Drag Illustrated Issue 120, April 2017 | Page 92

CLOSE-UP Patience Tested Farber’s season starts with frustration and promise M assachusetts’ Pete Farber kicked off the 2017 Pro Mod season with a strong showing and elimination round win at the RPM Pro Mod Winter Warm-Up in mid-February, and followed it up with the Amalie Motor Oil NHRA Gatornationals at Florida’s Gainesville Raceway in March. Returning to the most competitive doorslammer competition on the planet with his supercharged CRC Automotive Brakleen ’69 Dodge Daytona, Farber got back to racing after a long winter off-season. During the downtime, his car was gone over from front to back. A refreshed engine and updated technology throughout also meant Farber would be ready to race all season long, and Adam Lambert at Preci- sion Racing Suspension helped to dial in the Daytona’s suspension setup. At February’s RPM Winter Warm-Up event at Orlando SpeedWorld, Farber qual- ified fourth with a 5.849 at 250.55 mph hit. He also set the top speed for the class, and went on to get a big first-round win in eliminations. The race prepared him well for the start of the NHRA season, and Farber headed to Gainesville in top form. There, qualifying for the NHRA Pro Mod race began on Friday afternoon. Farber had a good launch, but his car got loose early in the run. During the second session that evening, the Daytona didn’t cooperate and produced massive tire shake near the 330-foot mark, prompting Farber to abort the run. He put down his quickest pass of the weekend during Saturday’s third session, but the numbers weren’t able to break him into the Top 16 as the extremely competitive