Short week lets Hagan, DieHard/Aaron’s Dodge team get quick chance to regain recent Funny Car momentum

July 01

JOLIET, Ill. (July 1, 2012) – Matt Hagan edged Don Schumacher Racing teammate Jack Beckman last year to win the NHRA Funny Car world championship.

But Beckman holds the edge this year while Hagan and his Tommy DeLago-tuned DieHard Advanced Gold Funny Car have been mired in a yearlong slump.

And for the second consecutive NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series event, Beckman eliminated Hagan from competition in the NHRA Route 66 Nationals near Chicago.

“It doesn’t hurt any less if you lose to one of your teammates,” Hagan said. “I’m glad Jack is still in the show, but it still hurts because our guys are working so hard. They deserve to go some rounds and get to celebrate.”

Hagan’s team has seemed to be on the cusp of a breakthrough after not advancing past the second round in any of this season’s 11 Full Throttle events. A broken part in Saturday night’s last qualifying run prevented Hagan from improving on a No. 14 qualifying position that tied its worst for the year other than not qualifying for the fifth event at Concord, N.C.

“I’m running out of things to say. The only good thing I can think of is that we get to race in five days at Norwalk (Ohio) so it won’t be long until we get another chance to get our Dodge Charger on the right track.”

All teams were thrown a spitball when heavy rain moved in less than an hour after eliminations began at 11 a.m. and shut down racing until about 3:30 p.m.

Go to NHRA.com for complete event results.

The following are Hagan’s event results:

MATT HAGAN, DieHard Advantage Gold/Aaron’s Dodge Charger R/T
Qualified: No. 14
First round: Jack Beckman (4.093 sec., 308.00) def. HAGAN (4.176, 301.60)

FRIDAY
Session 1: 4.193 sec., 294.43 mph
Session 2: 5.742, 123.07
SATURDAY
Session 3: 4.249, 281.19
Session 4: broke on burnout

NEXT EVENT:
July 5-8, NHRA Summit Racing Equipment Nationals, Norwalk, Ohio