Funny Car rookie Mike Neff finally collected his first round-win and made his first trip to the final round in the same day, but when Tim Wilkerson edged ahead of Neff after an incredible wire-to-wire race, he earned a victory at his home track and took the Funny Car points lead for the first time in his career.

A drastic weather change created havoc for the Pro Stock cars, but there were other surprises in store for the doorslammers, including a final-round .144 launch for freshly returned Dave Connolly that sent well-tuned Kurt Johnson straight to the winner's circle and a dethroning of Team Summit final-round kings Greg Anderson and Jason Line, who have traded final-round showings every event this season. Andrew Hines raced ahead of a broken Matt Smith to win while recording his 16th Pro Stock Motorcycle pass in the sixes, and "Hot Rod" Fuller earned the Top Fuel Wally in a great side-by-side race with Tony Schumacher.

Tim Wilkerson

Wilkerson has been on an incredible streak this season and earned his fourth No. 1 qualifier in seven races and his second win of the season - the seventh of his career - at the event. The driver of the Levi, Ray & Shoup Chevy Impala earned lane choice and opted to be in the first pair of Funny Cars down the track, which was revealed to be a good choice when he defeated a tire-striking Tony Bartone. Second-round opponent Del Worsham was up in smoke right off the starting line, and Cruz Pedregon followed suit in a haze of smoke. Wilkerson advanced to the final round in what appeared to be a flawless flopper; he posted 4.82 passes in each of the first three rounds.

"I don't know what to tell you; the emotions are out of control," said Wilkerson. "It was all I could do at the other end of the track just to get out of the car. Thank you, this gets the monkey off our back. We ended up qualifying No. 1 a couple time this year and couldn't even get out of first round, so we're pretty proud of this deal. My guys are just doing a terrific job working on the car, and the track was good all day.

"We're sure happy to be here; I've never been in the points lead in anything in my life. We're really surprised to be able to tell you at this point of the year that we're doing this well. I hope when the new cars come out in Denver and we have to start with our new car that won't put a damper on my performance.

"If you lose your handle on what's going on with those cars, it's really hard to get it back. But just through tenacity and a lot of help from a lot of people out here, I don't think there's one crew chief in Top Fuel or Funny Car that hasn't helped me at one time or another with some stupid question I had. They're probably all kind of upset about that now, but we're happy about it ourselves. We're just doing the best that we can do."

John Force Racing rookie Neff pulled off perhaps the biggest surprise of the weekend when he earned his first round-win in his Old Spice Ford Mustang and kept right on going, first defeating Funny Car newcomer Melanie Troxel, 4.904 to 4.920, then running down Troxel's teammate, Mike Ashley, with a 4.924 to Ashley's 4.959 pass. In the semi's, Neff made a clean pass next to his teammate Robert Hight, who took the starting-line advantage but shook the tires.

Force, the winningest driver in NHRA history, was looking to reach a great milestone at Gateway Int'l Raceway on his 59th birthday. All he had to do was qualify and win one round to earn his 1,000th round-win, a milestone that has never been reached in the sport, and he did just that when he deep staged for a first-round holeshot win over Ron Capps.

Rod Fuller

Though crew chief Rob Flynn was a little under the weather earlier in the weekend, he tuned Fuller to a 15th final round, Fuller's first of the season, and his seventh win. The Caterpillar dragster pilot is on an upswing; after two consecutive first-round losses, he posted a semifinal finish in Atlanta last week to Schumacher and avenged the loss with a final-round victory in Madison for his first win since the 2007 ACDelco Las Vegas NHRA Nationals.

"I kind of had a chip on my shoulder from what happened to me last year," said Fuller. "Leading the points all year long and losing to [Schumacher]. It's a great gratification when you beat him. What can I say about David Powers Motorsports? Four finals in a row for us and three wins, that just tells you how strong this organization is.

"More importantly, this race meant two really big things for me. I wouldn't have gotten this opportunity without the death of Darrell Russell. A lot of people don't know this story, but Darrell was from Houston, and Chris, Burnell, and Gwen [Russell's brother, father, and mother] along with David Powers had the idea to put this team together because that's what Darrell wanted to do, was to have his own team one day, and when they did, they hired me. Part of the reason why they hired me was because Darrell was a Sportsman racer, and they wanted to come after a Sportsman racer. What an honor for me to get that call and to represent the Russell family and David Powers. This trophy is going to Chris Russell. I had to fight tears down there, because this really meant a lot to me.

