Tony Pedregon is recovering after fiery crash
DRAG RACING
He has second-degree burns on his hand after his car explodes in first-round race at Pomona Raceway; fireball distracts him from deploying parachutes.
Tony Pedregon felt lucky to be alive after his spectacular crash Sunday at the 48th Carquest Auto Parts Winternationals at Pomona Raceway.
Pedregon, the two-time and defending funny car champion who grew up in Gardena, was matched in the first round against John Force, the man for whom Pedregon won the 2003 title.
But Pedregon, who now owns his own team, jumped the start and red-lighted, giving Force the automatic victory in the first round.
Pedregon didn't know it, and continued to run his Quaker State Chevrolet Impala down the track. After reaching the midway point on the quarter-mile strip, his car exploded.
He and Force -- whose elapsed time was 4.805 seconds -- crossed the finish line side by side, Force about 18 inches ahead. Pedregon's car hit the wall on the left side while doing "about 290 mph" he said, then on the right in Force's lane, and another time as the car spun about 180 degrees to a stop.
Distracted by the fireball, Force was late deploying his parachutes and ended up in the sand runoff area at the end of the drag strip.
Pedregon emerged from the destruction under his own power but suffered second-degree burns on his right hand. The fire, he said, "burned through six layers of my fire suit on my leg" and also singed his eyelashes.
"Worst crash, worst fire, worst experience I've ever had in a race car," Pedregon said. "I kept telling myself, don't let me hit hard, kept telling myself to keep driving it because I don't want to die today.
"I remember John, brake, fire extinguisher, stay alive."
Among his checklist was reaching for his parachutes, but they burned off in the massive explosion, which came in the first event since 2000 in which the NHRA allowed teams to run a mixture of 90% nitromethane.
The fire was so hot, he said he saw white spots, and the heat was so intense he could not keep his right hand on the steering wheel.
After going to Pomona Valley Medical Center, he returned to the track with his hand bandaged.
"I still got people asking me for autographs," he said. "It would look like a second-grader."
Force, whose arms and legs were mangled in a crash in September at Texas Motorplex, was making his first competitive pass since undergoing extensive rehabilitation. He limps badly and doesn't have the same hand and arm strength as he did previously.
