Photos by: Alexis Owens, Adam Dobbs, NHRA
Competition Plus’ Water-Cooler Topics From The NHRA Nationals at the Rock outside of Rockingham.
1 – HAGAN’S FULL-CIRCLE MOMENT – Let the record reflect that Rockingham (NC) Dragway now holds victory No. 1 and No. 59 for Matt Hagan.
The opponent was even the same.
Eighteen years after Hagan beat Paul Lee in an IHRA Funny Car final at Rockingham, the two lined up again Sunday in the NHRA Nationals at The Rock. Hagan won again, this time with considerably more at stake.
Hagan powered to a 3.922-second pass at 327.75 mph as Lee lost traction, giving the four-time NHRA champion his fourth victory this season and 59th of his career. Hagan beat Dave Richards, Ron Capps, and J.R. Todd before dueling Lee in the final.
The victory pushed Hagan’s championship lead to 84 points over Jordan Vandergriff with four races remaining. It also marked his fourth consecutive final-round appearance, meaning it was also his second straight to begin the six-race Countdown to the Championship.
Then there was the Rockingham history.
Back in 2008, Hagan was a rookie Funny Car driver still trying to figure out a machine that seemed equally capable of winning races and trying to burn itself to the ground.
“I was on fire a lot. I felt like John Force back then,” Hagan said. “I was earning my stripes early on and we blew the steering wheel off the car and we pulled the heads off of it and the crank would fall off of it out of the bottom.
“And I really sat down and was like, ‘This thing might kill me. I don’t know if I want to keep doing this.’”
Yet he did, and four championships and 59 wins later, he found himself back at Rockingham lined up against Lee again.
“I didn’t know until we were right there to the final,” Hagan said. “It’s stuff that kind of makes the hair on the back of your neck stand up. You’re going like, ‘Wow.’”
The symmetry wasn’t lost on him.
“Just how ironic and how wild that is to be able to kind of repeat history a little bit,” Hagan said. “It’s pretty cool that it came full circle again, and here we are once again winning at The Rock.”
This time Hagan left Rockingham chasing something considerably bigger than establishing himself as a Funny Car driver.
“We have the parts and pieces and the people to do it,” he said of a potential fifth title. “It’s just a matter of us doing our job and stepping up and rising to the occasions.”
2 – THE PART-TIME, FULL-TIME TEAM GETS THEIR WINS – Paul Lee took a step back from the full-time tour, but as he has said, no matter how many races his team runs a year, it rolls through the gates with a chance to win.
He put words to action after reaching the semifinals, having taken out Cruz Pedregon and Alexis DeJoria to reach that point. Lee then took out a surging Austin Prock to reach the finals.
It was a great weekend for Lee, who debuted IGTG.com and PerimeterOne.com sponsorships.
“We’re a professional full-time team, racing part-time,” Lee said. “That’s what we are. We have a team as good as anyone out here. I’m really proud of my team and everybody loves racing with us. IGTG, Scott, the whole crowd, thanks for being with us this weekend and giving them a good show.
“I’ll tell you what, we’re out here to win. When we come out here to race, we’re here to win. We’re not out here just to qualify or go rounds, we’re here to win.”
3 – LANGDON SWEEPS THE NEW VENUES – NHRA added four new facilities to the schedule for the 2026 season. Six months later, Shawn Langdon can boast something no one else can: He won all four.
Langdon completed the sweep Sunday at Rockingham Dragway, beating Kalitta Motorsports teammate Doug Kalitta on a holeshot in the Top Fuel final and giving The Rock its first 340-mph run in the process.
Langdon left with a .024-second reaction time and covered the track in 3.739 seconds at a booming 342.73 mph. Kalitta was quicker with a 3.722 at 330.40, but Langdon’s starting-line advantage and massive speed at the finish made the difference.
The victory was Langdon’s third straight, following wins at the U.S. Nationals and the Great Lakes Nationals. He’s 2-for-2 in the Countdown to the Championship postseason.
It is also his second three-race winning streak this season. With four races remaining, Langdon now has seven victories and owns a 25-point advantage over Kalitta.
“We knew for the final round we had to make a picture-perfect run,” Langdon said. “AJ [Alan Johnson, Doug Kalitta’s crew chief] has been running really well. He’s got a great handle on that car. The Mac Tools guys have been doing a great job, and Doug’s been really lights-out this year. I knew going to the final, I had to figure out a way to find something on the starting line.”
Langdon needed it.
Kalitta had been four-hundredths quicker in the semifinals, leaving crew chief Brian Husen with some homework and Langdon knowing there was little room for error.
The result was about as close to perfect as they could ask.
Langdon defeated Cam Ferre, Billy Torrence, and Shawn Reed before facing Kalitta, putting considerable separation between the Kalitta teammates and everyone else. Tony Stewart sits third, 155 points behind Langdon. Kalitta Motorsports has now won 11 of the season’s 16 events.
“We’re out here to win races and you have to be perfect in order to do things like this,” Langdon said. “We’re just bonding together and working hard and keeping our heads, working just as hard for the next one.”
4 – WELL, BACK IN MY DAY – There was a day when Greg Stanfield saw himself as one of the young guns in a Pro Stock class loaded with seasoned veterans. That was roughly 25 years ago.
Now Stanfield looks around, sees the young talent coming after him, and figures there is no better place to be than right in the middle of the fight.
Stanfield proved Sunday at Rockingham Dragway that experience still travels pretty well.
He defeated rookie Cody Anderson on a holeshot in the final round of the NHRA Nationals at The Rock, running 6.537 seconds at 210.48 mph after leaving with a .019-second reaction time. Anderson was quicker at 6.525, but Stanfield had already done the decisive damage at the starting line.
