Tonglet won for the second consecutive time Sunday and third time in four outings since that Ohio stop when he defeated Hector Arana Jr. in the Lucas Oil Nationals finale at Brainerd, Minn. It improved his 2011 final-round record to 4-0.
The Nitro Fish/Tonglet Racing Suzuki GSXR covered the quarter-mile in 6.954 seconds at 191.27 mph to Arana’s 6.961 at 193.43 – a margin of six-thousandths of a second.
“It’s pretty crazy,” Tonglet said of his performance. “We feel like our jinx is gone. Usually this year we’ve been winning a race and then going out early in the next one, so we broke that jinx. This was a lot better result here than it was last year” (when the team’s only motor broke).
He began eliminations with a 6.925, 192.17 win over Angie Smith, then stopped Chip Ellis, 6.955 at 190.48, and Eddie Krawiec by sixth-thousandths on a hole shot (.013 to .084), 6.956, 191.24 to 6.904 at 194.07 to advance to the finals.
The impressive showings lifted him to third place in series points with 683 – one behind second place and 52 behind leader Kraweic’s 735.