Scelzi Still Reaping Rewards

The dramatic yearlong run by rookie Gary Scelzi in Alan Johnson’s Team Winston top-fuel car continued unabated Saturday at Pomona Raceway.

The newly crowned National Hot Rod Assn. champion from Fresno, who earned $200,000 when he clinched the title Thursday, put an additional $100,000 in the team’s pockets when he outran Larry Dixon in the final round of the Budweiser Classic.

In a tense side-by-side race of 5,500-horsepower machines, Scelzi flew down the quarter-mile in 4.60 seconds. the second-fastest run of the Winston Final week. He needed it; Dixon ran 4.73 in losing.

Scelzi’s speed of 313.91 mph was bettered by only three drivers during three rounds of qualifying for today’s final eliminations. If Scelzi wins today, he will collect another $100,000, $50,000 as the Winston Final champion and another $50,000 for scoring a top-fuel double.

Of the 12 past Budweiser Classic winners, only Joe Amato in 1990 managed to win the two events on successive days.

“I hope [today] is as good as [Saturday],” said Scelzi, chosen by the Johnson family of Santa Maria to replace their son, Blaine, in the team car after Blaine died in an accident last year.

“I’ll just be glad when [today] is over. I’m really tired. This has been a long and very emotional year for me. I had no idea when I accepted Alan’s offer that something like this would happen. I’m just a very, very fortunate guy.”

Not surprisingly, Dixon and Scelzi are Nos. 1 and 2 in today’s 16-car, top-fuel field.

Showing remarkable consistency, Dixon set a track record of 319.37 mph on Thursday, a Winston Final elapsed time-record of 4.596 on Friday and then ran 315.12 and 314.35 before his losing run of 298.11 on Saturday.

“I knew something was wrong from the hit of the throttle,” Dixon said of the final round. “I could hear a severe grinding in the supercharger and I knew why the run wasn’t up to par.”

The closest Scelzi came to losing was in the first round when his tires smoked coming off the starting line, but when Bob Vandergriff’s car began to shake and rumble a little farther down the strip, Scelzi continued on his way to victory in a pedestrian 5.80 seconds at 277.09 mph.

In the semifinal round, Scelzi demonstrated championship form with a 4.632-second run at 316.12 mph, although it was not needed when Mike Dunn broke at the start.

Dixon used a 0.454-second reaction time to ruin Scott Kalitta’s retirement party, winning the race in 4.678 seconds to 4.699. The speed was just as close, 314.35 for Dixon and 314.24 for the defending Budweiser champion. Kalitta, two-time Winston champion, has announced that today’s race will be his last.

Cristen Powell, the Oregon teenager who skipped her high school prom to go drag racing earlier this season, celebrated signing a major sponsorship contract with Reebok by sneaking into the field on her last run, a 4.805 effort that put her 14th in the 16-car field.

Chuck Etchells held the No. 1 qualifying spot with his 4.958 second effort Thursday.

Notes

Pro stock champion Jim Yates took aim on his 10th win when he qualified first with a 6.973-second run in his Pontiac Firebird. . . . Wyatt Radke of Alta Loma didn’t let a flash fire in his funny car and a failure to qualify deter his main goal of the day. Shortly after he climbed out of his burning Olds Cutlass, he had a message flashed across the electronic scoreboard: “Amy, Will You Marry Me?” She accepted.