The victory was Stanfield’s second of the season and eighth in Pro Stock, moving him into the championship lead by 31 points over Matt Hartford and 39 over Dallas Glenn.
Stanfield earned every bit of it. He beat his son Aaron, Matt Latino, and reigning NHRA champion Glenn, cutting a .005 light against Glenn in the semifinals before taking down Anderson.
“Anybody can win in this class right now,” Stanfield said. “I mean, it is incredible how tight it is. The points battle is going to go all the way to the end.”
The irony isn’t lost on Stanfield. When he came into Pro Stock, racers built their cars, served as crew chief, worked on their engines, and often drove the transporter, too.
Today, the veteran can concentrate on driving — and occasionally sitting down between rounds.
“So at my age, I feel great,” Stanfield said. “I can come back, make a run, I’ll go sit in a chair and go, ‘Man, this is nice, not [having] to worry about what the next call is.’ So I’m enjoying it. I love racing with Aaron. So, I’m having a blast.”
5 – PLAYING THE GAME – Richard Gadson didn’t have the quickest motorcycle at Rockingham Dragway. Fortunately for him, that wasn’t mandatory for a victory Sunday.
Gadson decided survival was more important than swagger, and four green lights later, the reigning Pro Stock Motorcycle champion was holding the Wally and carrying a larger points lead out of town.
Gadson won the NHRA Nationals at The Rock when teammate Gaige Herrera left .018-seconds too soon in the final. Gadson went 6.789 seconds at 199.65 mph for his third victory this season and seventh of his career, increasing his championship lead to 64 points over Herrera with four races remaining.
“I feel like I got away with one out here this weekend,” Gadson said. “It wasn’t fancy, it wasn’t glamorous, it wasn’t headline worthy, but we’re here holding our third Diamond Wally here at Rockingham Dragway.”
The starting line became as much an opponent as anyone in the other lane.
Gadson said reaction-time characteristics during the past two events – brought into play by a different timing system than the racers had seen all season – forced riders to adjust. For someone who has spent years training himself to attack the tree, his solution was counterintuitive — practice slowing himself down.
He used an app Saturday night until he fell asleep, practiced again Sunday morning, and returned to it in the trailer between runs.
“In order to win the race, you’ve got to be green four times,” Gadson said. “So that was my motto today.”
Herrera chased elapsed time. Gadson chased win lights.
“Gaige went for the E.T., and he got away with it for three rounds, and we decided, ‘You know what, man? We’re just going to race our lane,’” Gadson said. “So this weekend it was survival, and I had four green lights and it got me a win here at Rockingham Dragway.”
There was psychological warfare, too. Gadson admitted publicly declaring Herrera had the better motorcycle and calling it his race to lose was calculated. The longtime grudge racer isn’t apologizing for using every available weapon in a championship fight.
“I’ll take whatever I can get, whatever edge I can get, whatever I can do,” Gadson said. “The gloves are off.”
And Gadson knows exactly where his advantage might have to come from.
“So if it’s psychological warfare, then that’s what it is because I can’t beat them in E.T. warfare,” Gadson said. “I’ll take what I can get.”
6 – CLOSE ENOUGH – Michael Stavrinos didn’t have the quicker race car in Sunday’s Pro Mod final at Rockingham Dragway – but he had something Justin Bond couldn’t overcome, and that was the starting line.
Stavrinos used a .039-second reaction time and a 5.664-second pass at 254.09 mph to steal the NHRA Nationals at The Rock final on a holeshot. Bond was quicker at 5.656 and faster at 257.29, but by then Stavrinos had already gobbled up enough real estate to make the difference.
The payoff was bigger than another Wally.
Stavrinos’ second victory of the season and fifth of his career vaulted him into the JBS Equipment NHRA Pro Mod Drag Racing Series points lead for the first time this year. With two races remaining in the Road to the Championship, he holds a razor-thin nine-point advantage over Bond. Pro Mod teams are back in action next weekend (Oct. 2-4) at Madison, Ill., and wrap up their season Oct. 29-Nov. 1 in Las Vegas.
Nothing about the trip to the final suggested Stavrinos had stumbled into the opportunity.
He took out Kevin Rivenbark before eliminating reigning NHRA titlist J.R. Gray and veteran Rickie Smith. Then, with the championship lead effectively a duel between himself and Bond, Stavrinos delivered where drivers get paid — on the starting line.
“I was focused as I could be,” Stavrinos said. “What a day at Rockingham. This place is awesome and to get the first win here, that’s just great. I love it here and my team is amazing.”
Bond didn’t exactly back into the championship round, either. He defeated Mike Castellana, Tony Wilson, and Derek Menholt to reach his fourth final of the season.
Menholt remains close enough to make Stavrinos and Bond uncomfortable, sitting third and 43 points out of the lead. Billy Banaka is fourth, 84 points off the pace.
7 – REED STILL FUMING – Apparently Shawn Reed hasn’t calmed down after last week’s ruling his 11th-place finish in the regular-season points standings didn’t qualify for a Countdown to the Championship berth despite having attended all events. Reed alleged NHRA said he was okay to miss a session back at the NHRA 4-Wide Nationals, and then reneged on the permission.
“NHRA, they didn’t let me in the Countdown this year, and I’m pretty pissed off about it and my guys are pretty pissed off about it,” Reed said. “So all we can do is come out here and hopefully we can get a response out of NHRA. But for now, we can just come out here and piss people off and that’s all we aim to do.
8 – YOUNG BULL BEATS OLD BULL – Be careful what you ask for because you just might get it. Greg Anderson told his son and fellow Pro Stock racer Cody Anderson to, “kick my ass,”
Never say Cody Anderson doesn’t listen to his old man.
The younger Anderson left the line first, .034 seconds to .060, and never looked back as his dad pushed in the clutch, winning with a 6.532, 209.30.
