Phoenix and Pomona Blog!

March 3, 2011

Hey all! It's Taylor doing a little blog action! Been kind of crazy since we got home from our awesome roadtrip… sorry I am a little late! Wow…where do I even begin? We started our 2011 season out in Phoenix and what a great start it was! We tested the car on Thursday to "work out the off-season bugs" and fought the weather all weekend! While I was fighting off that vicious stomach flu that everyone seems to be getting, the boys (and Shirleen :-D) did an awesome job! They had a qualifying run on Friday and ran a 5.314 which put us #2 qualifier. After sitting around the rest of the weekend in the rain, they finally got the race off on Monday and finished it! After winning first round, we had a bye in the second and ran a 5.284 for low pass of the weekend! Going into the final we knew we had a tough competitor. We never take Whiteley lightly. Thankfully, luck was on our side and we won the race with a 5.331! What an amazing way to start the year! Unfortunately, I was not there to celebrate with everyone because of school, but I know everyone was ecstatic! Onto Pomona we went! Believe it or not the weather was worse there! There was hail, wind, heavy rain, and it was freezing! It was bizarre! We all had to whip out our heavy coats and gloves! They managed to get the race off on Sunday and it even warmed up a little bit! We started the day with a 5.281 to finish #4 in qualifying. We had Johnny Ahten in round one and ran a 5.243 at 273MPH!! That is the new record for fastest ET for a blown alcohol dragster!!!! I think we jumped up and down after that one like we had just won the race! What an amazing feeling! In round two, we followed up with a 5.268 against Copeland and on we went to the semis! We had Duane third round which we knew was going to be a tough one. Dana had that thing hyped up all weekend! We did run a 5.256 but unfortunately, Shawn "jumped the gun" a little bit and went red. Funny thing is Shawn doesn’t go red very often but one of the only other times he has gone red before was against Duane a couple years ago in Tucson! He must have our number :-) Shawn was pretty bummed but it just wasn’t our day! After talking to him, he said the sun was in his eyes…he doesn’t want to use that as an excuse by any means but it was just that time of the day in Pomona where the sun is about to go down and it is in the right spot…oh well though! It is what it is and he is just ready to get to Vegas! Congrats to Duane, Dana, and the gang for an awesome weekend! They deserve it! We decided to go to one of our favorite restaurants in Pomona that night and have a delicious meal and drinks! Whenever we go to Mora we always ask for Art…he does such a fabulous job of making the meals right in front of you! Even though we lost in the semifinals, we really cant say enough about the last two weeks. We won our first race, set a new record, learning a lot about the car, and most importantly, had a lot of fun! Hopefully this happy trend can continue the rest of the year! We have Vegas coming up which is one of our favorite races of the year! The boys are busy busy already in the shop since we have been home. Shawn was even up at 6:30am the other morning! Lots to do this month but we cannot wait to see everyone again at the end of March! Lets hope the weather turns out a little better this time! See you all in Vegas!!!