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FUNNY CAR

Local favorite Scelzi cut Robert Hight's series lead to 16 points and earned his third Funny Car win of the season. He drove his Mopar/Oakley Dodge Stratus to a 4.984 at 295.21 to defeat teammate Ron Capps, who posted a 5.079 at 293.60 in his Brut Stratus. (lead photo by James Drew)

"We didn't make any mistakes today," said Scelzi, who beat Frank Pedregon, Phil Burkart and Tony Bartone to advance to the final round. "Mike Neff (crew chief) and the team kept the car running quick and we kept it in the left lane and that seemed to work for us. When the points guys ahead of you go out first round, the pressure is on you and you have to deliver."

It was Scelzi's 32nd career victory and second at the Fresno, Calif. native's home track.

"We should have been 100 points ahead of everybody if we'd been able to capitalize on some early-round losses," said Scelzi, who's had his own string of two first-round exits in the last four races. "Robert has been deadly, and (John) Force isn't going to stumble like this. If you think that those guys aren't deadly and can't win this championship you're wrong, and we know that."

Force, the defending and 13-time Funny Car world champion, lost in the first round for the fourth consecutive race. It was a career-high eighth first round loss of the season for the driver of the Castrol GTX Start Up Ford Mustang.

"I'm just not going to think about (the championship)," said Scelzi, a three-time NHRA Top Fuel world champion before he made the switch to Funny Car racing in 2002.

"Force and I are buddies. I'm not going to worry about it. I put too much effort in this thing too early. I know how to win championships, I know how to shut my mouth and I know how to pay attention to what I've got to do, and that's what I'm doing from here on out, and whatever happens, happens. If they get ahead of us they get ahead of us, If they don't, then they don't. They decide the champion at the end of the year in Pomona, not right now. But a win is a big thing right now."

PRO STOCK

Anderson regained the series points lead in Pro Stock with his fourth victory of the season and 35th of his career, which ties him for 10th with "Big Daddy" Don Garlits on the all-time wins list.

He outran Jeg Coughlin, Jim Yates and Greg Stanfield in the first three rounds before posting a 6.732 at 205.63 in his new Pontiac GTO to outrun final round foe and event top qualifier Kurt Johnson, who clocked a 6.760 at 204.23 in his Chevy Cobalt.

"Kurt (Johnson) and I are like brothers, we have a lot of history together and there could be no more motivator than running against him or Warren (Johnson)," Anderson said. "It's fun when you race either one of them, but you have to dig down and find something extra. Kurt wanted this race badly - he was .016 on the light in the finals, but I also came up with my best light of the day - it was enough to get the job done and give that Pontiac GTO its first win.

Anderson moved 50 points ahead of first-round loser Warren Johnson, who became the first drag racer to be inducted into Infineon Raceway's Wall of Fame on Sunday.

"The Pro Stock class is a dogfight right now," said Anderson. "We have five guys that can absolutely win this POWERade championship without any one of them being an upset or anybody wondering how it happened, and that's the state of Pro Stock racing right now. We're back in first place and that's obviously a great place to be after the Western Swing. We didn't have a good series of races out here and this one right here made us healthy. Now we can go home, regroup and have this car smokin' at Brainerd."