Two hours later the call went out again for AA/FC and the teams rolled their cars to the staging lanes. The first pair out were arch-rivals Romine and Hale in Ford Mustangs. Hale had won the first Battle of the Mustangs the previous week at Kansas City. Both drivers bumped their cars into the lights with Romine staging deeper than usual. At the green Romine got a .017 head start and then darted down the track to a 5.889/243.81 win over Hale’s off the pace 6.115/214.89.

Baker faced Bronge in the final pair of the semifinals. Bronge was the heavy favorite based on his 5.93 first round lap and the fact that Baker’s best was just a 6.58. Bronge put a huge holeshot on Baker with a .107 to Baker’s .143 but, unbelievably, Bronge spun the tires hard at 400 feet and was forced to lift and watch Baker cruise by with a 7.063/208.91 that put the affable Baker and his brand new team into their first final round.

The final was anti-climatic as there was no way Baker had a chance unless misfortune once again plagued Romine as it had the previous weekend at KC when an almost new blower belt disintegrated. But that wasn’t the scenario this time as Romine streaked to 5.806/246.93. That was the second quickest pass in series’ history behind the 5.79 that Romine ran at last year’s World Series of Drag Racing at Cordova Dragway Park.

(Dennis Mothershed photo)

Baker’s ‘Vette left with all of the pipes firing, then, as it had all night, the engine dropped a couple of cylinders causing tire shake. Baker lifted and coasted through with an 8.845/99.92.

Romine and his “Man O’ War” teammates came as close as they could to “running the table” at Cedar Falls. The team qualified number one, had low ET of every round, re-set the Series ET record, and scored almost the maximum amount of points available. They also would have had to set the series speed record to accomplish that feat.

Romine’s “Man O’ War” team left the race leading the point chase with 330 points followed by Halladay with 270 and Hale with 267.

The next race in the Series is the World Series of Drag Racing Aug 26-28 at Cordova Dragway Park in Cordova, Ill. As is the custom, that race pays 1.5 points for every point earned, so there are still a lot of cars that could win the 2011 championship of the Mickey Thompson Tires/DRO AA/FC Challenge presented by Victory Performance Tire and Comp Cams.

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