"The other thing is my mom hasn't been in great health. She's never seen me win Top Fuel, and she was down there at the end when I got out of the car. It's not about the money, it's not about the trophy, it's not about all this stuff, it's about when I got out of the car and she was down there and she had tears in her eyes. If it wasn't for my mom and my dad and all the sacrifices they made ...What a great day. If I look back on it, this takes all those six prior wins, puts them all together, and means more because I had my mom here -- and my dad -- and I got to embrace her at the end. I feel very, very blessed."

Fuller laid down consistent 4.530, 4.570, and 4.591 passes and advanced to the final round on three consecutive tire-smoking opponents: Cory McClenathan, who uncharacteristically smoked the hides right off the starting line; Dave Grubnic, who started from the No. 1 spot for the eighth time in his career, lost traction at about half-track; and Doug Kalitta, who was up in smoke from the 330 marker. In the final, Fuller drove the Cat digger to a winning 4.525 against Schumacher's 4.583 effort despite Schumacher's tenth-of-a-second starting-line advantage.

Reigning NHRA POWERade world champion and current points leader Schumacher drove the U.S. Army rail, under the guidance of crew chief Alan Johnson, to his fourth final-round appearance of the year. For Schumacher, a final-round showing at Gateway Int'l Raceway felt familiar; he won here in 2006 and runner-upped to Gary Scelzi in 1999. This weekend's runner-up falls in line with a season that has begun much better than the previous year, when Schumacher had five first-round losses prior to this event.

Schumacher started from the No. 2 position and took out Morgan Lucas in the first round in a side-by-side race, 4.531 to 4.604, before a second-round match with Alan Bradshaw, who struck the tires early. Schumacher lost traction a little farther down the track and got it back to turn on the win light but lost lane choice to semifinal opponent Hillary Will, who didn't benefit from a last-minute lane change and hazed the tires next to the Don Schumacher-owned dragster.

Kurt Johnson

Although his father, Warren Johnson, missed the Pro Stock field, it was a remarkable weekend for K.J., who, in his 69th final-round appearance, drove his ACDelco Chevy Cobalt to a win over Connolly and earned his 37th victory. During qualifying, Johnson recorded a 6.598, the fastest pass of his career, and set a new track record for speed with a 209.39 blast.

"It looked pretty tough out there," said Johnson. "There was a lot of tire shaking, and we've had our lifelong fill of tire shake for years. I think everybody just kind of underestimated the racetrack. The grind job they put on it is the same grind job they put on Atlanta, and it was exceptional for me, running that [6.581] this morning. I was scared to touch it after that, but we knew we had to make some changes, so we changed the gears around, changed the clutch around. The whole ACDelco crew just came together, and we did what we needed to do.

"That's what it's all about. We just had a great day. It's brutal out there. Every run is a challenge."

Johnson's quick 6.581 in the first round beat Todd Hoerner's career-best 6.619, and jaws dropped when the margin of victory between Johnson and second-round opponent Jeg Coughlin was revealed to be a ridiculously close .0001-second. Johnson advanced to the final round easily when V. Gaines went red in the semi's, and in the final round, it was all K.J. when Connolly seemed to have experienced extreme distraction at the starting line. The last thing anybody expected was to see was notoriously quick leaver Connolly produce a .144 start, but the Charter Communications Chevy Cobalt camp revealed that the late launch was a result of a mechanical issue.

Connolly, the defending event champion, entered the event looking to make up a pile of points after missing the first five starts of the season and returning to the field last weekend in Atlanta. In the first round, Connolly was quick out of the gate and had his hands full soon after leaving the starting line but reeled it back and beat Ron Krisher on a holeshot. Second-round opponent Allen Johnson was dead in the water with tire shake off the starting line, and in the semi's, Connolly had troubles but got a major break when Anderson broke in the lane next to him and coasted to a winning 8.851.

Anderson's teammate and No. 1 qualifier Line stunned the crowd with a wild run next to John Nobile. Nobile moved toward the centerline and shut off early, but Line's engine erupted into a shocking ball of fire, and Nobile coasted to the win. Line was unhurt, but his Summit Racing Pontiac GXP will need a little work before the next event.

Andrew Hines

It was the fourth stop in the NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series for the Pro Stock Motorcycle class, and Hines made the most of it, adding to his string of six-second runs that now totals 16. Hines, the No. 2 qualifier who is currently coined as a runaway freight train, made the quickest run of eliminations, a 6.875, in his first-round victory over Joe DeSantis, and continued to rule the field on his Screamin' Eagle Vance & Hines Harley-Davidson, posting wins over Karen Stoffer, 6.901 to 6.970, and Chip Ellis, 6.905 to 6.941, before meeting defending event champion Smith in the final round. Smith had trouble downtrack and sat up on the bike, and Hines raced across the finish line to collect his second win of the season and 15th of his career.

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