Reading: Morgan Lucas preview

LUCAS ROLLING ONWARD TO READING

READING, PA. (Sept. 27) -- For Morgan Lucas, wrestling the colossal chore of taking the wheel of his Lucas Oil NHRA POWERade Top Fuel dragster and his Lucas Oil Series Top Alcohol dragster, has the young 22-year old seeing his life as a blur.

At this weekend's Toyo Tire NHRA Nationals at Maple Grove Raceway on Sept. 29 -- Oct. 1, Lucas will be the only professional driver on the NHRA circuit driving two cars. Just last weekend in Dallas, he drove to a quarterfinal finish in his Top Fuel ride before advancing to the semi-finals in the Top Alcohol dragster.

"It really hasn't been a problem in running two different cars," Lucas said nonchalantly. "Each one has their own way of teaching you new things and I've having a ball. It gives you twice as many attempts to work the tree (timing system) and not to mention the enormous amount of feedback you can give your team about a certain lane or other track conditions.

The Lucas Oil Racing teams, owned by Forrest and Charlotte Lucas, will roll back to Reading after the Toyo Tires Nationals were postponed two weeks ago and despite not getting any time on the track, the potential quotient in what Maple Grove Raceway will bring has many teams thinking National records.

"Maple Grove has always been noted as one of the quickest tracks we race on every year," said Lucas, whose quickest elapsed time is 4.47 seconds. "The weather will be probably the coolest of the year and our nitro-burning engines love all that good air. We could possibly see new records set and we're hoping to be right in the middle of it all."

The NHRA Lucas Oil Top Alcohol division has never been more competitive. Lucas, where much of his winning, spirited drive was born in this series, set the quickest time of the Dallas meet and with that come a winning combination.

"We tried some different things on our A-Fuel dragster that worked," said Lucas. "It was a great feeling putting the throttle down and holding on, basically. It created the power we needed and enabled us to get down the track with the quickest time of the weekend."

The start of the Toyo Tires NHRA Nationals begins at the Maple Grove Raceway on Friday, September 29 with qualifying starting at 2:00 p.m. (EDT) and 5:00 p.m. Saturday's time trials start at 12:00 p.m. for the nitro classes followed by a second session at 3:00 p.m. The race starts promptly at 11 a.m. on Sunday, Oct. 1.

-credit: www.morganlucas.com