99 Camaro for a long time this season. Cannister has been dominant in the class this year, and her victory over Paul Noakes in the final round at US 131 Motorsports Park marked her fifth national event victory in seven tries this season.

Cannister coasted to the finish line after Noakes lit the red light by .162 of a second.

“It’s incredible because we’ve been trying to figure the car out because there’s something wrong with it,” Cannister said. “It’s been a bug-fogger all weekend and we’re thrilled we were able to get this win.”

While Cannister has been dominating the rounds of eliminations this season, recently her qualifying efforts have been less than stellar. She wants to turn that around. She qualified in the bottom half of the field in Martin, ending up #5 on the ladder, before turning up the heat in eliminations.

“That’s happened at the last couple of races, we’ve struggled in qualifying,” she said. “We had some kind of gremlin and ended up changing engines for today. For some reason this engine liked the track a little better. I don’t know how to explain it.”

Jeff Dobbins  (Steve Embling photo)

Jeff Dobbins (Wilmington, N.C.) has seemingly righted the ship after a second-round red-light in Grand Bend two weeks ago cost him his points lead. Frank Gugliotta won the Ironman in Grand Bend and entered US 131 Motorsports Park as the points leader. While a red-light cost Dobbins the points lead in Canada, one gave it back to him in Michigan. Pete Berner, who had the quickest car all weekend, jumped the gun in the final round to hand the win to Dobbins.

Berner out-performed Dobbins in the final, clocking a 6.383 to Dobbins’ 6.387, but his -.021 red-light start rendered his performance advantage useless.

“I saw it when I went by the tree. I knew he red-lighted, but we wanted to make another good run,” Dobbins said. “That made it eight good runs this weekend so we were pretty happy with how the weekend turned out.”

Dobbins historically has not done well at US 131 Motorsports Park, so he was pleased he was able to get that monkey off his back.

“We had never done really well here,” he said. “We had done well at the other Michigan track (Milan Dragway) but this was our first final round here. In fact this was our first semifinal here, so we’re happy with how things turned out this weekend.”

FINAL ROUNDS

Nitro Funny Car: Andy Kelley, Chevy Camaro, 5.544, 263.20, def. Paul Lee, Camaro, 6.556, 144.43.

Top Fuel: Spencer Massey, 4.741, 312.57, def. Terry McMillen, 11.957, 82.72.

Pro Modified: Jim Halsey, Chevy Camaro, 6.088, 235.64, def. Mike Castellana, Pontiac Firebird, 6.124, 229.12.

Alcohol Funny Car: Laurie Cannister, Chevy Camaro, 9.899, 86.66, def. Paul Noakes, Dodge Avenger, foul.

Pro Stock: Jeff Dobbins, Ford Escort, 6.387, 220.26, def. Pete Berner, Pontiac GXP, foul.