Top Fuel Ace Reaches No. 39; Scelzi, Coughlin Win On Strange Weekend

By Susan Wade
NSSN Correspondent
JOLIET, Ill. — It didn’t matter to Larry Dixon that he tied Kenny Bernstein for second place on the National Hot Rod Ass’n’s all-time victories list for the Top Fuel class with 39 — or that he’s 13 away from No. 1 Joe Amato.
All that mattered Sunday at Route 66 Raceway was that his long, 38-race drought was over.
Dixon hadn’t won since the U.S. Nationals at Indianapolis on Labor Day 2005. But he defeated Rod Fuller in the final round of the Torco Racing Fuels Route 66 Nationals and shared the moment with sons Donovan and Darien and daughter Alanna, who greeted him after the victory wearing a cheerleader outfit.
It was the first win for crew chief Donnie Bender, who took over for tuning legend Dick LaHaie. And Dixon said, “I wish it didn’t take a year and a half to get him his first win. I’m sure glad that Snake (team owner Don Prudhomme) stuck with him and gave him his chance to get everything right. He and Todd Smith work great together. You give him some time, he’ll be a Dick LaHaie. He just doesn’t have 40 years under his belt. He has a year and a half being a tuner, and I think he’s doing a great job.”
In his previous final-round appearance last June at Englishtown, N.J., Dixon was runner-up to Fuller, as his Father’s Day winning streak ended at five years.
But he made up for that by winning with a 4.579-second elapsed time at 322.11 miles per hour in the SkyTel dragster, as new point-leader Fuller had traction problems in his Fabick Cat dragster and settled for a 9.155/80.76 effort.
“It’s not a revenge thing,“ Dixon said. “Hot Rod’s a good driver, and that’s a good team. It’s just nice to get one in. If you have a car that can go to the semis every week, you’ll get your wins. And we’re starting to get that.
“I don’t ‘deserve’ anything. If you go out there and you put your time in, and if you have a good car and you’re driving good, (victories) will come to you.”
As for the historic value of this victory, Dixon said, “I didn’t feel worthy of passing Don Garlits and still don’t. But we raced against Kenny for so long, you want to compete against that. It’s certainly an honor.”
Chicago-based team owner Don Schumacher saw two of his three Funny Car drivers square off in the final round. Gary Scelzi defeated point-leader Ron Capps to score his second victory of the year from the No. 1 position.
“The Don had a good weekend,” Scelzi said.
Scelzi used a 4.838-second elapsed time at 321.42 mph in the Mopar/Oakley Dodge Charger to nip Capps and his Brut Dodge Charger by .0092 of a second, or about four feet.
“The track was definitely better than it had been all weekend,” Scelzi said. “We were very careful. We tried to run only what we thought the track could hold.”
Knowing that he would be third in the standings no matter who won the final round, he and crew chief Mike Neff decided to “see if we could throw something at ’em. So, we stepped on it from half track on. That’s where our car normally really thumps. That’s where the big dogs started to eat.”
Jeg Coughlin (Pro Stock) and Andrew Hines (Pro Stock Motorcycle) joined Dixon and Scelzi in the winner’s circle.
Coughlin, driving the Victor Cagnazzi-owned Jeg’s Chevy Cobalt, used a 6.658-second, 207.37-mph pass to beat Jason Line by about six feet. Line covered the quarter mile in his Summit Pontiac GTO in 6.656 seconds at 208.07 mph.
Winning for the first time since November 2005, Coughlin said, “It feels exceptional. The crew did a phenomenal job. Today, we were the picture of consistency.”
Hines, the No. 1 qualifier with his Screamin’ Eagle Harley-Davidson V-Rod, outran point-leader Matt Smith. Hines registered a 6.959-second e.t. at 192.11 mph to Smith’s 7.014/187.18.  That vaulted the three-time and reigning champion from ninth to fourth in the standings.