While most people are wrapping up their weekend on Sundays and preparing for the workweek, National Hot Rod Association Top Fuel drivers are hard at work in their land rockets.
On a wild day in Charlotte, North Carolina, at the Betway NHRA Nationals, fans were treated to an extraordinary afternoon of championship racing that is the hallmark of the NHRA. Wild as in, all three of the top qualifiers from Saturday were eliminated in Top Fuel, Funny Car, and Pro Stock.
This 6-race period that began last week at the Pep Boys Nationals will determine the world champion in all classes, so the stakes are as high as the expectations most teams at this juncture of the season have.
In Top Fuel, Antron Brown seemingly came out of nowhere to beat points leader Justin Ashley in the final. With the win, Brown leapfrogs Mike Salinas and Brittany Force into second place behind Ashley with four events remaining. His 71st NHRA win was also a record-tying sixth victory at the zMAX track. Brown took Ashley to task on his specialty, which is the hole-shot. This was the key to his championship run. Brown's reaction time was .02 better than Ashely's.
Brown and his Matco Tools machine eliminated top qualifier and fading driver Brittany Force before dispatching Clay Millican to set up the duel against Ashley.
Funny Car's Ron Capps snatched his 72nd NHRA win by barely squeaking out a win over Alexis Dejoria as both cars coasted to the line on dead engines. The win vaults him over Matt Hagan into second place just 27 points behind leader Robert Hight. After a disappointing outing in the first race of the Countdown to the Championship last week, Capp's found the rhythm with his NAPA Auto Parts Toyota that earned him the U.S. Nationals Championship in Indy.
Dejoria, laboring down in ninth place in the Countdown's eleven Funny Car field, eliminated Hight and second place Matt Hagan to gain a shot at her first win since 2021 in Bristol. She was strong enough to jump to sixth in the standings.
The Pro Stock class was won by Aaron Stanfield and his Janac Brothers Camaro by getting by Matt Hartford with a hole-shot of his own to get his seventh career Pro Stock win. Even better, the win took him from fifth place in the title race to second place, just 64 points behind leader and teammate Erica Enders and her Elite Motorsports car.
The third race in the Countdown to the Champion takes the racers to Madison, Illinois, for the NHRA Midwest Nationals, September 30th-October 2nd.
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