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Despite ending the race day earlier than expected, both teams representing the Qatar Al-Anabi Racing Top Fuel Team, the two-time World Championship team owned by HE Sheikh Khalid bin Hamad al-Thani, leave the Tennessee mountains ranked in the top-five positions in the NHRA Mello Yello Top Fuel point standings following the just-completed Ford NHRA Thunder Valley Nationals in Bristol, Tennessee, the 10th of 24 races that make up America’s 2013 NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing season. |
Dubai driver Khalid al-Balooshi powered his gold Al-Anabi Racing Top Fuel dragster to the sixth qualifying position; he has qualified in the top six at eight of the 10 races this season. In eliminations, al-Balooshi, who debuted a new car this weekend, made his best pass of the weekend with a brilliant 3.821-second effort at 319.22 mph, but it was not good enough to beat veteran driver Doug Kalitta who also made his quickest run of the weekend and used his extensive Top Fuel driving experience to leave the starting line before al-Balooshi. Kalitta defeated the second-year Top Fuel driver by just three thousandths of a second.
“This week in Bristol was not our week,” al-Balooshi said. “We tried hard and did our best for Qatar and the Al-Anabi team, but it was not a good weekend for our team. I need to do a better job leaving the starting line, and I know that I will get better as I get more experience. We are leaving what happened this weekend in Tennessee and going to New Hampshire for a better race next weekend. I thank everyone on our team for his hard work, and I know next week will be better for our team.”
Despite the early exit, al-Balooshi remains in fifth place in the point standings. He trails fourth-place Antron Brown by 82 points and leads sixth-place Doug Kalitta by 15 points.
The results were slightly better on the silver side of the Qatar Al-Anabi Racing pit area where Shawn Langdon, who entered the weekend following two consecutive races wins as the Top Fuel points leader, was the No. 7 qualifier.
He dispatched veteran driver Bob Vandergriff in the first round with his best pass of the weekend. In the second round, Langdon used his superior driving skills to leave the starting line well before his opponent, Steve Torrence. Langdon was winning the race when the tires on the Al-Anabi car lost traction allowing Torrence to win the round; he went on to win the event.
“We made some good runs in the Al-Anabi car this weekend, but we struggled a little bit in the heat today and smoked the tires,” Langdon said. “We were trying to make another great run like we have been making in the last few races, but it just didn’t work out this weekend. As hard as we try to win for Sheikh Khalid, we know we can’t win every race. We’ll go to Epping (New Hampshire) next week and try to get back to what we’ve been doing most of this year. We’ve had some really good success lately winning some races and plugging away at it so we hope things will be better for us next week.”
With the quarter-final loss, Langdon dropped one spot to second place in the NHRA Mello Yello Top Fuel point standings. He trails first-place Tony Schumacher by one point and leads third-place Spencer Massey by 85 points.