Gainesville, Florida (March 19, 2016) - After seeing Morgan Lucas Racing teammate Richie Crampton blaze to the No. 1 qualifying spot for the NHRA Gatornationals on Saturday at Gainesville Raceway, Morgan Lucas knows there is more speed in his Lucas Oil Racing TV dragster.
Lucas qualified No. 12 after a top pass of 3.810 seconds at 315.64 mph as his part-time team continued to make improvements on his car throughout the weekend.
"Sometimes we don't hit it right the first time in qualifying," Lucas said. "We kinda get a little closer every time. We're making a lot of power and the car's hooking up; it just need some fine-tuning adjustments. If you look at what Richie's car did today, which was amazing, we know the cars are similar enough that we should be able to run somewhat close."
Crampton made a track-record pass of 3.698 seconds at 319.37 mph in a sister car to Lucas', and Aaron Brooks tunes both dragsters, so Lucas knows the potential of his race car when he lines up against No. 5 qualifier Brittany Force in Sunday.
"We'll see what we can do tomorrow," Lucas said. "We've got to race Brittany and Alan (Johnson) and that entire Monster team, and that's rough, but on the bright side at least a Lucas Oil car is going to go past first round in that scenario."
Force's top pass was 3.745 seconds at 309.56 mph.
"For me, just getting to drop the laundry is awesome," Lucas said. "It's fun to go over 300 mph. We're not hurting a lot of parts right now, and we're running the car A to B and having some fun doing it."
Neither Lucas nor Crampton made a full pass in either of Friday's sessions, but Lucas still had plenty of confidence in his race team.
"I still didn't have any worry in my mind," Lucas said. "It's because I know everybody here does their job right, and that starts at the top with Aaron. He does a great job working the cars, finessing them, finding things he can do to try to make them better. When you can have that much confidence in your people, it helps everything.
"We've built a good team over here, and I'm very excited about it. I know the future's bright and we have a really good foundation for a good long-lasting run."
Race day eliminations will air live from 1 to 4 p.m. ET Sunday on FOX Sports 1.
