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PRO MOD – INDY 2018

September 9, 2018 /

The biggest race in all of drag racing, which two-time world champion Jim Whiteley won in his second of two championship seasons in Top Alcohol Dragster, wasn’t kind to the J&A Service/YNot Racing Pro Mod team this year. Teammate Annie Whiteley, who has reached at least the semifinals of Top Alcohol Funny Car at Indy almost every year in her career, did so again this year, but neither of the YNot Pro Mods made the field – not that they didn’t run hard.

Both Jim Whiteley and son Steven ran well down into the 5.80s, but neither Jim’s ’69 Camaro nor Steven’s late model Camaro was quite fast enough to qualify, which at Indy required a 5.85. At the first stop on the NHRA J&A Service Pro Mod tour since Norwalk in June, Jim missed the cut by a hundredth of a second with a 5.86 at 245 mph and Steven fell short by two-hundredths with a 5.87 at 246. Jim wound up 18th on the final qualifying ladder, Steven 20th.

“We got a little greedy,” Steven admitted. “We just bolted the converter back in the week before the race, and that’s not the easiest way to go. [Trans-brake] button racing is nothing new to me – I’m an old Top Sportsman racer – but when you’re racing all the turbo guys and “Stevie Fast” [Jackson] and all these people who’ve been running one all year, it’s kinda tough. We’ll go back to what we know, finish out the year, and go from there.”

TAFC – INDY 2018

September 3, 2018 /

Three-time Indy runner-up Annie Whiteley padded her already gaudy career stats at the U.S. Nationals with yet another late-round finish at the biggest race of the year in 2018. Whiteley, who reached the final round in 2013, 2015, and 2016, and just missed winning it all in ’15, overcame a rough start to reach the semifinals for the sixth time in seven career Indy starts.

“The first runner-up wasn’t that bad – I mean, who really thinks they’re going to beat [Frank] Manzo anyway?” Whiteley asked. “The next one, I barely lost to Andy Bohl, 5.62 to 5.63, and the last one, against Jonnie Lindberg, I smoked the tires right off the line and he slowed way down from what we’d both been running all day.”

This year, Whiteley’s YNot/J&A Camaro broke and stopped on the track on her first qualifying attempt, coasted to a 7.69 at just 127 mph in Q2 on the second, then ran back-to-back 5.57s in Saturday’s third and fourth qualifying sessions to nail down the No. 3 spot. She trounced returning veteran Bob McCosh in the opening round of eliminations, 5.59 to 5.72, and got a measure of revenge on Bohl for the 2015 final in a classic second-round matchup, 5.601 to his right-there 5.607, before bowing out in the semifinals against eventual runner-up Chris Marshall, 5.49 to 5.61.

“I don’t know what it is about this race,” said Whiteley, who ran 5.44, 5.43, and 5.42 here last year and has a career U.S. Nationals win-loss record of 15-7 (.682). “I think some people might make too big of a deal out of it. I just try to treat it like it’s any other race.”

PSM – INDY 2018

September 3, 2018 /

Turning the seat over to Joey Gladstone at the 64th annual U.S. Nationals, former NHRA Rookie of the Year Cory Reed stood back and watched his teammates perform at the biggest race of the year. Reed, who, as a stone rookie, clinched his spot in the Countdown to the Championship playoffs here in 2016, looked on as Gladstone made the field and Angelle Sampey, the 2000-02 NHRA Pro Stock Motorcycle world champ, bumped in in last-shot qualifying at the last race of the regular season to keep herself in title contention.

Sampey ripped off a clutch 6.94 that nearly vaulted her into the top half of the field, and Gladstone entered eliminations in his Team Liberty debut one spot ahead of her in the No. 10 position after laying down a string of 6.90s. Both were eliminated in the first round, but Reed, who’s suffered through way too many aggravating outings already this year, remains undeterred.

“We still haven’t got it all figured out,” Reed said. “We’ve been locking up the clutch too hard and not keeping the motor freed up enough to drive through it and run like it wants to. We didn’t want to take a bunch of clutch out of it again this time and get too far on the other side of it, and we didn’t.” Facing rookie Mark Paquette in the opening round, Gladstone came out on the wrong end of one of the closest matches of the entire weekend. He and Paquette tore off the line separated by just thousandths of a second, and Gladstone came out on the wrong end of a heartbreaker, 6.968/192 to 6.970/192. They crossed the finish line separated by less than a hundredth of a second. Two pair later, Sampey followed with a similar 6.937/193 that wasn’t quite enough against former world champion Andrew Hines’ 6.880/195.

