Drag Racing Online - Agent 1320 Vol. IV No. 12 December 2002

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2003 TESTING ALREADY UNDERWAY

DRO's photog Steve Gruenwald went to Bradenton, Florida from his home base in Jupiter (the town in Florida, not the planet) and attended a test session. A couple of cars that tested included the CARQUEST-backed 'Vette driven by Scott Ray (above) and Dale Brinsfield's '41 Willys (below). The Vette ran eighth mile laps only and had a best lap of 4.07/178, with a sixty footer of .995. Brinsfield, who switched from a nitrous oxide-urged Camaro to a supercharged Hemi Willys, had a best lap of 6.29 and a best speed of 223 mph. (photos by Steve Gruenwald) [12-27-2002]

SCHUMACHER FLOPS WILL HAVE MOPAR BODIES

It's deals like this one that keep the Agent dubious of anything he (or is it she) is told by the factory reps. Earlier this year when Mopar announced that they were dropping their factory sponsorship of Don and Dean Skuza's Fuel Flopper team, there were rumors that the Prudhomme team (among others) were being approached about switching over to Dodge bodies for the 2003 NHRA season. According to several of the Agent's sources, Prudhomme asked for so much money to sever his long relationship with GM that the deal couldn't be made. Mopar PR people then told the Agent that Mopar had no intention of returning to the Fuel Coupe wars and that they had decided to put all of their factory sponsorships into their Pro Stock programs.

"We want to back race cars that look like what we sell. We're getting back to the win on Sunday, sell on Monday program and we don't feel that Fuel Funny car with bodies no one can identify helps us do that," they said. The Agent had three different sources tell him they believed Chrysler didn't even own the body molds used to make the Funny Car bodies the Skuza team owned and therefore couldn't promise a team they could get bodies.

Now DRO gets a press release saying that the Don Schumacher Fuel Coupes will wear Stratus RT bodies for 2003 and the team has a multi-year deal with the Mopar factory, DaimlerChrysler. It's this kind of stuff that keeps the Agent on his toes and digging for the truth for the reader. [12-27-2002]

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