Like session one for the class cars, there was a lull towards the end of session two as only a few cars were left in the lanes. At 12:35 Brian Lohnes made the announcement that John Faraone and his 72 Valiant Charger had entered the facility. Seven minutes later the session was ended and the tractors went out to prep the track one last time. It was 12:55 before session three was started, and I was expecting two hours of track time. We had lost thirty minutes to the morning rain, and twenty-five minutes to track clean-up, so I was counting on the normal two pm cutoff to be moved to 2:55pm.

The first several cars down didn't instill confidence in the belief that we were about to see more big numbers. Jeffrey Lutz's SBC Honda Civic refused to come up on boost, and labored down the track. Blake Hughes' S-10 looked to be on another stout 8.70 run when it popped something loose and lost boost at the eighth mile. Dennis Taylor's Retro Nova left with a stellar 1.28 sixty foot time, then lost fire and coasted to a 17.23. Paul Castiglione and his yellow 72 Challenger ran an 11.53-119, which was an improvement over his earlier 12.56-105.
Twelve minutes in, Boone pulled the Duster to the line, and went 10.21-131, when he made it back to the pits, I could tell he wasn't going to attempt a second run.

"It's got a little squeak in the engine I'm not particularly happy with", he shook his head, "we've got two drives, and two race days left, so I'm happy with that one."
"Saponaro is out, and the Retro Nova is struggling...you could be battling it out with Meyer and Northern Bel for a third place in class!"
Boone laughed heartily, "Look...Saponaro, Gallimore, Taylor, Trunkett, Meyer; the Ruster Duster might have the same letter on the windshield as their cars, but it's not in the same class! Not even close!"

I jumped in the Valiant and headed up for my first attempt, and planned for a good one and done number well into the nines. Eight minutes after Boone ran, Jacob Foster stood his 240Z straight up off the line, he nailed it upon landing and it went up again, the rack broke upon re-entry from the second wheelstand and he went for a wild ride that culminated with the Z inches from the wall at the thousand foot mark. At the same moment they were loading the car on the ramp truck, Jesse Madaffari was pulling Dennis Taylor back to his pits with a tow rope, so it didn't look good for him to improve on his seventeen second run.
During the ten minutes it took to get Foster's ride off the track, one of the Faraone crew was sharing pictures of the twin turbo wedge's torched Predator head, while Lohnes and Freiburger relayed the story of how they had seen the Aussie shoot fire out from under it on his Tuesday pass. They had apparently stayed up all night to replace the head and limp to Martin.
Darren was leaning up against the Valiant with me in the lanes, having rode up with Dale in the Gremlin.
I looked over at him and laughed, "Now we know how they lost a hundred mph from one day to the next!"
"Yep, burning aluminum instead of fuel can have that effect", he agreed with a nod.