Brown steals the show

Antron Brown made his first 4.49-second pass of his career today in just his second ever run in a Top Fuel dragster.

Antron Brown is rookie in a rookie in the Top Fuel class this season.

He just doesn't drive by one. The former Pro Stock Motorcycle rider stole the show today after taking the top spot in Top Fuel with an impressive 4.495-second run at 330.07 mph.

"That was a great run," Brown said. I can't say enough of my Matco Tools team. I'm not a rookie racer, but I'm a rookie driver. My team has made this transition real easy.

"This is such a great race car. It's almost driving itself. It's making a lot of horsepower and the numbers are coming up on the board."

Kurt Johnson in Pro Stock and Cruz Pedregon in Funny Car aren't the top qualifiers in their respective classes, but they did manage to make the best runs of the day in their individual categories.

Pedregon, who failed to qualify here at the Auto Club Finals in November, cruised to a 4.830 at 321.27 mph. Scott Kalitta, who smoked the tires today, is still No. 1 in Funny with his 4.818 run he made Thursday.

"For me, I don't worry too much about going low e.t.," Pedregon said. "I'd rather come out and run another 4.83 and maybe follow it up with a 4.81.

"I've been doing this long enough to know that consistency is what works out here."

For Johnson, moving over to the left lane was what worked for his Chevy Cobalt.

"We took the information from Thursday and just applied it to that left-hand lane," said Johnson, who moved up to No. 2 in Pro Stock with a 6.646 today. Greg Anderson is still No. 1 with the 6.635 he ran on Thursday.

. "It looks like that left lane is probably a couple (hundredths of a second) quicker.

"I hope its not a one-lane track on Sunday, but moving over there made a difference today."