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 Veteran Nostalgia Funny Car driver Jason Rupert was likely sleeping easy Sunday night.

Earlier in the day, Rupert captured the Nostalgia Funny Car crown at the 2018 California Hot Rod Reunion presented by Automobile Club of Southern California.

Rupert claimed the title by clocking a 5.634-second time at 259.51 mph run in the finals in his Camaro Funny Car to defeat Rian Konno’s 5.855-second 241.84 mph lap at Auto Club Famoso Raceway in Bakersfield.

The victory was extra special for Rupert, a multi-time Nostalgia Funny Car champion, since the plan is for him to start competing in NHRA’s Mello Yello Drag Racing Series in the nitro Funny Car ranks as he purchased the complete Funny Car operation from the late Steve Plueger's estate.

“I’m not sure if I’m through racing, but I am going to concentrate efforts on the big-show car for sure,” Rupert said. “It means a lot (to win this race) because there were a bunch of people speculating we had some sort of illegal device on our car and that’s the reason we were blowing it up because we had to take it off and that wasn’t the case at all. To come back out here, and if this is my last race in Nostalgia, to end my Nostalgia racing career like this is the perfect way to do it. It means a lot.”

Rupert’s victory parade consisted of wins over Tony Jurado, Matt Bynum, season champion Bobby Cottrell and then Konno. Although Rupert had a memorable Bakersfield performance, getting to the winner’s circle Sunday was quite the journey. A journey which included Rupert breaking his ankle during the season.

Rupert is the son of former nitro racer Frank Rupert.

“That was terrible,” Rupert said. “We got back from Tucson (Ariz.) and it felt like we had our problem fixed and I had an accident in my shop and broke my ankle and that was just terrible. I broke my thumb once, but I don’t consider that bad, but the recovery of that (broken ankle) and waiting it for it to heal so you can come back was not easy. I went to a couple of races, probably a little premature because after holding that pedal clutch in with that nitro motor on the starting line, you don’t realize how much force is on it. I couldn’t walk for a week after that. I feel good now and it is a great way to end the season.”

Rupert acknowledged there were times in his career when he thought winning races was the last thing that would happen for him.

Like a year ago at this race. At the 2017 CHRR weekend where he made three top three qualifying runs, only to have them erased when his car put oil on the racing surface, rendering him a DNQ.

“I thought that a lot,” said Rupert when asked if he thought he was cursed. “Then, you have to dig out of a hole. There are peaks and valleys. You get down there and you have to crawl back out and start running again. I think every drag racer goes through that. I try a lot of stuff and when you try stuff and some stuff isn’t proven because you’re trying to keep ahead and get ahead there is always that element of failure that can pop up. If it works and gets you ahead, that’s worth it, but you have to be careful with what you try. We might all be cursed.”

Rupert said getting everything back in place with his team was a work in process throughout the season.

“We went up and ran Spokane (Wash.) after I broke my ankle and the first couple of runs I was timid and didn’t have a whole lot of confidence because of breaking my ankle and blowing all the stuff up at the end of (last year) and the beginning of this year. Then, we ran really good in that altitude and I thought you know what next weekend we are going to Seattle and I think we can run 260 (mph) and we did, and I felt like we were back.”

As good as Rupert felt, things weren’t smooth sailing this weekend in Bakersfield.

“The parachute kept falling out for some reason and I was thinking what in the heck is going on,” Rupert said. “Basically, we got that fixed and that 5.638 run we made in first round the parachute actually came out and I thought I drove through oil or something down there because the motor spiked up in an instance and I shut it off. Luckily, we have photographers out here because Brad got a hold of a picture that showed that the parachute was coming out so prematurely that it was actually lifting the back end of the car off the ground when I was still on the throttle. Right then, it was like we know what is going on, we should be able to go fast now.”