Ups and Downs for Team Al-Anabi at the AAA FallNationals – Langdon Runner-up, alBalooshi DNQ
Shawn Langdon, Al-Anabi Racing Top Fuel Dragster (silver)
Qualifying: Shawn Langdon was the No. 1 qualifier at the AAA Texas NHRA Fallnationals. Friday’s qualifying sessions were rained reducing the event to two qualifying attempts. During Saturday’s first round of qualifying, Langdon recorded a 3.819-second pass at 321.09 mph. to take top-qualifying honors. It was Langdon’s fifth No. 1 qualifier of the season and the 11th of his career. He was also the No. 1 qualifier in Dallas last year.
Eliminations: Langdon advanced to his sixth final round of the season. He defeated T.J. Zizzo, Bob Vandergriff and Morgan Lucas before losing to Doug Kalitta in the final round of eliminations.
Unofficial Point Standings: Langdon moved up one spot into a tie for first place in the NHRA Mello Yello Top Fuel point standings. He and today’s race winner, Doug Kalitta, lead third-place Spencer Massey by two points. The top-four positions are separated by just 35 points.
Langdon on Dallas: “We had a pretty good weekend in Dallas. The Al-Anabi team made some strong runs starting with the first qualifying session. The left lane was a little bit better than the right. We were able to keep lane choice most of today so we could stay in that left lane, but we got moved over to the right lane in the final. We just didn’t get it done in the final round, but we were able to get back to a tie for the points lead. Things are looking good, and the Al-Anabi car is back. Our goal for the weekend was to get the points lead back. We were able to get a share of it today, and we’ll go from there.”
Khalid alBalooshi – Al- Anabi Racing Top Fuel Dragster (gold)
Qualifying: Khalid alBalooshi did not qualify for the AAA NHRA Fallnationals. Friday’s qualifying sessions were rained out so the event was reduced to two qualifying attempts. It was the first time in his Top Fuel career that he failed to qualify for a race. One week ago, reigning Top Fuel champion Antron Brown failed to qualify in Charlotte making alBalooshi and Brown the only two Top Fuel drivers in the Countdown to the Championship NHRA Playoffs to miss a Countdown race so far this year.
Eliminations: AlBalooshi did not qualify for eliminations.
Unofficial Point Standings: With the DNQ, alBalooshi dropped two spots to ninth place in the NHRA Mello Yello Top Fuel point standings. He trails eighth-place Antron Brown by four points and leads 10th-place Steve Torrence by three points. He is 62 points behind fifth-place.
AlBalooshi on Dallas: “Things like this happen to every team at some time I know. Any driver can miss a race, but it happened to us at the wrong time and at the wrong race. The main thing is I need to take what happened this week and throw it away. I need to go to St. Louis and forget what happened this week and last week and have a better race in St. Louis. Our team has been working together, and we know we have one of the best cars in the show. We are going to stay in Dallas and test tomorrow so we can learn what is going wrong with our Al-Anabi car, fix it and be ready for St. Louis next week.”