“It’s so bittersweet right now,” Cody said. “A little emotional. I’ve always rooted on my dad and here we are, we’re beating him and, yeah, that’s tough. But I’m looking forward to going to the next round and we beat two greats today, so we’re having a great day.”
9 – WHAT DID I DO TO YOU? PART 2 – Last weekend at the NHRA Great Lakes Nationals, Daniel Wilkerson was cruising through the first round of eliminations until he ran into a suddenly on-track Jordan Vandergriff, who had gotten the derailed Cornwell Tools Funny Car back on track.
Wilkerson wasn’t necessarily derailed in Rockingham, but his 13th-best run of 3.98 seconds in qualifying wasn’t the worst in Funny Car – nor was it in the ballpark as Jack Beckman’s 3.911.
Wilkerson won it on a holeshot with his best run of the weekend, a 3.931. 327.27 that beat Beckman’s 3.916, 324.44. The margin at the finish was 6/10,000ths of a second.
“That’s a pretty lucky win, I think,” said Tim Wilkerson, Daniel’s father. “That’s a great team over there, but Dan’s doing a great job and I’ve been letting him down. So I thought it’d go a little faster than that, to tell you the truth. I wouldn’t have beaten anybody else in this round, but we were racing the right guy and God bless that.”
Daniel didn’t care – a win is a win.
“I finally got one, huh? I’m just so proud of these guys,” Dan said. “We had some adversity this weekend. These stupid funny cars do stupid funny car stuff, so we overcame a little bit there on that run.
“Team owner Randy Gloede was a little nervous about racing Jack Beckman first round and I told him, ‘We did that on purpose, bro. We were stock racing again. We’re back to our bracket-racing days. We’re loading the ladder on purpose. We got to get these big guys out of here first.’”
“We’re not trying to just be eighth, ninth, seventh, we’re trying to win this whole stupid thing.”
10 – PLOURD LOSES AND WINS TO HEADLINE SPORTSMAN – Brad Plourd came within one round of pulling off a Rockingham double. When that opportunity disappeared, he found another way to make the inaugural NHRA Nationals at The Rock memorable.
Plourd lost the Stock Eliminator final to Cody Phillips, then returned to win Right Trailers Top Dragster, becoming only the third driver in NHRA history to win national events in seven categories.
Phillips made sure the double was never going to be easy. He drilled the Tree with a perfect .000 reaction time and ran 10.351 on his 10.31 dial to defeat Plourd by .012 seconds, roughly two feet, for his second career Wally.
Plourd didn’t have to wait long for another shot. Steve Furr went red by .001 in the Top Dragster final, handing Plourd his first victory in the category and putting a seventh eliminator on his NHRA résumé.
Joe Carnasciale won Competition Eliminator despite Monty Bogan’s .012 reaction time to his .084. Carnasciale chased him down with an 8.876 against his 9.46 F/EA index for his fifth career Wally and second this season.
Super Stock ended at the starting line when Dan Fletcher left .002 too soon, turning the win over to Bryan Worner. The victory was Worner’s ninth career Wally.
Hayden James made his first national event final count, cutting a .003 light and running 8.920 on the 8.90 Super Comp index to defeat Mike Robilotto for his first Wally.
Tim Powell finished the Sportsman winners list with a .007 reaction time in Super Gas. Jock Lisenby broke out with a 9.854 against the 9.90 index, giving Powell his third career Wally and second this season.
10B – DO WHAT???? – There’s a few nuggets of information that often slips out in starting line and shutdown interviews.
“We’ve made up some really good points this weekend, ran hella good yesterday. We made Saturday our bitch.” – Alexis DeJoria discussing her team’s good Saturday performance after her first round win.
“Cameron is a fantastic driver. If the man just had a good race car, he would be a world champion.” – Top Fuel team co-owner Jerry Freeman after his driver Cameron Ferre gave Shawn Langdon a challenge in the first round.
“That’s the second time that car has gone down the track, and I’ve had about 10 different tuneups in it.” – Rob Wendland, after his driver Clay Millican defeated Tony Stewart in the first round.
“It feels like the good ol’ DSR days.” – Matt Hagan on his second-round match against former teammate Ron Capps.
“Yeah, well, the interim crew chief, he’s making headway for the real thing.” – Shawn Reed correcting top-end announcer Courtney Enders after she described Ryan Elliot as his crew chief getting his first round win.
“There is something about racing dad that seems to get to Aaron Stanfield.” – NHRA announcer Jason Galvin after Aaron went red against Greg Stanfield in the first round.
“I was trying to keep my composure because I love America and firing up. It’s just so patriotic here, but what a great place to race.” – Maddi Gordon after beating Justin Ashley in the first round.
“Let me tell you, [at] half-track it was pulling me. It pulled my head down and toward the finish line, it wanted to move me inside again.” – Jordan Vandergriff on his first round win over Chad Green.
SATURDAY NOTEBOOK – SOLD OUT CROWD TREATED TO A GREAT DAY OF RUNS WHILE REMINICING ABOUT THE GOOD ‘OL DAYS
1 – SOLD THE JOINT OUT – NHRA took a chance on Rockingham (NC) Dragway. On Saturday, the fans answered.
NHRA officials announced a sellout for Saturday’s round of the inaugural NHRA Nationals at The Rock. Fans packed the grandstands for the second day of qualifying and delivered another strong attendance statement during the sanctioning body’s 75th anniversary season.
For Rockingham, though, this one carried a little more meaning.
The historic North Carolina drag strip underwent extensive work in preparation for NHRA’s return, including a new racing surface and facility upgrades. Throw in rain and the usual headaches that come with breaking in a new surface, and the weekend arrived with its share of unknowns.
By Saturday, there wasn’t much mystery left in the grandstands.