“We’re getting there,” Reed said, “getting closer and closer all the time. It was actually kind of nice to just be there without all the responsibilities and the stress of racing the bike, trying to get in your zone, and for once just standing back and watching how everybody else was working together. Losing in the first round with both bikes was frustrating because there’s nothing you can do about it, but not riding wasn’t the torture I expected it to be. I’m fine. Both bikes qualified at Indy and things are starting to click.”

 

TAFC – BRAINERD 2018

August 20, 2018 /

Even a cursory glance at the box score would indicate that Annie Whiteley dominated Top Alcohol Funny Car at the Lucas Oil Nationals – winner, No. 1 qualifier, low E.T., and top speed of the meet. A deeper dive into the round-by-round results shows otherwise: just two representative runs – a 5.56 in last-shot qualifying for the pole position and an identical 5.56 in the final round to overwhelm Jay Payne, who lost the blower belt in low gear.

“We go down the track time after time and don’t win,” Whiteley said. “Here, we only make two good runs all weekend and win the race.” A rare trip over the centerline in the second qualifying session left the YNot team seventh of seven in attendance because she had to shut off early in the opening session. In the final session, a dead ignition on fire-up, a broken blower belt on the burnout, or a broken reverser would’ve been disastrous, but she steamed to a 5.562 that held up all weekend for low e.t.

Because of the odd number of entries, qualifying No. 1 at this race meant a bye run first round, but trouble set in again when massive shake in low gear ended in a shut-off 12-second cruise. Whiteley coasted silently across the finish line at 70 mph and advanced straight to the semifinals, where her car veered for the centerline again, this time with opponent Scott McVey well behind her with a blown-up engine.

“We were a little light on the front end, and when I hit that bump the front end bounced and moved me way over by the centerline,” she said. “I wasn’t sure if I crossed it or not, and if he hadn’t blown up he might’ve gotten around me.” (Ironically, one of the few times she’s ever crossed the centerline came against McVey at this same event in 2015.)

“This had to be the strangest, most stressful win ever, other than maybe Louisiana earlier this year [where the first round essentially was the final because only one other car was in attendance],” Whiteley said. “The whole time, you’re just thinking, ‘Don’t screw this up.’ It was bizarre, but I guess it doesn’t matter. We won.”

PSM – BRAINERD 2018

August 20, 2018 /

There’s no getting around it – the Lucas Oil Nationals was a major disappointment for Cory Reed, probably the low point of the former NHRA Rookie of the Year’s young career. Seventeenth is nowhere to be in a 16-bike field – especially when only 18 teams show up.

“I think our motors were hurt when we got here,” Reed said. “Every run, it felt like the bike wasn’t going anywhere.” It wasn’t. Reed, who has run well down into the 6.80s and was getting used to going rounds in eliminations against even the biggest stars of Pro Stock Motorcycle, fell flat with a 7.14 at just 185 mph Friday afternoon, skipped the Friday night session, and missed the all-6-second field Saturday afternoon with back-to-back 7.0s at 191 mph.

With an aggregate best of 7.040/191.35, Team Liberty fell short of the 6.99 bump spot by a half-tenth. “It’s not as bad as it looks,” Reed insisted. “We’ve made progress. We’ve learned things. Ever since Charlotte or Atlanta, it’s looked like we’ve been moving backwards and I guess to a lot of people we have, but a lot of the moves we’ve made have taught us what not to do. And they won’t happen again. I’m OK with everything. It’s not showing up on the race track, I know, but we’re making progress.”

PRO MOD – DENVER 2018

August 12, 2018 /

Unlike last year, neither Jim nor Steven Whiteley made it to the final round of the $100,000-to-win World Series of Pro Mod, but the father-and-son team enjoyed its second-best outing of the season behind only Jim’s victory at the NHRA Spring Nationals in Houston. Key word: enjoyed.

