Battling the elements, Rodger Brogdon has head held high for Charlotte eliminations

CHARLOTTE, NC – Rodger Brogdon, who entered the NHRA Four-Wide Nationals with the Pro Stock points lead, had to fight through minor adversity during qualifying.

With rain shortening the weekend’s schedule to only two qualifying sessions, Brogdon feels confident that he has a pretty good idea of what to expect for Sunday’s eliminations.

“It’s really not a good thing anywhere to lose two passes down the track but especially here because you don’t get a shot to run all the lanes,” Brogdon said. “The general consensus, though, from today is that lanes three and four are the best lanes. That may change tomorrow, but either way I’m going to do my best.”

After getting timed out in the staging process during the first round of qualifying Saturday, Brogdon was able to put down his only time of the weekend, a 6.532 at 213.84 mph, during Q2. His No. 10 spot on the ladder has his Rodger Brogdon Racing Chevy Camaro matched up against Jason Line, John Gaydosh, and Larry Morgan in the first round of eliminations.

“I moved my pedal a little bit,” Brogdon said. “We run so much more clutch when the air is like this. It was 100 percent my fault. I still went from A to B anyway though because even without getting an e.t. slip I do have data to look at.

“We are a lot faster than what we qualified. We should be able to go 6.48 pretty easily and that’s our goal. The numbers don’t show it but I have a fast car, so we’ll see what happens.”

Running four abreast only happens once during the NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series season, but Brogdon doesn’t count himself out despite the added challenges.

“It’s so easy to get confused at this race,” Brogdon said, “and we have a lot more going on inside our cars before we turn it loose compared to the fuel cars. It’s a tough one. Reaction times will definitely be one of the big factors tomorrow.

“All I know is if my guys do well, if I do a decent job, and if we have a good lane to run in we could easily win this race.”

Final eliminations will start at approximately 1:45 p.m., Sunday, with action live on ESPN starting at 2 p.m. ET.