"Lonnie is telling us in the tower that there are forty-five minutes left in this first session of class cars", Brian Lohnes' voice boomed over the PA.
Dale had fired the Gremlin, played with the carb linkage a bit, then walked over to me after putting his hood back on.
"I'm going to put mine in line", he explained, pointing towards the staging area. What about you, is the Valiant ready?
"Yeah, but I was seriously just going to wait for the second session", I shrugged.
"They said in the driver's meeting that they weren't going to turn us around, so why not take it up now?"
"I just don't want to get stuck in line and have to sit there through the entire Street Machine Eliminator session", I complained.
"Why not?" Dale threw his hands up, "when they shut off the lanes for class cars, you walk up and sit in the bleachers to watch SME".
"Yeah, I suppose", I agreed.
"If you leave the Valiant sitting here, you're going to walk down to the bleachers or stand here and watch SME, so where the Valiant is parked at the time has no bearing on what you're going to do for that hour or hour and a half!"
"I see your point, but you go ahead, and I'll be in the lanes shortly".
"When is the last time you made a nitrous pass in that car?" He continued to badger me.
"Uh, December...basically", I colored a bit.
"Then you better plan on making two today, because the first one will be you learning how to drive it all over again!" He slapped my back, laughed through a huge smile then walked back towards the Gremlin.
"Your fire suit pants make you look fat!" I retorted at his back.
"Really Dad?" Rachael shook her head, "that's the bast comeback you had?"

Matt Blasco and the Dirty Drag Week Dart were rolling through a good burnout, so my attention went back to the track, and I walked up next to Boone.
"Glenn Hunter just went 7.504 at 186, the quickest pass in the history of the Pro Street Power adder class, coming off his win from last year and a top three finish!"
"And I suppose you're wondering if Matt can hang with that?"
"I'm thinking Matt just wants to get through the week without pulling the trans out at this point", Boone laughed.

The Dart belched soot for the first 60ft. as it squatted over the huge rear tires while gingerly dangling the fronts a few inches in the air. The rest of the pass looked near perfect and the right lane scoreboard lit up with a 7.76-183!

"A quarter of a second down on day 1?"
"It's a long week, and he's just six hundredths off his Drag Week best", Boone shrugged, "I think I'd call it good and roll out if I was him!"
I took a deep breath as I realized the Monte Smith Performance 66 'Vette of David Schroeder was in the water prepared to follow in Matt's tracks down the right lane.