Arana Jr. runs family’s No. 1 streak in Denver to four years

DENVER, CO – Lucas Oil Buell rider Hector Arana Jr. ran his family’s pole-winning streak in Denver to four years in a row by claiming the No. 1 spot for the Mopar Mile-High NHRA Nationals on Saturday at Bandimere Speedway. His dad Hector Sr. was No. 1 in 2011, Arana in 2012, and brother Adam last year.

“It’s a great accomplishment,” Arana said. “It’s nice to know you have a good setup on the mountain. It’s a big deal, even though it’s a one-off race, but it’s pretty awesome to be good at this race.

“To be able to score four No. 1s in a row — and all three of us have one — that’s pretty cool.”

Arana was the quickest in each of the first three qualifying sessions with a track-record run of 7.178 seconds at 185.97 mph to secure the No. 1 spot. He also set the track speed record in Q2 at 186.72 mph.

“We have a motor combination that has been really consistent,” Arana said. “We have only been doing minor maintenance but other than that nothing has changed, so we have really been able to fine-tune everything and dial in the motor.”

Arana’s speed on Friday enabled he and crew chief Dan Gonzalez to experiment Saturday, and while he didn’t improve on his e.t., he’s confident heading into eliminations.

“We were trying a couple of different things since we ran so well on Friday,” Arana said. “We ran really well on that last pass and we have a good setup for tomorrow.

“We will just take it one round at a time. To be consistent we need to just watch the weather. The weather seems to be doing some different things. We need to watch the weather to make sure we make the correct changes that are needed to be and stay consistent as possible. We need to watch every little thing and go from there.”

Arana will line up against No. 16 qualifier Charlie Sullivan in the first round tomorrow. Sullivan qualified for the race with a pass of 7.419 seconds at 177.84 mph.

“I have not raced him,” Arana said, “but you cant take any of these guys out here lightly.”

Final eliminations at the Mopar Mile-High NHRA Nationals begin at noon, Sunday. ESPN2 will broadcast all elimination action, including live coverage of the final two rounds.