Peter Russo and wife Helen have been living out their Nitro Funny Car dreams on US soil for a long time but arguably one of the greatest highlights of their career came early this morning Australian time when the Victorians qualified into the quickest NHRA Nitro Funny Car field in history with a personal best of 4.04/302mph.
The Russos have put veteran Canadian driver Jeff Arend into the seat for recent events, leaving Peter to concentrate his efforts on tuning the Murray Anderson-built car. The move appears to have paid off with the 4.04 coming in the third session of qualifying at Las Vegas and putting Arend into the #16 spot.
With pre-event goals simply a 4.10 or better and a healthy motor, it is needless to say that those goals have been well and truly surpassed.
The team will face top qualifier Jack Beckman in round one on Sunday.