“This is just incredible,” Rockingham Dragway co-owner Dan VanHorn said. “These teams are just off the charts. All the weather, the rain, the brand-new facility, brand new surface, and they’re getting down and making us look good, and the NHRA is making us look good and we’re all just really proud.”
Rockingham was the fourth and final new stop added to the NHRA Mission Foods Drag Racing Series schedule during its 75th anniversary season, joining South Georgia Motorsports Park, Maryland International Raceway, and U.S. 131 Motorsports Park.
All four produced sellout days.
Saturday’s crowd at Rockingham also represented the 10th sellout day of the 2026 NHRA season, a list that began with the season-opening Gatornationals in Gainesville, Fla.
2 – LEADERBOARD REMAINS UNCHANGED – They threw another full day of qualifying at Rockingham Dragway on Saturday, and nobody managed to move the four names sitting atop the professional leaderboards. Ron Capps, Doug Kalitta, Matt Hartford, and Angie Smith started the day as provisional No. 1 qualifiers and ended it the same way for the inaugural NHRA Nationals at The Rock.
Capps’ Friday run of 3.870 seconds at 330.40 mph survived every Funny Car shot Saturday, giving the three-time champion his fourth No. 1 qualifier of the season and 41st of his career. The payoff is a first-round bye Sunday, valuable real estate with the Countdown standings still packed tightly.
“We were praying that nobody would outdo us because that first-round bye is huge,” Capps said. “The points are still pretty bunched up. We gave up some ground in Martin. We’re just trying to forget about it, put it behind us.”
Alexis DeJoria qualified second at 3.892, 334.82, while reigning NHRA champion Austin Prock was third with a 3.892 at 326.80. Capps enters eliminations looking for his fourth victory of the season and 81st of his career.
Top Fuel competitors couldn’t match, much less better, Kalitta’s Friday 3.682 at 338.09, leaving the reigning class champion with his sixth No. 1 of 2026 and 72nd of his career. Tony Stewart’s 3.704 at 336.83 secured second, while points leader Shawn Langdon, Kalitta Motorsports’ other driver, qualified third at 3.732, 334.08.
Hartford made it three consecutive No. 1 qualifiers in Pro Stock when his Friday 6.476 at 212.87 held up Saturday. After consecutive runner-up finishes at Indianapolis and Martin, Hartford gets a first-round bye Sunday as he tries to convert another strong weekend into his fourth victory of the season.
Reigning NHRA Pro Stock titlist Dallas Glenn qualified second with a 6.478 at 212.06, followed by Matt Latino’s 6.479 at 211.67. Just three-thousandths separated the top three heading into eliminations.
Angie Smith completed the qualifying sweep when her 6.674 at 201.61 remained quickest in Pro Stock Motorcycle. It was Smith’s fourth No. 1 qualifier of the season, and also rewarded her with a first-round bye.
Gaige Herrera qualified second at 6.680, 202.07, with Matt Smith third at 6.681, 204.17.
3 – NOT THE SAME ROCKINGHAM – No one had to tell Ron Capps this was a different Rockingham Dragway than the one he last raced on in the 1998 NHRA Winston Invitational. The grandstands still crowd the racing surface and the memories remain, but what Capps felt through the seat of his Funny Car belonged to another Rockingham.
That was probably a good thing.
Capps reached the Funny Car final the last time NHRA raced here, driving
for Don Prudhomme. His current crew chief, Dean “Guido” Antonelli, was on John Force’s team back then, giving the two veterans different views of the same Rockingham era.
“I was there the last time NHRA raced here. I was in the final round, actually,” Capps said. “It’s funny because Guido and I, we’re like these two OG dogs.”
The memories started coming back before Capps ever staged.
“We were pulling up the first run, I said, ‘Man, I’m having flashbacks from this left lane because you have to pull up around the tower, a hard left and get it over in the left lane for the burnout,'” Capps said. “He was on John Force’s team back then and I was driving for Don Prudhomme, so we got great memories, just different ways we came about.”
Thursday’s rain forced NHRA’s Safety Safari into extensive track work, including an area roughly 200 to 400 feet down the left lane where getting rubber to adhere had been an issue. By Friday, Capps couldn’t tell from inside the car that anything had happened.
“Completely different track,” Capps said. “And it used to be pretty bumpy.”
Capps remembered having only one parachute deploy on a run at the old Rockingham, an experience he believes would have put him into the sand or possibly the net. This time, the shutdown area produced no drama.
“It’s a short shutdown, but very smooth,” Capps said. “They did a great job.”
Even one of Rockingham’s most unmistakable throwbacks remains — the concrete grandstand sitting almost on top of the left lane.
“If you sat in the first one or two rows, you for sure felt like your eyebrows were getting singed by the Top Fuel headers,” Capps said. “It is by far the coolest grandstand to sit in for a Top Fuel race.”
Capps came back looking at a place loaded with memories. He left Friday impressed by something he never remembered about the old Rockingham, just how smooth it was.
“I made my run in the left lane and we were No. 2 at the time, but smooth,” Capps said. “I couldn’t believe how smooth it was.”
4 – STILL THE SAME PAUL SMITH – Paul Smith is 80 years old, has been racing nitro cars at Rockingham Dragway since the days when tuners drove them, and already knows when he’ll finally retire – when he’s gone.
Smith returned to The Rock this weekend with longtime friend and former track owner Steve Earwood helping sponsor his Funny Car. Their relationship reaches back to the 1970s, when Smith was racing here and Earwood was working the other side of the guardwall as a promoter.
“I love racing with my family, and I love Rockingham, and we’re going to give it another shot this weekend,” Smith said.
Smith raced in AHRA, IHRA, and NHRA competition, winning three IHRA races in 11 final rounds. He finished runner-up for the 1974 NHRA Funny Car championship and later won NHRA national events as a team owner and tuner.
