It’s not a lack of speed that has kept Steve Torrence from finding greatness this season.
The CAPCO Contractors dragster qualified second at the season-opening Gatornationals at Florida’s Gainesville Raceway, fourth at the ensuing Winternationals at In-N-Out Burger Dragstrip in California and No. 1 at last weekend’s Arizona Nationals at Firebird Motorsports Park.
“We’ve been working on that the last year and a half, two years, to make the car quicker and make the car faster and that’s ultimately just power,” Torrence explained.
He mentioned the team has hit 337 mph a few times in testing, and his 336.23 mph run during Friday’s qualifying session at Firebird Motorsports Park was one of the fastest passes he’s ever logged.
“I definitely think this is the quickest race car I’ve ever been in,” Torrence said. “I feel like we can set the national record in the right conditions.”
Unfortunately for the CAPCO team, speed only solves half of the equation.
It’s a lack of consistency that has stunted Torrence’s win record over the opening trio of races on the NHRA Mission Foods Drag Racing Series schedule.
“We’ve had some things, couple little gremlins that bit us at Gainesville (Raceway) and at Pomona,” Torrence said. “We got some stuff going on that we’re working to find to try to identify and isolate. We made some big steps on that through the last week and a half.”
Torrence lost by a mere .0085 seconds to Justin Ashley in the semifinals at the Arizona Nationals — a painful defeat, despite being an improvement on his quarterfinal finish two weeks prior.
“The consistency’s not as good as it has been before, but it’s coming. That’s what we won championships on is consistency, but you ultimately need to be quick and fast as well,” said Torrence, who is a four-time Top Fuel champion.
Overall, it’s been a solid start to the year for the CAPCO team, with Torrence and his 65-year-old father, Billy Torrence, both representing the family-owned operation this year.
The elder Torrence began his first full-time Top Fuel season by flaunting the red-and-white CAPCO colors in the Gatornationals finale, where he finished runner-up to Shawn Langdon.
“I think he (Billy) just needs to get some more lap time and more experience,” the younger Torrence said. “He’s never had the opportunity to just go out there and really back-to-back, week-in and week-out drive one of these things. And that’s what it takes to be better.”
In addition to the extra seat time he’s getting, Billy Torrence has another asset in his corner. His dragster is being tuned by Jason McCulloch and Joe Barlam, who both studied under championship-winning crew chief Alan Johnson.
“That’s a proven set of crew chiefs over there, kind of a newer crew that we’ve assembled,” Steve Torrence said. “They’re all doing a really good job.”
The Torrence duo will turn its attention to the NHRA 4-Wide Nationals at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway this weekend, with Steve Torrence attempting to win his seventh four-wide national event in six years.