NHRA: Reading preview (PRO/STOCK) 


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE


Contact: Paul Kelly (818) 914-4761


PRESSURE IS ON WARREN JOHNSON IN PRO STOCK AT READING


	MOHNTON, Pa. -- It's crunch time for Warren 
Johnson.


	Johnson trails point leader Jim Yates by 129 
points -- more than one race -- with just four races 
remaining in the 1996 season. Time is running out if 
he wants to win his second consecutive NHRA Winston 
Pro Stock championship, and he knows it.


	"We can still win the championship," Johnson 
said. "We'll have to qualify opposite Yates on the 
ladder and take him out in the early rounds."


	Johnson, from Duluth, Ga., faces almost a must-
win situation at the 12th annual, $1,515,050 Pioneer 
Electronics Keystone Nationals, Sept. 12-15 at 
picturesque Maple Grove Raceway near Reading, Pa. The 
race is the 16th event in the 19-event, $27-million 
NHRA Winston Drag Racing Series in 1996.


	The chase for the championship took an abrupt 
turn at the U.S. Nationals earlier this month at 
Indianapolis. Johnson entered that event with five 
victories in the last nine races in the GM Performance 
Parts Pontiac Firebird. He was just 88 points behind 
Yates and had big momentum.


	But a freak parts failure at Indy changed all 
that. A weld broke on his right wheelie bar during a 
first-round matchup against Jerry Eckman, sending his 
car skyward. Johnson had to shut off, giving the win 
to Eckman. Yates advanced to the semifinals before 
losing to Johnson's son, Kurt Johnson.


	"There's not a lot of load on the wheelie bars, 
but the problem is that the welds fatigue because of 
the severe vibration they're subjected to during 
burnouts and tire shake," Johnson said. "Nothing 
conceived by the human mind and made by human hands is 
ever perfect."


	But Johnson has nearly a perfect record of 
advancing to the final at Maple Grove this decade. He 
has raced in the final every year since 1991, with 
victories in 1991, 1992 and 1995.


PIONEER ELECTRONICS KEYSTONE NATIONALS PRO STOCK 
NOTEBOOK


	--Back in business: Team Mopar will return to 
Pro Stock in 1997 with Dale Eicke as owner and engine 
builder. Darrell Alderman and Scott Geoffrion will 
remain as drivers.


	The new team will debut at the season-opening 
Chief Auto Parts Winternationals at Pomona, Calif.


	"This is a great opportunity for Eicke Racing," 
said Eicke, 46, from Granville, Ohio. "I have been in 
the business for 30 years and worked with a lot of 
great racers. But owning my own team has always been a 
goal and getting the chance to work with Mopar and two 
superb drivers makes it even better.


	"I feel we have an excellent chance to be a 
factor next year."


	Eicke previously was a partner in a successful 
engine-building business with Pro Stock driver and 
engine wizard Steve Schmidt. The duo began development 
this season of Chrysler engines used by Pro Stock 
driver Allen Johnson.


	"We think we have a head start on Dodge 
cylinder-head design with some of our previous work, 
and we're especially excited about the Chrysler 
engineering support that we're going to get."


	The Wayne County Speed Shop team had fielded 
Team Mopar Dodges for Alderman and Geoffrion since 
1992, but that team disbanded in July after struggling 
for nearly 14 months after vandals entered its shop in 
May 1995 and destroyed all of the team's racing 
engines.


	Alderman won Winston championships for Wayne 
County in 1990, 1991 and 1994.


	--Overdue: The long Pontiac drought in Pro Stock 
at the Pioneer Electronics Keystone Nationals is due 
to end this year.


	Don Beverley won at Maple Grove in a Pontiac 
Firebird in 1986, the only Pontiac victory in Pro 
Stock in the 11-year history of this event.


	But there's a good chance that a Pontiac will 
break through this year. Many top drivers switched 
from Oldsmobile to Pontiac this season, as Oldsmobile 
withdrew from drag racing after 1995 and Pontiac 
became the Official Car of NHRA.


	Only one non-Pontiac driver has won this season 
in Pro Stock. Mike Edwards drove the Winnebago 
Oldsmobile Cutlass to victory in the Slick 50 
Nationals presented by Western Auto in March at 
Houston and the Northwest Nationals in August at 
Seattle.


	--Family ties: A member of the Johnson family 
has won the NHRA U.S. Nationals the last five years.


	Kurt Johnson won this year in the Delco Freedom 
Battery Pontiac Firebird, and his father, Warren 
Johnson, won four straight from 1992-95.


	--Hurley stepping up: Hurley Blakeney, who last 
year became the first Competition racer to record a 
200-mph run in a doorslammer with his AA/AT Ford 
Thunderbird, is having a new Ford Probe built that 
will first compete in Comp eliminator and later Pro 
Stock.


	"Kim Smith, who built my Thunderbird, is 
building the car, and he will be the initial driver 
when we run it in BB/AT," Blakeney said. "It will have 
a 295-cid twin-turbocharged Ford engine built by Ken 
Duttweiler, who built the motor for my Thunderbird."


	Duttweiler is also working on a Ford 500-cid 
engine that Blakeney, from Chester, Vt., will use when 
he makes his debut in Pro Stock racing.


	--Rampy back in Pro Stock: Three-time NHRA 
Winston sportsman champion David Rampy returned to Pro 
Stock for the first time since 1994 at the U.S. 
Nationals.


	Rampy did not qualify in the Winnebago Pontiac 
owned by Harold Stout.


	"In the time we have been gone from the class, 
Pro Stock as a whole has tightened up and is more 
competitive than ever," Rampy said.


	Rampy finished 10th in the NHRA Winston Pro 
Stock point standings in 1993. He finished runner-up 
to Larry Morgan at the 1993 Sears Craftsman Nationals 
at Topeka, Kan., in the only final round of his Pro 
Stock career.


	The move to Pro Stock cost the versatile Rampy 
his ride in a Super Comp dragster. NHRA rules state 
that a driver can compete in only two categories. So 
Rampy decided to continue racing in a Super Gas 
roadster while racing in Pro Stock.


	"It used to be draining to run in Pro Stock and 
sportsman," Rampy said. "But since I quit Pro Stock in 
1994, I've been running two cars almost every weekend. 
It makes for a long mental weekend, but I wish it was 
twice as bad on Sunday, because that means we 
qualified."


	--Schedule: Pro qualifying starts at 3 p.m. 
Sept. 13 and is followed by a night-qualifying session 
at 7 p.m. Qualifying ends with sessions at noon and 4 
p.m. Sept. 14, with final eliminations starting at 11 
a.m. Sept. 15. Sportsman competition starts at 8:30 
a.m. Sept. 12.


	--Tickets: Tickets are available for the Pioneer 
Electronics Keystone Nationals. Call Maple Grove 
Raceway at (610) 856-7812 for ticket information. 
Tickets also can be purchased at Ticketmaster outlets. 
To order tickets by phone from Ticketmaster, call 
(215) 336-2000.


	--On TV: The Nashville Network (TNN) will 
televise 60 minutes of live final-round competition 
from the Pioneer Electronics Keystone Nationals at 5 
p.m. (EDT) Sept. 15.


	--On the Web: The NHRA home page on the World 
Wide Web at http://www.goracing.com/nhra/ offers more 
information about NHRA Winston Drag Racing, including 
qualifying and eliminations results, news, point 
standings, statistics, driver biographies and video 
clips.


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Motorsport News International                      jackd@motorsport.com
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