He’s also a holdover from another era, when a Funny Car driver often doubled as his own crew chief.
Smith pointed to Dale Armstrong and Ken Veney as examples of racers who drove, tuned, and worked on their own cars because independent teams didn’t have much choice. Smith’s operation remains a family affair with sons John “Bodie” Smith and Mike Smith involved, along with granddaughter Megan Hartman-Smith, an A/Fuel racer who holds a Top Fuel license.
Smith hasn’t ruled out eventually putting Megan in his Funny Car. He also provided a Smith-style explanation of why that transition shouldn’t be taken lightly.
“I mean a dragster, you treat it like a lady,” Smith said. “A funny car, you say some bad words to it and you make it happen.”
The sport Smith grew up in has changed considerably, particularly financially. He might run eight or 10 races annually while leading teams can spend heavily testing and servicing components at intervals an independent operation cannot match.
“I’m not crying poor,” Smith said. “We’re not poor or nothing, but I mean if you want to take two million dollars and turn it into one million, buy a funny car.”
That’s where Earwood enters the story. For Smith, his friend’s support isn’t another sponsorship transaction.
“When you know a guy like Steve Earwood, it ain’t about the money,” Smith said. “It’s about friendship.”
Smith still calls drag racers carnies — people who arrive, put up their show, race for their money and move to the next stop. He’s been doing it for more than half a century, and age hasn’t changed the plan.
“People say, ‘When are you going to quit or when are you going to retire?’” Smith said. “I say, ‘When I’m gone. If I can keep scraping up the money, I’m going to keep doing it.’”
5 – BACK WHERE IT ALL BEGAN – Justin Ashley can laugh about it now. Ten years ago at Rockingham Dragway, one of Top Fuel’s better starting-line launchers apparently had trouble finding the starting line.
Ashley was 21, the last car he’d driven was a Junior Dragster, and he was making his Barry Brown Top Dragster debut in conditions hardly suited for breaking in a rookie. The wind was howling across the racetrack, and Ashley remembers rolling through the staging beams on one of his first attempts.
“The first time I tried to stage, I’m pretty sure I rolled right through the beams,” Ashley said. “And it took us a little while. We got the license. We had a great weekend. We didn’t qualify, but I just had such a good experience racing with Barry Brown and his family at Top Dragster.”
A decade later, Ashley returned to Rockingham as a 19-time Top Fuel winner with a 193-111 round-win record. He graduated to Top Alcohol Dragster in 2017 and Top Fuel two years later.
None of that was on his radar at Rockingham.
“My thought process was, ‘Okay, Top Dragster. Let’s see how this goes and then we’ll go from there,’” Ashley said. “And one thing led to another, and it led to Top Alcohol Dragster and Top Fuel.”
That first Rockingham weekend was memorable for other reasons. Top Sportsman champion Ronnie Davis died following a crash, and photographer Ian Tocher was badly injured.
Ashley also remembers Top Dragster team owner Barry Brown making a run in the difficult conditions and refusing to move his car at the top end until word was sent back that Ashley shouldn’t make another pass.
“He didn’t feel like it was safe and it wasn’t safe for me, so for him to take a stand and do that was really neat,” Ashley said.
Ashley came to Rockingham trying to learn to race a Top Dragster. Ten years later, he returned knowing considerably more about the race car — and the sport.
“And to think about 10 years ago being here, and aside from Junior Dragsters, that was really the kickstart to my NHRA career, to where I am today and all the people that have helped along the way, it really is, it gives me a lot of gratitude,” Ashley said. “So nice to return to the place where it all started.”
6 – GREEN RIDING SOLO – Chad Green had already made his run last Monday at Michigan when son Hunter Green launched in the family’s second Funny Car. From the top end, the elder Green could only listen to the radio as an engine explosion turned Hunter’s run into something no racing father wants to witness.
Then came the message Chad needed most: Hunter was out of the car.
“I was listening to it on the radio right when he took off and heard he blew up, he was in the wall,” Green said. “I looked up and I could see him getting the car shut down, car hopping around. I saw that he got shut down.”
The damage was substantial enough to keep Hunter out of this weekend’s NHRA Nationals at the Rock at Rockingham Dragway. The Funny Car is undergoing front-half repairs, leaving Chad as the only CGM Funny Car in competition.
“Of course I was concerned, but I also heard on the radio that he’s out of the car,” Green said. “So once I heard that, I knew he was going to be alright.”
There was also a racer’s perspective once the father knew his son was safe. Nitro Funny Cars have a way of teaching lessons that cannot be duplicated in a classroom or explained during a team meeting.
“It was a rough weekend for him, but a lot of good experience comes from that, all that stuff that happened to him last weekend,” Green said.
“Not that you want that to happen, but if everything just always goes smoothly, you don’t gain much experience from that. It reminds him how much you’ve got to respect these cars because they can hurt you.”
Hunter had been scheduled to compete at Rockingham, but the damage to the car will also cause him to miss St. Louis. Chad said the team expects the repaired car back for Dallas, with Hunter also planning to race Las Vegas and Pomona.
Rockingham carries its own significance for the elder Green. Long before nitromethane became part of the family business, Green made his first Pro Modified licensing runs at the track.
“That’s really the only history I have,” he said, “but it’s still cool because that was in the beginning when I first got into Pro Mod, and now to be back here racing nitro Funny Car’s pretty cool.”
7 – ROCKINGHAM’S HISTORIC CONTRIBUTIONS – Rockingham Dragway has never needed a history lesson painted on the wall. The asphalt has done a pretty good job of keeping the receipts.
Long before NHRA returned to The Rock this weekend, Shirley Muldowney and Rickie Smith put their names into drag racing history at this place, nine years apart and in two completely different forms of race car.
