The fastest automotive racing in the world returned to Sears Point Friday at the The DENSO NHRA Sonoma Nationals. The cool track conditions helped racers break multiple records throughout the day, and the fastest person in automotive racing on earth broke her own record Friday.
The Queen of Speed
Brittany Force – once again – broke the NHRA record for fastest drag car, running a record-shattering 3.645 ET at 343.16 mph, becoming officially, again, the fastest woman in automotive racing on earth. “It [her car] moved around,” she said when speaking about the run. “I almost pulled my foot out of the thing just to play it safe, and I thought, nope. I could get her there,” Force said.
She singlehandedly takes the first seed heading into the second day of qualifiers.
“When I got to that finish line, my guys came on the radio and I couldn’t hear anything. They popped back on, they said ‘Did you hear me?’ and then they repeated the run, and I said, ‘You’re joking, right? You guys aren’t messing with me? What’s going on?’ when I jumped out on the top end [of the drag strip], I knew what the mile per hour was, and I was just pumped for all of us.”
Ring around the track record.
Force wasn’t the only one to break a record Friday, as it was a dogfight to beat the fastest mph in track history for the Pro Stock category. Drivers Greg Stanfield, Aaron Stanfield and Cory Reed jockeyed for the title, with Greg prevailing after the second round of qualifying, running 211.43 mph. Greg holds the top position heading into Saturday’s qualifying runs.
Funny Car Blues
Multiple Funny Cars suffered either engine problems or tire slippage, leading to poor qualifying runs throughout the night. Driver Matt Hagan leads the pack heading into Saturday’s runs with Spencer Hyde, Paul Lee, Austin Prock and “Fast Jack” Beckman rounding out the top 5.
Hagan reflected on the tight race for points overall this season. “I think that’s a big thing to consider,” he said. “We need to get as many points as we can on Prock and Beckman. I think we’re only a couple points out of second, we need to eat up some points here, we ate up four points tonight.”
Pro Stock Motorcycle
Richard Gadson sits in seed No. 1 heading into Saturday for the Pro Stock Motorcycle category, with Matt Smith, John Hall, Gaige Herrera and Angie Smith rounding out the top 5.
Purse on the line.
What has become an annual occurrence at Sonoma Raceway, the DENSO NHRA Sonoma Nationals hosts the GETTRX All Star Pro Stock Motorcycle Callout racing series once again. The race consists of the top eight racers in the category to have a bracket race competition for a coin-purse of $25,000. The catch: the drivers’ school-yard pick their opponent to race.
The No. 1 seed Gaige Herrera called out No. 8 seed Chris Bostick, much to Bostick’s amusement. “Picking at the old guy, huh?” he chuckled. No. 3 seed Matt Smith called out No. 6 seed Chase Van Sant. Richard Gadson then called out Jianna Evaristo, which led to Angie Smith matching up against teammate John Hall.
The DENSO NHRA Sonoma Nationals continues Saturday.
