After Jack Beckman’s unfortunate crash last night,  there are 14 entries left in the 16-car Nitro Funny Car class, which means that once eliminations begin this afternoon both myself and Krabill will get uncontested “bye” runs into the 2nd round.

Stay tuned for more news from Cowtown, cyber-cats and kittens.

Here’s the first news from Funny Car Fever in Sacramento: Last night on a cold, slippery and green track,  we were able to claim the provisional #2 position on the 16-car Nitro Funny Car ladder. By virtue of posting a quarter-mile elapsed time of 6.63 seconds, we ended up slated behind Kris Krabill, who claimed the #1 spot  with a 6-flat.

This was our first pass with Smoky Alleman tuning McCain’s Bomb Squad. His tune-up is based on tweaks to ideas that tuner/consultant Roland Leong came up with at the March Meet and it seems to be paying off, especially considering that I shut off the engine at 1000 feet into the run (as corroborated by our 177-mph top end speed, in contrast to Krabill’s stout 242-mph clocking.)

Qualifying was marred by a  scary crash, involving “Fast Jack” Beckman, last week’s Funny Car winner at NHRA’s Atlanta drag race, and a driver who came to Sacrament to moonlight in a vintage-style Funny Car. Unfortunately, Jack bounced off athe guardwall and turned upside down in Lee Paul Jenning’s American Revolution Camaro.

I was strapped in McCain’s Bomb Squad Duster, waiting our turn to run when the crash happened. I didn’t see it; I could only hear it. Net, net: Beckman is okay; the race car not so much.

More qualifying today. Eliminations later this afternoon. Stay tuned.