Tony Bartone- US Nationals Friday Recap

BARTONE AND BOYS SEVENTH AFTER TWO SESSIONS AT INDY

Photo provided by Auto Imagery

Indianapolis, Ind. - The Rick Jackson Racing Top Alcohol Funny Car finds itself in the number seven qualified position after two attacks at the O’Reilly Raceway Park quarter-mile. The qualifying for this marathon event will continue tomorrow afternoon as 23 Alky Floppers will attempt to crack the sixteen-car field at the 55th NHRA Mac Tool’s US Nationals presented by Lucas Oil in Indianapolis, Ind.

The team was pleased to see an improvement from their previous event.

At last week’s Division 5 Lucas Oil Drag Racing Series event in Topeka, Kan., the Jackson Racing Ford Mustang had it share of problems with oil pressure issues. “We found every way to not supply our engine with proper lubrication,” stated Tony Bartone, the driver of Jackson’s Center Pointe Collision Centre sponsored flopper. “We got behind the eight ball per-say and couldn’t catch up during the weekend.” The results were a semi-final loss to Roger Bateman.

The Jackson boys lead by crew chief Steve Boggs brought their Funny Car to the line for a first qualifying session pairing against Chris Foster. Bartone negotiated his mount down the quarter-mile in 5.672-seconds, placing the Center Pointe Ford in the fifth qualifying position. “We are not entirely pleased with this effort, but it is a much better start than last week,” noted Bartone. “The key is to get down the track and steadily improve with each session. We hope to do this for Q-2 later today.”

Bartone would get his wish as the Rick Jackson Racing Alcohol Funny Car headed up to the staging lanes for the second session. Cooler track conditions produced a minor improvement. A 5.650-second elapsed time at only 251 miles per hour will place the team in the seventh qualified spot heading into tomorrow’s third qualifying attempt.

“We steadily improved, but this car is still a bit behind it’s potential,” noted the two-time US Nationals winner Bartone. “I know Stevie and the boys will turn up the wick tomorrow and get this hot rod back to comfortable territory.

The Top Alcohol Funny Car category will hit the track for round 3 of qualifying tomorrow morning.

The Rick Jackson Racing team will also be announcing a new marketing partner in a press release scheduled to be posted on http://www.rickjacksonracing.com tomorrow afternoon after the third round of qualifying.

Stay tuned to http://www.rickjacksonracing.com for updates during the weekend for the 55th US Nationals.


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