Then came two drivers in new cars: Brian Stewart behind the butterflies of the Tom Hoover tribute ‘Vette raced veteran Joe Haas driving Frank Ousley’s brand new ’72 Plymouth Duster with an 392-inch Donovan built by famed driver/tuner Dale Emery. Haas left four-tenths of a second before Stewart and was able to make his 6.673/193.71 hold up against rookie driver Stewart’s much quicker and faster 6.337/220.26.

The final pair out featured Martin driving his “Chi-town Hustler”  ’73 Charger versus Don Schumacher Racing VP Mike Lewis in the Don Schumacher-backed “Stardust” Cuda owned by Justin Grant. Martin put almost a tenth-and-a-half holeshot on Lewis at the green and ran a 6.473/217 to trailer the “Stardust” car.

An embarrassed Lewis later said that he was having problems seeing the pre-stage and stage beams because of a fogged up visor, a common problem with many drivers had that night at Cordova Dragway Park.

“I reached up to adjust my visor so that I could see and the tree came down at the same time. No excuses, I just screwed up,” he said. When asked about the race he said, “You know what I really like about the DRO AA/FC series is that we really race. You have to qualify for the field and you have to be in race mode to win.”

John Hale’s pit (Don Eckert photo)

The next round of eliminations came 90 minutes later. The Romine, Ousley and Martin teams all had their engines down to the bare block. Ousley’s team put in a rack of pistons in their Donovan 392 when they found one piston burned and most of the others had tightened the ring lans. They also put in a couple of sleeves.

Romine’s crew, led by car chief John Bullard, installed a new rack of pistons and a new clutch pack. The “Chi-town” team replaced some rocker arms and also borrowed and installed new fire bottles after the driver accidently emptied the bottles on the previous run.

In Halladay’s pits the crew didn’t take the heads off of their 500 incher which according to engine builder Jerry Newman uses the heavy duty rotating assembly used in NHRA “big show” engines. A leak-down check showed all cylinders within limits, so the crew  replaced one brake chute, installed a new blower belt and were ready to run.

The first pair out in the semi’s were supposed to be Halladay and Joe Haas but “The Crop Duster” couldn’t make the call when after a preliminary warm-up the engine shut itself off after they fired it for a second time and a faulty ignition shut the engine off.