Severance, Bartone Continue Vegas Dominance

Courtesy of Todd Veney/Pro Sportsman Association

Top Alcohol Dragster veteran Joey Severance, appearing in his sixth final in eight years at the Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, and Tony Bartone, who was in his fifth Top Alcohol Funny Car final in a row there, scored again at the desert supertrack. Severance edged Chris Demke by about a foot, 5.45 to 5.44, for the SummitRacing.com Nationals title, and Bartone nipped emerging star Shane Westerfield, 5.66 to 5.69, for his 37^th career win.

"I don't know what it is about this place, but it's my second-favorite track in the world," said Severance, who is a co-owner of Woodburn Dragstrip. He and Demke actually made their worst runs of eliminations in a final decided by just three-thousandths of a second. Severance, who has countless .00 lights to his credit, got off the mark first with a .057 reaction time and ran a 5.45, and Demke cut a .070 and clocked a 5.44. Demke's Operational Solutions/Peen Rite/801 entry broke a lifter three seconds into the run and eventually kicked a rod.

Demke defeated Jegs Allstars West Region leader Ray Martin in one semifinal matchup, and Severance won the other over Megan McKernan, who had upset Jim Whiteley in round two. Whiteley went up in smoke after qualifying No. 1 for the 15^th time in his career.

Severance and father Joe Severance, a two-time national event winner in the late '70s, qualified No. 3 and took out Johnny Ahten in round one and Garrett Bateman in the HipLink A/Fueler in the quarterfinals. Demke qualified No. 5 on his only attempt and eliminated Ashley Sanford, who made her debut at this event, in round one and Aaron Olivarez in an odd second-round race in which both drivers were affected by Demke's flickering stage light.

Demke now has runner-ups in both national event starts this season, including one to nemesis Whiteley at the Winternationals, and until the final appeared to have his recent parts-attrition problems behind him. "We've blown up some stuff, trying to get better down the road," he said. "If we don't change something, we'll do no better than second place in the points like we did last year."

For the second time in three years, Top Alcohol Funny Car came down to Bartone versus Westerfield, who was in the third final of his young career – all against Bartone. "I'm getting a little tired of it," joked Westerfield, the new national points leader, who now stands 0-5 against Bartone overall.

Bartone, who swept both national events in Las Vegas in each of the past two years, qualified No. 1 and set low e.t. and top speed with a 5.58, 261.47 in the third and final session. He was on the bump until then. "I love this track," he said. "Why don't we run all the races here?" In eliminations, he dropped Hannes Wernhart and Winternationals runner-up Jason Rupert with consistent times of 5.65 and 5.64.

He was vulnerable in the semifinals with a .306 reaction time against Jirka Kaplan, who would have been long gone with a .009, but Kaplan's Bearspaw Petroleum car smoked the tires at the hit. "I haven't done that in years," Bartone said of his double-step. "That guy leaves off of a button [with a trans-brake] and I was trying to cut a light and got caught up in the heat of the moment. But I got the car down the track and we won – that's the important thing."

TAN