![]() ![]() That would put my career where I would like it to be.” But he said, “I really do have a desire and I think I am young enough and still have the skill set to maybe win a third championship. Pedregon will be 60 years old by the start of this year’s Countdown. The fact that we were able to close the deal (in the most recent race) says something.” We are racing guys out here like Jimmy Prock and Guido (Dean Antonelli) that have been running at the top of the game for years and came out here and pretty much dominated. Pedregon said, “I am even amazed at how quick it came together, because that normally doesn't happen. They switched to a six-disc clutch and made “a lot of little changes” to their engine program. We welcomed Lee with open arms,” Pedregon said. and said we need to change our program completely. I decided (at the start of the Countdown) I wanted to change course, and I called J.C. and the team that has been grinding with me for two years credit, because what Lee brought to the table fit what we were already doing. ![]() “We added Lee to the team, and I want to give J.C. It’s as good as the great McDonald’s ’92 car that dethroned the great John Force. The Snap-on Tools Dodge driver, Funny Car winner of the 2022 season finale, Cruz Pedregon found the missing element for perfect chemistry in consultant Lee Beard to supplement the performance of crew chiefs John Collins and Rip Reynolds.Ĭoupled with that, he declared his Charger “the best race car I have ever driven, by a longshot. “Tony Stewart loves me already,” Prock said, referring to his days racing midgets and sprints out of Stewart’s shop.Īnd if Tony Stewart loves Austin Prock, that’s good enough for us. “Maybe Tony Stewart will love you and buy you a new car,” someone suggested. It ain’t even cheap to drag it up there, let alone level it top to bottom.” It ain't cheap to blow one of these things up. It was the fact that how much money we were spending. It wasn't even so much that we lost that round. “We weren't doing a good job, and it was wearing on me, and I exploded. Tony Stewart saw Bode’s passion, said he loved that, and bought him a replacement helmet. The move was reminiscent of the time young Funny Car driver Bobby Bode expressed his displeasure last spring at Houston with his car blowing to pieces in his first final-round appearance by throwing his helmet. Consider an episode last August at Topeka when Prock lost patience at with his Top Fuel dragster “after blowing that thing up left and right.”He got out of the car and punched it, injuring his hand. And he has his sights on making up for being what he called “the weak link of John Force Racing” - a moniker that comes with being the organization’s lone driver without a championship. That’s a large part of why the confident John Force Racing driver rebounded from a frustrating string of performances to win the first and final race of the six-event Countdown last season. Matt Hagan set the track record in Funny Car at this year’s event in February, going 3.823-seconds at 333.41, while Brittany Force went 3.643 at 337.92 to set the Top Fuel track records in 2020.The 27-year-old Top Fuel hard-charger’s crew chief, Joe Barlam, said Austin Prock “is on kill all the time." John Force’s eight wins in Phoenix leads all Funny Car drivers. Schumacher has five career victories at the facility. Wild Horse Pass Motorsports Park has seen several historic and record performances on its dragstrip, including Tony Schumacher’s historic 330-mph run in 1999. ![]() “With interest from multiple NHRA member tracks within each region across the country, we are excited about the possibilities for a future NHRA national event.” “Our focus remains on making the NHRA an incredible experience to our fans, race teams and partners, and we are working on several new destinations,” Cromwell said. NHRA officials say that the series will look at venues not currently on the NHRA schedule to fill the void, starting in 2024. “The NHRA Arizona Nationals have provided NHRA fans countless memories for many years, and our race teams, partners, and NHRA officials look forward to celebrating the track in 2023 as we close out this chapter in NHRA history.” “We want to thank Wild Horse Pass Motorsports Park and the Gila River community for their dedicated commitment to drag racing,” NHRA president Glen Cromwell said. The facility has hosted NHRA racing since 1985.
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