CONCORD, N.C. – It’s not good when you bend the chassis of your race car and unfortunately for John Force Racing, that’s a problem they’ve had to deal with a few times this year.
John Force, John Force Racing’s team owner and the 16-time Funny Car champion, said Friday that the team has been battling the problem a large portion of the year. It wasn’t just on his car either, but also the car of his two-time Funny Car champion teammate Robert Hight.
“The biggest problem we had with the car wasn’t smoking the tires or being too weak, it was really the car was undriveable and we found chassis’ that were bending,” Force said. “We couldn’t figure a lot of that stuff out.
“They were bending on a regular basis. So was Robert’s.”
The problem hasn’t seemed to slow John Force Racing down this year, as Hight has won five times and leads the Funny Car standings while Force himself has two victories, including a triumph in the U.S. Nationals at Lucas Oil Raceway.
On the plus side, Force says they have figured out the problem and he doesn’t expect to have to fix any more bent chassis’ as Hight and Force work to bring another championship to John Force Racing.
“We just found some things that were wrong and we had to change the cars and it wasn’t because of my weight,” Force joked. “We got that fixed.”
– Reigning NHRA Funny Car champion J.R. Todd and his Kalitta Motorsports teammate Shawn Langdon got to have a little fun ahead of the NTK NHRA Carolina Nationals at zMAX Dragway.
On Wednesday Todd, Langdon and the Kalitta Motorsports crews visited the home base of sponsor WIX Filters to meet with employees. They also brought along their Funny Cars, which they fired up for those in attendance.
“We got to take both Funny Cars out to Gastonia and warm up the cars for the folks there at WIX Filters,” Todd explained. “A lot of them haven’t seen a nitro Funny Car in person or are not able to come out to this weekend’s event. We got to warm them up side-by-side with Shawn’s team and whack the throttle back and forth.
“Between the two of us it was close to a dozen throttle whacks. That was pretty cool. Finally Jon (Oberhofer, crew chief) said that was enough, because I think we’d still be there whacking the throttle if they let us.”
– Entering the NTK NHRA Carolina Nationals, the top-five in Funny Car points are separated by 53 points. Hight leads the standings, with John Force, Jack Beckman, Ron Capps and Todd all within striking distance at the third of six races in the NHRA Countdown to the Championship.
“In the Funny Car division it seems like nobody wants to carry the ball,” Capps said.
– Jack Beckman visited the media center for a press conference, but there were few questions for the 2012 Funny Car champion. Instead of returning to his Don Schumacher Racing pit, Beckman hung around and watched amateur competitors make passes down the strip.
“I’m going to pretend I’m still up here,” joked Beckman as he stepped away from the microphone to watch the cars run down the strip.
– Justin Ashley, attempting to qualify for his first National event in the Top Fuel class, impressed with a solid day that left him 10th overall in the Top Fuel field heading into rounds three and four of qualifying on Saturday at zMAX Dragway.
– A strong field of Pro Stock entries are on hand for the NTK NHRA Carolina Nationals, with 19 cars fighting for a place in the 16-car field. Eighteen competitors took time in the Funny Car and Top Fuel classes, meaning two racers from each of those divisions will not get to compete during eliminations on Sunday.
– Speaking of the Pro Stock division, fans looking over the qualifying results from Friday may have noticed the same last name appearing a few times. The Cuadra family is represented in the Pro Stock class by father Fernando Cuadra and his sons, Fernando Cuadra Jr. and Cristian Cuadra.