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For Immediate Release
Contact: Dave Densmore, denswood@aol.com / 214-244-0008, mobile

 

TORRENCE SLIPS A SPOT AT HOUSTON
Loses Close Decision to Millican in Round Two

April 26, 2015 -- Unable to capitalize on a first round upset of J.R. Todd, Steve Torrence lost a position in the Mello Yello driver standings at the conclusion of Sunday’s 28th annual O’Reilly Auto Parts Spring Nationals at Royal Purple Raceway.

Torrence’s second round exit at the wheel of the Capco Contractors Top Fuel dragster, coupled with veteran Doug Kalitta’s first win of the season, dropped the Kilgore, Texas resident from sixth to seventh in points exactly one quarter of the way through the 2015 season.

As has been the case for the last year-and-a-half, Torrence ran well enough to win.  Unfortunately, the guy in the other lane in Sunday’s second round, Clay Millican, ran just a little bit better.  Millican won in 3.765 seconds.  Torrence trailed at 3.798.

In the last four races, the 31-year-old Texan has lost races even though he has run 3.899, 3.849, 3.859 and 3.798.  The average margin at the finish line?  A mere .067 of a second. 

“We know we’re really close to turning the corner (on a performance improvement),” Torrence said, “but that doesn’t make it any easier when you lose.  Once again, we had a good car.  We won a round that most people figured we wouldn’t (against Todd), but we’ve got to find a way to build on that.”

Although he got his car to the finish line ahead of Todd’s Red Line Oil entry in round one, it took all his starting line savvy to do so.  The No. 11 qualifier, he forged a narrow lead at the start (.047-to-.054 seconds) that made his 3.759 a winner over Todd’s 3.755 by .003 of a second.

“Those are the races we haven’t been winning,” Torrence said, “so maybe that’s a turning point for this Capco team.  Any time you beat one of the Kalitta (Motorsports) cars, you’ve done something.  Against Clay, we made a solid run but he made a great run.  The good thing is (crew chief Richard) Hogan took some big steps this week to get us where we need to be.

“This car was new at Gainesville and it’s a lot different (from the old one).  It hadn’t been running hard to 60 feet or to 330 but he’s been tweaking on it and it had good early numbers Saturday and today so we’re definitely gaining ground in performance even if we’re losing a little bit in points. 

“I feel really good right now,” said the former Top Alcohol Dragster World Champion (2005).  “The car’s running well, I’m driving well and we just announced a strategic partnership with the Chris Kyle Frog  Foundation to work with military families and families of first responders.  The only thing we’re missing is one of those little gold men (a winner’s trophy).”

 

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