Muldowney got there first.
On July 25, 1971, she drove her Mustang to victory at the IHRA Southern Nationals, becoming the first woman to win a national event in a nitro-burning Funny Car. Muldowney defeated Della Woods, Casey Powell, and Tom Hoover before beating Connie Kalitta in the final with a 7.39-second run when Kalitta lost an engine.
The car wasn’t exactly state-of-the-art, even by 1971 standards. Muldowney remembered it as a used Funny Car that didn’t fit her particularly well and required some creative engineering just to make it manageable.
“Had a round steering wheel,” she said. “It had an air slave cylinder in it so I could shift it. I tried using a hand shifter, and I couldn’t even pull it.”
Nine years later, Rockingham’s timing system spit out another piece of paper worth keeping.
During the April 1980 IHRA Pro-Am Nationals, Smith won his first-round race and became the first Pro Stock driver to officially break the seven-second barrier at a sanctioned event, stopping the clocks at 7.99 seconds. The performance came at a time when NHRA’s Pro Stock record remained in the 8.30s.
Smith didn’t initially realize what he had done. When an IHRA official came to retrieve him, Smith figured there might be bad news coming.
“I was happy that I had won, but the next thing I know, I had a race official coming over to me and telling me to follow him,” Smith said. “I didn’t know what was going on. I thought I was in trouble.”
Instead, IHRA President Larry Carrier stopped the race and presented Smith with the 7.99 time slip in front of the crowd.
It was the first in a series of highlights that eventually inspired NHRA to abandon their pounds-per-cubic-inch format and go to a variation of the mountain motor at 500 inches.
8 – THEY NEVER FORGOT HIM – Clay Millican barely had a break from the autograph seekers Saturday morning to squeeze in an interview. That’s to be expected when the good ol’ boy from Drummonds, Tenn., returns to the place where, for a stretch of IHRA history, he practically owned the joint.
Millican competed in 14 IHRA national events at Rockingham Dragway from 2000 through ’06, reached 12 final rounds and won 11. Six consecutive IHRA Top Fuel championships only strengthened his connection with a fan base that clearly hasn’t forgotten him.
“Oh, yeah. It’s bright and early, but the people in this area have not forgotten the kind of run that I had here at this place,” Millican said. “I’ve always credited it, I have a house because of this racetrack right here.”
Rockingham was more than just another stop during Millican’s IHRA domination. He won nine consecutive events here before Cory McClenathan finally stopped the streak at the 2006 Spring Nationals. Millican returned later that year and won again.
“I’ve had more success here, hands down, than any other place I’ve ever raced at,” Millican said. “This place has just been special to me.”
Some of the old information apparently remains useful.
Millican received a text this week from former crew chief Mike Kloeber telling him where to position the car in Rockingham’s left lane and where to drive it.
“He said, ‘Because that left lane’s won us a lot of money,’” Millican said.
Returning to Rockingham also brought back memories that predated the Top Fuel championships. Millican spent part of Thursday riding around the property remembering where he once parked among the pine trees while competing in Top Dragster and Modified Eliminator on the same weekend.
“It made me remember we had a nitrous solenoid stuck closed,” he said, “and I got my butt kicked first round.”
9 – KEEP GETTING PULLED BACK – Joey Gladstone smiles when someone notes that he cannot get away from Pro Stock Motorcycle before it drags him back in, most notably Matt Smith Racing.
Gladstone, who subbed earlier this year for Matt Smith, is racing this weekend as a substitute for Jianna Evaristo, who is recovering from a knee injury.
Gladstone came to Rockingham Dragway primarily to handle the clutch and transmission on Matt Latino’s Pro Stock car. Then came the short-notice call to ride Evaristo’s motorcycle, turning an already busy race weekend into a two-class juggling act.
“It’s not a bad problem to have, right?” Gladstone said. “I mean, it feels pretty good when somebody asks you to ride a caliber bike like Jianna’s. That thing’s nice and it’s an honor to be called upon to ride it.”
There was one complication: Nobody was standing around waiting to take over Gladstone’s KB Racing regular job.
“We didn’t really have anybody to replace me for what I do on the car,” Gladstone said. “So we’ve had to modify what I do a little bit, and I’ve had to lean on my guys and they’ve stepped up and some of the guys are learning, moving up and that’s been really cool.”
Gladstone’s Pro Stock duties aren’t ceremonial. He services Latino’s clutch and builds transmissions according to whatever ratios the crew chiefs want for changing atmospheric and track conditions.
Sometimes the call comes with a stopwatch attached.
“So you got to be ready at a moment’s notice to build a transmission pretty quick,” Gladstone said. “The goal is to do it in under 15 minutes.”
Gladstone figures his personal best on a complete five-speed build is somewhere around nine minutes. Changing only fifth gear can be handled considerably quicker, but the routine is built around being ready when the turnaround gets ugly.
“If it’s a lot of times between the semis and the finals, it’s a really tight turnaround, you got to hammer down,” Gladstone said. “But if you don’t have to do that, it’s good to practice going fast all the time, develop that routine.”
So Gladstone can ride the motorcycle, build the transmission, service the clutch and weld whatever needs welding.
There’s still one job he’d happily add to the résumé.
Asked what his answer would be if KB Titan Racing offered him a Pro Stock driving opportunity, Gladstone didn’t require nine minutes to assemble the response.
“Oh, of course. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. You don’t say no to that,” Gladstone said. “I’ve done a few burnouts in a Pro Stock car, but I don’t even have my license. So how do you go to somebody and say, ‘Hey, I want you to fund my whole next season in a Pro Stock car. Don’t worry, I’ll get my license soon’? But maybe one day. We’ll see.”
