John Lombardo Jr.  (Tim Marshall photo)

It was all over at the starting line as Bateman cut an -.008RT red light and the Italians were all smiles on the sidelines, with John Lombardo Jr. picking up the victory with another 5.60 pass, this time 6.641 at 256.04 mph while Bateman ran a decent pass of 5.703, 253.44 mph but it was nullified by the red-light start.

COMPETITION ELIMINATOR

It wasn’t a bad turnout of Comp cars at 15 and they put on their usual great effort. During the qualifying it was hands down the ‘89 Grand Am driven by Div. 7 Champ Mike DePalma turning in outstanding runs of 8.899, 151.03 mph in the I/SM Pontiac. DePalma got defeated in round two when a very game Scott Graham in a C/A Dodge Stratus just flat outran the champ.

Tom Mettler  (James Drew photo)

On the other side of the ladder it was all Bakersfield’s Tom Mettler in his Dodge Dakota PST/A entry. He had to get by both Justin Lamb and then Scott McClay’s record holding C/ED to advance to the final round.  Mettler cut a killer .016 RT to Scott Graham’s OK-but-trailing .062, so it was all Mopar in the final. The Dodge Dakota took the win with a 7.6336/166.88 over a 7.390/184.12.