Heading into the most recent NHRA Div 5 event at Tri-State Raceway in Earlville, Iowa, all plans for Nick Folk to compete with his 2010 K&N equipped American Dragster in Super Comp, but with some quick changes literally as the team rolled into the gate, he ended up running Top Dragster and drove away with the event win.
Nick Folk's Super Comp American Dragster
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"We pulled into the race kinda late, because I had put the kids on the school bus," he explained. "You know, we're rolling into an NHRA points race at like, 10:30, seems like everyone else has been there for a day already. [laughs] I'm lying in the back and [brother] Brian is driving and says 'there aren't any parking spots anywhere, what is that all saved for Top Dragster?' I perked up in the back and said, 'Good, we have a Top Dragster car.' And that's how I decided to run Top Dragster. Got there, took the throttle stop off and there are never that many cars in the class at that race."
With only twenty-one cars entered for Top Dragster, there would be no bump spot to worry about and even with no power adders, Folk easily put himself in the number seventeen spot with his 7.266. That ladder position turned out to be a very good place to be.
"Really for first round, I didn't get the best pairing when I had to run John Lobner, you know that wasn't the best qualifying on the ladder," he pointed out of his relief of getting past first round. "It just worked out. I didn't change converters, that's the way the car runs in Super Comp, you know I just didn't turn the [throttle] stop on."
In round two, Folk took off with a nice .003 light and before he even made it too far down the track saw his win light come on, courtesy of Mike Wharram's .001 red. That set him up for a match up with Dan Phelps. Continuing with his 7.26 dial, Folk once again had the handicap and left first with a .024 light. Although behind by .012 in the reaction time department, as luck would have it, it was an easy win for Folk after Phelps experienced pretty severe tire shake and had to lift shortly into the run.
What happened in the final two rounds was rather interesting, to say the least and what should have technically been the semifinal, actually in some ways ended up being the final.
First, paying close attention to air and track changes, Folk dialed his car up two-hundredths from where he had been in earlier rounds to a 7.28 before meeting up with who would be his final competitor Ryan Smith. After edging him at the hit by .011, Folk took a narrow .008 at the stripe and posted a 7.296 on that 7.28 dial to Smith's losing 7.043 on his 7.03 dial.
On the other side of the ladder, Hank Brown was unable to make his semifinal round bye run and that meant that Folk would have a very unusual single in the Top Dragster final, all he had to do was take the tree and the Top Dragster Wally and all that goes with it, was his.
"The guy [Brown] won at six cars, but I guess he blew his stuff up," said Folk. 'So he couldn't show up for the bye run at three cars. So when I raced the guy in the semi's, that was technically the final."
"These two dragsters that we have right now are just the two best cars we have ever had," he continued. "We finally put data loggers on them and I'll never build another car without one. Attention to detail, is probably the only thing we have changed this year, and between Brian and I, we are probably having the best year we have ever had, with him winning Indy and what I have been able to do, too."
"One thing we haven't changed is the way we protect our motors and that's with everything K&N," said Folk. 'We are looking forward to adding the K&N scoops to our cars, we have heard nothing but great stuff about them from all kinds of racers that we respect. K&N just doesn't put out anything that isn't the absolute best and when you are running motors that cost what these do and what we demand out of them, you can't mess around with anything that you don't trust one-hundred percent."
The Folk family took one brief weekend off, to spend at home, before heading to the next event on their 2011 schedule, the Jeg's SportsNats in Columbus, Ohio at National Trail Raceway, September 22-25.
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