The Boise Nightfire
Nationals came to a dramatic conclusion on Sunday night and for
the huge crowd in attendance, it was a drag racing experience
that will go down as one of the best in the thirty-three year
history of Firebird's "Signature Event". The
temperatures finally simmered a bit from triple digit highs on
Friday and Saturday, as the day time temps climbed to just over
90-degrees under partly cloudy-hazy skies during the opening
round of eliminations.
Final Order of Qualifying for
Top Fuel
1. Jim Murphy, 5.937 at 247.25
2. Jack Harris, 5.985 at 247.86
3. Bill Dunlap, 6.110 at 221.02
4. Sean Bellemeur, 6.140 at 220.15
5. Scott Mason, 6.215 at 231.24
6. Jason Richey, 6.222 at 233.88
7. Mendy Fry, 6.253 at 231.30
8. Brendan Murray, 6.265 at 213.37
DNQ
9. Lee Jennings, 6.301 at 209.83
10. John Cox, 6.331 at 238.79
11. Howard Haight, 12.218 at 69.68 |
The first qualifying session
was held Friday evening and Murphy and the OSH-WW2 Racing team
got a good baseline on the tune-up.
The final qualifying session
on Saturday night allowed everyone to get more aggressive with
their tune-up and several cars that were on the outside looking
in qualified in the night air. Murphy did them one better ripping
off a stellar 5.937 at 247.25 to land him in the # 1 spot.
First
round found Murphy paired against his old buddy, Brendan Murry.
Steve Wallace Photo
Tim Beebe
makes his final inspection of the engine before Murphy stages.
Steve
Wallace Photo
After the burnouts
it became a moot point when Murray lost fire on the starting
line. Murphy gets a single and clicks early with a 6.19 at just
192.14.
Steve Wallace Photo
Round two pitted
the OSH car against Sean Bellemeur in the Plaza Hotel entry.
According to Murphy, "The car was starting to run like it
did at the end of last year and we had taken the weight off the
front end as it did not appear it was needed (it has been carrying
the front about 40 or 50 feet and just setting it down so nice).
In the race with Bellemeur, the car left great but carried the
wheels at about 3 or 4 inches all the way to the 330 foot mark
and started to move out of the groove (see photos below). I tried
to bring it back but it would not steer as the wheels were off
the ground. Well, as you know the groove is quite narrow at Boise
and as one tire got outside it set the front end down and the
wheels were turned so the car darted and got up on two wheels.
All turned fine but we lost another race we feel we could have
won. The air was getting better every round but, OH WELL that's
racing. We'll try again at Sacramento." JIM
While Murphy
was playing stunt driver, Bellemeur went on to a solid 6.06 @
218.49 win.
Related Link
AA/FD Inc. - Nostalgia Top Fuel Teams |
