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He conceded, "(Kenny) used us up last year and he won
the championship -- and he deserved it. They had the better car and
the better team last year. But we worked hard over the winter to make
our team a better team and (our car) a better car."
But he quickly downplayed the early notice he served Bernstein.
He said his advantage was "just 20 points -- it wasn't monumental" and
cautioning, "This is only Chapter One. It's a 23-chapter book." He also
predicted the points chase won't be a two-car affair.
 Eliminations
started with a couple of Top Fuel upsets. John Smith, driving the Fram
Dragster in competition for the first time since suffering multiple
injuries in an accident last August at Brainerd, knocked out top qualifier
Andrew Cowin and his Gwynn/Steinbrenner New York Yankees Dragster in
the first round. Then Tony Schumacher, who rewrote Mike Dunn's two-and-a-half-month-old
track speed record in qualifying third at 330.88 miles an hour, lost
to Wyatt Radke in Round 1.
Dixon's victories over Darrell Russell and Don Lampus
weren't beauties, and Bernstein first had his hands full with David
Grubnic then benefitted from Doug Kalitta's red light to advance. Both
had semifinal esacpes. "We got some lucky rounds earlier in the day,"
Dixon said of himself and Bernstein. "I told Kenny before the final
(that) neither one of us deserves to be there.We both should have been
out in the first or second round, the way things had been going."
Dixon said he was so excited to win that he told NHRA
founder Wally Parks, "Thanks for giving me a home to do this. (Otherwise)
I'd have to get a real job."
FORCE FALTERS
While Dixon chattered happily about his $40,000 win, the
17th of his career and the first for him and tuner Dick LaHaie since
the Dallas race last fall, John Force was the opposite in victory.
His voice quivering and his eyes misting, the Funny Car
icon abruptly halted his post-race remarks.
He wasn't weeping because his $40,000 victory over Del
Worsham put him on the threshold of 100 in his career. Or that he and
the Castrol GTX Ford Mustang team won the first POWERade Drag Racing
Series Funny Car event title after claiming 11Winston championships.
Or even that he ended his young challenger's round-wins streak at seven.
It certainly wouldn't have been his final-round 6.260 e.t. at 219.76
mph that outlasted Worsham's equally ugly 6.642/243.68 in the Checker-Schucks-Kragen
Pontiac Firebird.
The three-letter tear-trigger for Force was not "Del."
It was "age." Maybe he was reminiscing about his own career as 19-year-old
daughter Ashley is set to make her driving debut. Maybe he was sensitive
to a harmless wisecrack someone made about the fact he'll be 53 in May.
But his brief monologue started with him saying he was
"drained" and had been napping during the day and the notion that "I
had to really get up on the tire to race Capps." Then he spoke unspecifically
about what was troubling him.
"I could just cry, I love driving these cars so much,"
he said. "To me, it's the greatest sport in the world, and my baby's
out there driving and that means a lot to me. You know, at my age you
think maybe you can't come back . . . " At that point, he walked from
the media room.
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