“This is my favorite race of the year,” Jim said of the 2nd annual World Series of Pro Mod at picturesque Bandimere Speedway. “If I could only go to a couple races a year, it would have to be this one and Gainesville. And if I had to pick just one, it would be this one, no doubt about it. It’s just a fun deal all around – the atmosphere, the competition, no E.T.s on the scoreboard in qualifying … everything. There’s just nothing else like it.”

Just as at the inaugural in 2017, the event – billed by promoter Wes Buck of Drag Illustrated as “The Biggest, Richest Pro Mod Race in the History of the Known Universe – attracted the top names in the sport: folk hero “Stevie Fast” Jackson, perennial title contender Danny Rowe, Pro Stock world champion Erica Enders, former national event winner Shane Molinari, cagey veteran Todd Tutterow, and, of course, the Whiteleys’ YNot team. Contested just outside Denver and literally right over the hill from the world-famous Red Rocks Amphitheatre, it was five rounds of brutal competition, and the Colorado-based YNot crew was right in the middle of the fray all night.

The invitation-only affair was open to 32 drivers, but six were unable to attend, leaving 13 head-to-head showdowns in the opening round of eliminations. Both Jim and Steven advanced, Jim over Tutterow and Steven over Justin Jones with a stout 6-flat at 239 mph in the power-robbing mile-high air. Steven, who went all the way to the final last year before dropping a heartbreaker when he was forced to lift, and Jim both bowed out in the second round, but both will be back in 2019. “I wouldn’t miss it,” Jim said. “I’ve been looking forward to this weekend since we left here last year.”

TAFC – SEATTLE 2018

August 6, 2018 /

Perennial Top 5 driver Annie Whiteley, who won three times and reached at least the semifinals six straight times to open the season, fell in the first round for the third time in four races when traction problems set in at the Northwest Nationals. A winner in Belle Rose and Denver on the regional trail and in Charlotte on the national tour, she qualified a season-low sixth in Seattle despite an excellent 5.52, then barely made it to the Christmas Tree in the first round before she had to lift.

After an aborted 9.73 at 90 mph on her first of just two qualifying attempts for this race, Whiteley’s J&A Service/YNot Yenko Camaro tiptoed off the starting line with a relatively tame .970 60-foot time in last-shot qualifying, charged through the middle of the course, flew through the half-track clocks at more than 212 mph, and clocked a 5.52 at just short of 270 mph. It moved her from the last spot in the field to the middle of the pack and set up a tough first-round match with Alaska’s Ray Martin, driver of 2014 world champ Steve Harker’s “International Incident” Camaro.

Whiteley was off like a shot with one of her best reaction times of the season, .048, but was out of it early when Martin, who last year won in his Top Alcohol Funny Car debut just as Whiteley had in her 2012 rookie season, negotiated the quarter-mile with a shake-free 5.57. She tromped back on the throttle and chase but clicked it off in high gear when it was clear that she wouldn’t be getting around Martin and coasted to a disappointing 6.33 at 216 mph. “I have no idea why the car would do something that,” said Whiteley, a past finalist at this event. “It’s not like the guys were trying anything crazy – we qualified in the fast half and had lane choice. It just goes to show that with these cars, you never know.”

PSM – DENVER 2018

July 23, 2018 /

Cory Reed got quicker and faster every time down the track at the Mile-High Nationals and entered the first round solidly in the top half of the field, primed for a long run in eliminations. Then his bike bogged right off the line and Steve Johnson, who’d never beaten him, disappeared into the distance for an easy 7.29-7.41 win.

“I left, and the bike didn’t go anywhere, just kind of went ‘buhhhhh…’ ” Reed lamented. “It took off to the right, really hard. I wasn’t even looking through the windshield anymore to see where I was going. I got on the limiter – the shift light was on for a while as I tried to keep from running into the wall – and I had to double-hit the button to get into 4th gear. No way you’re going to win with a run like that.”

Reed’s disappointment was compounded when every rider he would have faced in the ensuring rounds ran slower than what he’d been running. Qualifying No. 8, as Reed did at this event, almost inevitably leads to a second-round loss to the No. 1 qualifier, but this time No. 1 Eddie Krawiec was upset by the slowest rider in the field, No. 16 Karen Stoffer, and never made it to the second round. “I wouldn’t have had to run 7-teens to win here,” Reed said. “7.20s like we ran Saturday would have been enough. Karen only ran another a 7.34 in the second round [when he would have raced her] and Jerry Savoie only went a 7.28 against her in the semi’s – another ‘gimme’ race. Both guys red-lighted in the final, so no matter what I ran, I would’ve won.”

