Sports - May 2003

Herbert poised for big weekend in Illinois

Published May 28, 2003

Special to the LTN

JOLIET, Ill. — Like many of NHRA's veteran Top Fuel drivers, Doug Herbert has fans at each of the 23 stops on the POWERade Series schedule.

None, however, attracts as many of Herbert's partisans from Kenosha, Wis., as Route 66 Raceway. The reason: Kenosha is the home of Snap-on Tools, primary sponsor of Herbert's dragster, and it's about 100 miles from the track, making it the closest venue.

"Yeah, that puts a little pressure on you to perform well," said Herbert.

But he has held up under the scrutiny recently. He's come one round from the finals in three of his last four visits. It was here in September that Herbert claimed his first career No. 1 qualifying berth, and then went to the semifinals. A year ago, the Cherryville, N.C., driver started from 10th position and still made it to the semis. He was beaten by the eventual race winner both times last year.

Herbert expects "about 2,000 Snap-on people" to make the trek from Kenosha this weekend to watch him during the Lucas Oil Route 66 Nationals, May 30-June 1, and he's looking forward to it.

"We've had some success at that track and we'd like to take it one step farther this year and get the win," Herbert said. "Now that would be good for our Snap-on fans."

His career-best numbers have come at Route 66 - 4.518 seconds and 325.69 mph - both last year.

Herbert, crew chief Ron Douglas and tuning consultant Jim Brissette have come up with some good times. His best thus far is 2003 is 4.554 seconds, run at Englishtown, N.J., two weeks ago.

But there haven't been enough 4.50s. Herbert has been suffering from a consistency problem - or lack of it - on race day.

"I think we may have something wrong in the engine," Herbert said, "but we haven't been able to find anything yet. We're close. I think this is the weekend for us to get everything working together so we can give the Snap-on people something good to talk about."

It's not that Herbert's season has been lacking in performance. He is fifth with 481 points, 19 behind Darrell Russell.

And, given his previous success here, a trip to the finals isn't far-fetched. Neither is a race win.

The team begins its quest with qualifying runs Friday at 5 and 8 p.m. and Saturday at 12:30 and 3:30 p.m. Eliminations get underway Sunday at 11 a.m.
 

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