Richie Crampton finished his solid run in the SealMaster Toyota Top Fuel dragster with another round win.
In four passes in qualifying, the SealMaster team led by Donnie Bender made three solid runs. Their best was a 3.748 second effort recorded in the second qualifying session on Friday afternoon. They just missed recording bonus points, but the run kept the SealMaster driver in the top half of the field all weekend and eventually seeded them eighth overall.
For the second straight Sunday, Crampton drew Terry McMillen in the first round. Crampton and McMillen were the first pair to see the track and left side-by-side, but Bender had a great tune-up behind the SealMaster Toyota and Crampton would earn the round win.
In the quarterfinals, Crampton came up against Brittany Force. Again, the drivers would leave beside each other, but Force laid down the low elapsed time of the eliminations and Crampton’s 3.757 proved to be not enough.
Despite only starting seven events, Crampton had a solid run. He earned a final round appearance in Charlotte and scored five round wins.
Statistics:
Qualified: No. 8 (3.748 sec., 316.23 mph)
E1: Crampton defeated McMillen – 3.724 sec., 328.62 mph to 3.769 sec., 324.36 mph
E2: Crampton defeated by B. Force – 3.757 sec., 323.81 mph to 3.679 sec., 328.22 mph
Quotable: “It was a nice way to end the season. We wanted to do more to help Doug Kalitta to win a championship. Unfortunately, we came up a little bit short. Hats off to Brittany and Alan Johnson. That 3.67 was tough to beat. All in all it was a good way to end the year. Finishing up the season for SealMaster and Toyota with the legendary Connie Kalitta was like a dream come to true. I’m extremely proud of this team and I can’t thank him enough.”
Kalitta Motorsports PR/Photo Gary Nastase Photography