10 – ON TAP FOR SUNDAY – Eliminations begin at 11 a.m. EDT on Sunday at the NHRA Nationals at The Rock. Sunday’s television coverage from Rockingham Dragway begins at 3 p.m. Eastern on FS1.
FRIDAY NOTEBOOK – THE ROCK WAS ROARING LIKE IT USED TO
1 – A PIECE OF THE ROCK – Ron Capps didn’t need a luxury suite, acres of pavement, or polished amenities to understand what was happening Friday at Rockingham (NC) Dragway.
He needed only to look around to find the crowd abuzz on the opening day of NHRA’s first full-bore national event at the track.
Capps gave everybody something to look at, driving his NAPA Toyota to a 3.860-second run at 330.40 mph to take the provisional No. 1 Funny Car qualifying position at the NHRA Nationals at The Rock.
The three-time champion has watched NHRA venture into different territory this season with stops at South Georgia Motorsports Park, U.S. 131 Motorsports Park and now Rockingham. These places might lack the conveniences of more modern facilities, but Capps believes they are delivering something difficult to manufacture, and that’s an innate excitement.
“The reward was, I can’t tell you how many of our partners and sponsors, people came today that would have probably not gone to Charlotte on Friday,” Capps said. “In fact, they probably wouldn’t – a lot of them.”
Capps wasn’t taking a shot at Charlotte. His point was Rockingham gave people a reason to make the trip on a Friday.
“It’s just this place has had a buzz about it,” Capps said. “I mean, I was surprised that some of them showed up today and here all weekend, but not today and they drove hours to get here.”
Capps has history here. He raced at Rockingham when NHRA last visited in 1998, reaching the Funny Car final of the non-points Winston Invitational while driving for Don Prudhomme.
Twenty-eight years later, much has changed.
The racetrack Capps remembered as rough was anything but that Friday, despite Thursday rain that forced NHRA’s Safety Safari to remove compromised rubber and rebuild portions of the racing surface. Capps praised the work after running near the front in both sessions.
“This is a completely different track,” Capps said. “It used to be pretty bumpy, but now it’s very smooth. They did a great job.”
There are still pieces of the old Rockingham that haven’t been sanitized out of existence. The concrete grandstands remain perched close enough to the left lane that Capps remembers fans getting a full dose of nitro fumes.
“It is, by, far the coolest grandstand to sit in for a Top Fuel race,” Capps said. “It’s just legendary.”
Capps could use some Rockingham magic beyond qualifying.
After leading the Funny Car standings through much of the regular season, he arrived fourth in points, 63 behind leader Matt Hagan. Austin Prock ended Friday second at 3.893, followed by Jack Beckman at 3.911, while Hagan was sixth at 3.935.
2 – HE GETS THE POINT(S) – Doug Kalitta will tell you the 20-point swings on Sundays are the ones worth sweating.
He’ll also take every qualifying point somebody wants to hand him.
The defending NHRA Top Fuel champion collected a few more Friday at Rockingham Dragway, driving his Mac Tools dragster to a 3.682-second run at 338.09 mph and the provisional No. 1 position at the NHRA Nationals at The Rock.
Kalitta was the only driver into the 3.60s, knocking Tony Stewart’s 3.720 at 336.32 from the top spot. Leah Pruett followed at 3.734, while Top Fuel points leader and Kalitta Motorsports teammate Shawn Langdon finished Friday seventh.
With five races remaining, nobody needs to explain the math to Kalitta.
“It’s really all about, in my opinion, just Sunday – the 20-point swings are the real thing there,” Kalitta said. “Every point counts. We’ve all lost on close point-race things and, yeah, it’s super important.
“I hate to try to focus too much on it, but … you’re down to five races, so you have to. It’s definitely not something that I’m personally too wrapped around the axle about.”
Maybe not. But Kalitta certainly isn’t leaving anything laying around.
If his 3.682 survives Saturday’s final two sessions, Kalitta will earn his sixth No. 1 qualifier of the season to open the Countdown to the Championship. He is also chasing his fifth victory of 2026.
There’s another wrinkle to this championship fight. The guy Kalitta is chasing parks about 40 feet away.
Langdon has won the past two races, leaving Alan Johnson and Mac Savage on Kalitta’s side of the Kalitta Motorsports operation trying to keep pace with Brian Husen and Langdon on the other.
“Brian, he’s definitely going to be a tough character for Alan through the end of the year,” Kalitta said. “There’s just so many good cars here and anything can happen. So it’s like just keep your head down, one round at a time. Just try to get through the field and just get close to the final, the semis – get to there, get a shot at the win.”
Friday also came with a $1,000 bonus and an ASUS laptop for Kalitta as the session’s low qualifier. He already has plans for the computer.
“I’ll end up giving this laptop to somebody because that’s just kind of the way I roll here,” Kalitta said.
3 – TAKING NOTES – Matt Hartford came to Rockingham Dragway without the notebook his engine supplier, KB Titan Racing, had accumulated from hundreds of runs at The Rock.
He didn’t need to borrow it Friday.
Hartford drove his GETTRX Chevrolet Camaro to a 6.476-second run in the opening session, then watched it survive the second session to secure the provisional No. 1 spot in Pro Stock. His 6.49 in Q2 wasn’t what Hartford wanted, but nobody managed to knock him off the top.
“We knew it was going to be really tight when we rolled up there,” Hartford said. “The air was basically four or five thousandths worse, but we figured the track would be close to a hundredth better.”
There is an interesting wrinkle to Hartford’s Rockingham success. With horsepower supplied from KB Titan, an organization with extensive testing experience at the track, Hartford said the information stays on the KB side of the fence.
“They give us great power,” Hartford said. “That’s the one thing about KB is you can rest assured any engine that you roll out underneath the bench is going to be as good as they can give you. Outside of that, there’s zero cross-communication between our teams.”
