TODD’S CAMRY QUALIFIES NUMBER ONE AT U.S. NATIONALS

INDIANAPOLIS, IN – J.R. Todd drove his DHL Toyota Camry to a 3.910-second pass at 325.45 mph to earn his first career Funny Car number one qualifier for Monday’s Chevrolet Performance U.S. Nationals at Lucas Oil Raceway in Indianapolis. Todd ran the quickest Funny Car qualifying pass on two of the three days, including in Sunday’s final session.

He becomes just the 19th driver in history to earn a pole position in both Top Fuel and Funny Car competition. The defending U.S. Nationals champion also is just one of 16 drivers to win races in both nitro categories.

“That run is a testament to the entire DHL Camry team,” said Todd, who earned bonus points in four of the weekend’s five qualifying sessions. “Three-second runs had been hard for us to come by till Brainerd where we were able to get it tuned up in the semi-finals for one. I was confident coming into the weekend after our test here last week. The car ran really well and we picked it right back up there in Friday night qualifying. We had a little hiccup in Q2 on Saturday and other than that we’ve been getting down the track and making some great runs. Now we’ve got some good notes for what we want to do tomorrow.”

Todd’s Kalitta Motorsports teammate Shawn Langdon continued his strong recent run with a seventh in Funny Car qualifying, earning six bonus points on the weekend. Cruz Pedregon placed tenth, while Del Worsham qualified 12th.

Todd will face Jim Campbell in the opening round, while Langdon and Pedregon will square off against one another and Worsham faces Tim Wilkerson.

Antron Brown led the Toyota Top Fuel drivers with a third in qualifying as he battles Doug Kalitta for the fifth-spot heading into the Countdown.  Kalitta placed 11th, while Richie Crampton will start from the 15th slot as he fights for the final playoff berth in Top Fuel. Brown matches up with Brittany Force in the first round of eliminations, with Kaltta racing Leah Pritchett and Crampton taking on Clay Millican.

Monday’s Mello Yello Drag Racing Series eliminations can be seen live on FS1 beginning at 11:00 a.m. before switching over to FOX Network beginning at 1:00 p.m. (ET).