Burkart pulls off ‘Strip’ surprise

Monday, April 5, 2004 | 9:29 a.m.

Phil Burkart Jr. provided one of the few surprises at Sunday's NHRA SummitRacing.com Nationals at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway by earning his first Funny Car victory in almost five years.

In the two other professional categories, Tony Schumacher picked up his third Top Fuel victory in four races, as did Greg Anderson in Pro Stock.

Burkart advanced through the Funny Car bracket as the 12th qualifier and knocked off Tim Wilkerson, Gary Scelzi and John Force to advance to the final against Whit Bazemore. Burkart's second career victory was sealed when Bazemore's engine gave out at half-track.

"We didn't have any easys, we didn't have any gimmes, we just picked all the big dogs off one by one today," said Burkart, who ran a 5.029 at 264.03 mph to Bazemore's 5.452 at 189.50 in the final.

"Like my father said for years, 'If you're in the show, anybody can win.' When I won Columbus way back in '99, I was qualified number 14 -- I guess maybe it's the element of surprise."

There was nothing surprising about Anderson's victory in the Pro Stock category he has dominated the past year. In addition to winning three of the first four races of the 2004 NHRA Powerade Drag Racing Series season, Anderson posted his third consecutive victory at The Strip.

Anderson, who drives the Vegas General Construction Pontiac Grand Am for Las Vegas businessman Ken Black, ran a 6.849 at 201.31 mph in the final and edged Kurt Johnson (6.908 at 200.08) by about 15 feet for his 19th career victory.

Anderson, the reigning NHRA Pro Stock champion and top qualifier this weekend, established a category record last year by winning 12 races and is showing no signs of letting up this season.

"I'm almost impressed with myself," Anderson said. "I don't ever let myself dream that high and (have) big expectations but I just seem to keep astounding myself.

"The car will not do anything wrong. It loves this racetrack ... I wish they had 10, 12 races here and I'm going to start lobbying for that. It's a great place for me to win, obviously, with the KB Racing team being from here."

Anderson now has won 13 of the past 20 Pro Stock races dating back to last season.

"I can't even imagine what we've accomplished and what seems to happen every week -- we seem to get better and better," Anderson said. "I keep telling people that this team is going to progress. It's going to get better, but how much better can it get?

"I keep waiting for the ball to drop and (for) somebody to find a big gain and somebody to reel us in and catch us, but it seems to be going the other way. I almost feel bad for the competition but no I don't."

Neither does Schumacher, who defeated two-time defending Top Fuel champion Larry Dixon in Sunday's final with his fastest run of the weekend (4.525 at 331.53). Schumacher has won six of the past 11 races dating back to last season.

"It was a hard day," said Schumacher, who had to defeat Scott Weis, top qualifier Scott Kalitta and Doug Herbert for the right to meet Dixon in the final. "I started out (in the) ninth position and didn't have lane choice.

"It was tough because we (had) won two races, we're leading the points and we have a lot of pressure -- and we should. A lot of guys have pressure catching but we have pressure leading and we want to stay that way; we want to stay focused."

Doug Kalitta, who had the fastest run in NHRA history at 335.57 mph during qualifying Saturday, needed to post a run of 332.22 mph Sunday to have his mark certified as a national record. Kalitta was eliminated by Dixon in the second round and was not able to back up his Saturday speed.

Burkart made the biggest move in the Powerade points standings, vaulting from 11th to fifth in the Funny Car standings. Del Worsham, who lost to Bazemore in the first round, holds a 71-point advantage over John Force.

Schumacher padded his lead in Top Fuel points to 110 over Brandon Bernstein and 112 over Doug Kalitta, who slipped from second to third in points.

Anderson's victory allowed him to extend his lead in Pro Stock to 92 points over Kurt Johnson, who trailed by 66 points going into the race.