JACK BECKMAN HOPES MOMENTUM CONTINUES IN THE RACE ON THE STRIP AT LAS VEGAS

Jack Beckman’s Valvoline/Aaron’s Funny Car team, steadily improving through the first two races of the 2011 NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series season, wants to keep the ball rolling up hill this weekend in the 12th annual SummitRacing.com NHRA Nationals here on the Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

The 44-year-old Don Schumacher Racing driver qualified second and reached the semifinals during the last race, after a first-round defeat in the inaugural contest of the year.

According to Beckman, “I’m not sure about momentum in drag racing. I think it can be overrated, but, having said that, I think the Valvoline/Aaron’s Funny Car team has some.

“We’ve had two weeks off since the last race, which is unique this year this early in the season. Like almost every other driver, I wish we could have gone right back to racing the week after the Gatornationals.

“We just can’t wait to get back out there.”

Las Vegas is close to being a “home” race for the Southern California native and he has always enjoyed competing here.

“I won a lot of races here in my sportsman cars,” he said. “And I won the first time I raced here in a Funny Car (the 2006 fall Las Vegas event, his first season with DSR).”

The weather forecast for the race weekend ranges from the 90s during Friday and Saturday’s qualifying rounds to 80 for Sunday’s eliminations, but Beckman does not see this as an issue.

“It seems there is a greater weather window here, from 80-95 degrees, than most tracks,” he said. “This unique situation means the crew chiefs have more to do. For the drivers, if it is hot, it means we sweat a bit more when we put the helmet on; the crew chiefs sweat all the time dealing with weather conditions like this. They have to figure it out; for the drivers, it is business as usual.

“And the conditions are the same for the cars in both lanes, so no one has an automatic edge.”

Beckman comes to Las Vegas in fifth place of the 2011 NHRA Full Throttle Funny Car championship, with a strong desire to get into the winner’s circle.

“Every driver wants to have a multiple-win season,” he said. “ You can’t achieve that without getting your first win and it helps to do this early in the year.”