Since I'd already showered at the track, I walked in the room, dropped my bag, piled my clothes on top, pulled on my shorts and crashed in the bed. According to reports, I was snoring 2 minutes after we slid our key card and opened the door.

I awoke with a start at 4:30AM, took a shower, and got dressed. Rachael was next up, and I told her to get Dale in the shower after she was done. I stepped out of the room to check on the other guys, and found Dad ready to get moving, but he said he was having difficulty getting the other two around. I went out to put my bag in the Valiant and walked straight into a bad case of deja vu. The lightning flashes showed off the thunderhead cloud that was rolling over us, and it was obvious that rain was imminent. Apparently the Drag Week Gods had decided to punish us with driving in rain for every decent amount of sleep we took this year!

Rachael brought back breakfast from McDonalds at about the same time the Motel breakfast room opened, so we doubled up! Just as we fired up our cars to leave, the rain stepped up it's tempo considerably. I followed Rachael out onto KS-14, and it wasn't bad for the first five or six miles, then we transitioned onto US-50, and it was a completely different road surface that definitely didn't agree with the M/Ts and the rain, it was white knuckle time until we jumped back on 14 a few miles down the road. The few minutes head start we had on the brothers stretched with every phone call I made to Boone, as it sounded as though they were getting more rain than we were. With the storm traveling the same direction we were, Rachael and I cleared the leading edge a good ten miles earlier than they did. By the time we drove through Haven Kansas on KS-96, the roads were pretty much dry. KS-96 dumped us off on I-235 so we could skirt around the southwest edge of Wichita, then the route sheet called for us to exit onto US-81 South, which is a small two lane that basically runs parallel with I-35 Kansas Turnpike. Rachael and I pulled into a gas station just after exiting, and I called Boone. We decided they would stay on I-35 to Wellington, so they could get Darren's E-85, since the only station was on the turnpike, and then they would re-join us in Wellington.