Coughlin scores round win in Dallas; sets sights on St. Louis

Courtesy of Jegs
Photo by Roger Richards

DALLAS, TX – Jeg Coughlin Jr. is happy to take the breaks where he and the JEGS.com/Mopar Dodge Avenger can get them. On Sunday at the 27th annual AAA Texas NHRA Fall Nationals, Coughlin was happy to accept his first round win thanks to a fortunate break against his opponentVieri Gaines.

Coughlin won that race on the starting line when Gaines left -.003 seconds too early and fouled out.

“He was on a heckuva run there,” Coughlin said. “He was on pace to run a 6.59 or 6.60, but he turned it red. It’s a good bit of good luck and we’ll take it any time.”

Coughlin ran a 6.629-second pass at 209.14 mph. Gaines did run a 6.606 at 207.50 mph as it was all for naught after he turned on the red light.

“I felt pretty good,” Coughlin said. “I didn’t think we’d slow down as much in the second round after we cleaned up what we had the first round.”

In the quarterfinals, Coughlin squared off against Erica Enders. Coughlin enjoyed a .007 second advantage at the starting line, but didn’t have the horsepower to hold her off. Enders crossed the finish line in 6.601 seconds at 209.72 mph, with Coughlin right behind her, finishing in 6.640 seconds at 209.39 mph.

“We had a little jump at the line, but we needed a little more than what we got.” Coughlin said. “About any way you slice the pie, we had the 10th best car out here all weekend. We’d like to sugar-coat it a little more than that, but the numbers just don’t let us do it.”

Coughlin said the weekend did provide a lot of good data to go over in advance of next weekend’s race inSt. Louis.

“There’s work to do on the whole program,” Coughlin said. “We completed runs and more often than not knew what we were doing out there. We’ve got a couple of things in  mind right now that we think can improve the program for the final four races of this year and looking ahead for 2013 in Pomona.”

Up next for Coughlin is the AAA Insurance NHRA Midwest Nationals at Gateway Motorsports Park starting on Friday and running through Sunday.