Until the first-round letdown, Reed’s Team Liberty Buell was improving every time he rolled out from under the tower, from a 7.53/180 to a 7.41/182 to a 7.25/184 to a 7.23/184 in last-shot qualifying that carried him into the top half of the program. “We kinda screwed ourselves on the first two runs, then put in a clutch on Saturday like we ran with Star Racing [in his 2016 Rookie of the Year campaign] and it showed a lot of promise,” Reed said. “Our 60-foot time was better than anyone’s. That’s where we belong – that’s Ken [Johnson’s] specialty – but for some reason, the damn thing bogged again Sunday morning. No idea why it would fall on its face like that, but the more the rounds went on, the more frustrated I got.”

TAFC – NORWALK 2018

June 25, 2018 /

After winning two of her three previous starts and three races overall this season, Annie Whiteley was upset in the first round of the NHRA Nationals in tiny Norwalk, Ohio. As in her only other first-round loss all year, at Topeka, rain played havoc with the schedule, in this case reducing qualifying to a single session. She and other Top Alcohol Funny Car drivers couldn’t have known it at the time, but their opening qualifying runs Friday afternoon would be the only ones they’d get. She charged off the line and sped to a 5.57 at just short of 270 mph for the No. 2 spot on the grid, her third No. 2 in the past four races after opening the season with five No. 1s in a row.

That set up a first-round match with the No. 15 qualifier – only this time, No. 15 wasn’t the normal second-slowest car in the field; it was Chip Beverett and his 5.40-capable Camaro. Beverett may have run just a 5.84 on his lone qualifying attempt, but he picked up three-tenths of a second to a 5.54 in the first round that edged the YNot driver’s 5.52 at 270.64 mph (top speed of the meet).

“The car started creeping on me at the starting line,” said Whiteley, who’s off until the Northwest Nationals in Seattle (Aug. 3-5). “When I brought the motor up, it kind of staged itself. That just kills your concentration – you’re going back down on the pedal, and, naturally, that’s right when the Tree comes on so you’re late.”

PRO MOD – NORWALK 2018

June 25, 2018 /

Steven Whiteley persevered through rain-shortened preliminaries to once again qualify high in the Pro Mod field, as he has every race since he debuted his 5.7-second Camaro, only to bow out early in eliminations. The second-generation racer, who has yet to miss the top half of the field since debuting a new Jerry Haas-built piece last month in Kansas, took the provisional pole with an off-the trailer 5.79 at 251 mph and eventually landed in the No. 6 spot with that time.

Rain stopped the action six different times Saturday and trimmed qualifying from the usual four sessions to just two. In the first round of eliminations early Sunday morning, in just his second run all weekend in the left lane, Whiteley faced nemesis Todd Tutterow, who had upset him from the No. 16 a week earlier in Bristol. Tutterow, as experienced as anyone in the J&A Service Pro Mod Series and a known leaver, cut a near-perfect .005 reaction time, but by then the outcome of this one had already been decided.

“That third pedal makes driving these cars a little harder, doesn’t it?” asked Whiteley, who disqualified himself with a rare foul start. “I knew Todd was good on the Tree, so I was hanging on the pedal with just my big toe like I’ve done a million times before. It came off the clutch and I tried to save it, but I rolled the beams.” Tutterow rattled the tires in low gear, lifted, got back on the gas, and sped to a winning 6.51 at 240 mph while an aggravated Whiteley coasted across the stripe at 68 mph nine seconds later with a shut-off 14.28.

“I double-clutched, and when I got back on the throttle it picked the front end up,” said Whiteley, who’ll have two months to think about it before the tour resumes Labor Day weekend at the biggest race of all, the U.S. Nationals. “I heard him pedal it and thought, ‘Here’s my opportunity.’ Then it was like, ‘Oh, wait, there is no opportunity – I already red-lighted.’ It leaves a pretty sour taste in your mouth, trust me. I don’t think I’ve ever been this mad at myself.”

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