WYATT FINDS HIS FOUR IN THE DESERT

After tip-toeing around the first three races of the season veteran Jack Wyatt, who along with John Force is one of the last funny car racers who regularly ran on the long-gone AHRA circuit, not only qualified for his first NHRA national event, but did it with a respectable 4.96 pass to make a stout Fuel Flopper field that had some 25 cars trying for 16 spots.

THANKS, GENE

Gene Wilson may have saved Larry Morgan's deal with Mopar by putting the team's Hemi-powered Dodge Stratus into the Pro Stock field in the #15 spot. Evidently the time the team spent recently flogging their engine program is starting to pay dividends.

MR. GEOFFRION, MR. FORD ON THE LINE FOR YOU

Scott Geoffrion's new NitroFish-backed Ford Escort is a one-of-kind car powered by an equally one-of-kind Ford powerplant built by team owner and former Pro Stock truck racer Bob Panella. The car qualified well and, according to Geoffrion, they are finally getting the folks at Ford's engineering department to call them. Better late than never, huh!

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