Hartford said his team’s slower second run wasn’t a track issue. The data showed areas in the 60-foot portion and through the car’s travel where the setup missed, giving the team something it didn’t have when Friday began — Rockingham data of its own.
Hartford isn’t acting like Friday’s qualifying lead gives him an advantage over KB Titan. He knows exactly what he’s racing against.
“They’re the best of the best,” Hartford said. “I think we’re a thorn in their side right now. We’re using their power and running with them, and sometimes running a little bit better.”
While the provisional No. 1 is nice, Hartford has something larger in mind.
“We want to win the championship,” Hartford said. “We’re dug in, doing everything we can to try to run with these mega teams out here and, hopefully, at the end of the year we can have a big trophy.”
4 – NO DIRECTIONS NEEDED – Angie Smith didn’t need directions around Rockingham Dragway on Friday. She has about 60 runs worth of notes telling her exactly where to go.
Smith turned all that testing homework into a career-best 6.674-second pass at 201.61 mph aboard her Denso Auto Parts Buell, grabbing the provisional No. 1 qualifying position in Pro Stock Motorcycle after two sessions.
And she had to knock her husband out of the top spot to get it.
Matt Smith opened with a 6.68 while Angie countered with a 6.69, which apparently qualified as sufficient grounds for some marital trash talk. Matt responded by telling her he was going to put more tune-up into her motorcycle.
That worked – maybe a little too well.
“Matt went 6.68 in the first session and I went 6.69, so I gave him some crap about it because us racers, we’re greedy,” Smith said. “We always want to go fast. I knew my bike had a little bit more left in it and he said, ‘Well, I’m going to tune you up, so you better be ready.’ Well, I was ready, and then after the run, he was like, ‘I guess I tuned you up too much.’”
Smith’s familiarity with Rockingham is a home-track advantage. The Matt Smith Racing operation routinely tests at the facility, giving the team a notebook considerably thicker than what most arrived with for NHRA’s return to The Rock. The Smiths raced there extensively in their pre-NHRA careers.
“I really do think that us testing here gives us good data, good starting-line data,” Smith said. “We know what the track will hold, we know what it likes. So, I really do think that it helps us really get a hold of the starting line, and it does translate down the track.”
The timing couldn’t be better for Smith.
She entered Rockingham fourth in the championship standings. A second-round exit in the Countdown opener at Martin, Mich., last weekend left her feeling an opportunity had escaped. Friday offered a considerably better start, particularly on a day when four motorcycles dipped into the 6.60s.
Matt Smith sits second at 6.681, 204.17, with Michigan No. 1 qualifier Ryan Oehler third at 6.681, 202.25. Points leader and reigning champion Richard Gadson is fourth at 6.683, 202.41.
For Angie Smith, Rockingham might be an NHRA national event this weekend, but the surroundings are hardly unfamiliar.
“To do it here, a lot of our hometown fans are here, and we know the starting-line guys, and we know the people that own this track,” Smith said. “So, to do it here and to give them kudos, that’s really just icing on the cake for us.”
5 – THE OVERNIGHT TRACK FIX – You didn’t need to be a track-prep expert to see where Rockingham Dragway had received some extra attention Thursday.
Even through the steady rain, a section of asphalt in the left lane carried the unmistakable marks of a grinder. During pre-event preparation, roughly 200 to 400 feet of the racing surface reportedly refused to take rubber, regardless of what the track crew threw at it.
That’s not something anybody wants to discover with 11,000-horsepower nitro cars coming to town.
NHRA reportedly brought out its grinder, took the top layer off the troublesome section and followed the work with a scrubber. The objective was straightforward: get down to a surface that would accept rubber and give the track-prep crew something it could work with.
By the time qualifying began Friday, the evidence was displayed on the scoreboard for all to see.
There was no obvious visual indication from the grandstands that a section of the left lane had required additional work. More importantly, the race cars weren’t providing any evidence that the repaired area was an issue.
Doug Kalitta supplied the best example in the opening Top Fuel session.
Kalitta went straight down the left lane in 3.747 seconds at 338.86 mph to take the provisional No. 1 qualifying position. Funny Car provided another indication, as Ron Capps made his opening run in the left lane and emerged second quickest in the session.
6 – GRAY TOPS WILSON TO LEAD PRO MOD FRIDAY – J.R. Gray took over the No. 1 position in Pro Modified qualifying with a 5.635-second pass at 255.68 mph, edging Tony Wilson by one-thousandth of a second after two sessions.
Wilson put the nitrous-injected “Son of Barney” 1941 Willys into the No. 2 position with a 5.636, 253.24, leading a tightly packed group behind Gray.
Justin Bond is third at 5.637, 257.58, followed by Steve Jackson, who ran 5.638, 255.97. Veteran Rickie Smith rounds out the top five with a 5.640, 252.10.
That leaves the first five qualifiers separated by just .005 seconds.
Gray made the biggest move near the top of the sheet during the second session. He entered the session qualified eighth following a 5.673, 254.09 before improving by nearly .04 and jumping seven positions.
Mike Stavrinos sits sixth with a 5.642, 255.39, and Derek Menholt seventh at 5.645, 254.81. Nick Januik holds the eighth position, clocking a 5.655, 255.68. Chip King is ninth after running 5.662, 251.96, while Billy Banaka completes the top 10 at 5.676, 256.26.
The numbers leave little margin heading into the remaining qualifying sessions. Only .041 separates Gray at No. 1 from Banaka in the 10th position.
At the other end of the 16-car field, Lyle Barnett occupies the final qualifying position with a 5.751, 250.42 mph in his 1968 Camaro.
7 – THE PRO STOCKERS AND THE MICHIGAN TREE – The tour moved from U.S. 131 Motorsports Park last weekend to Rockingham Dragway, but that doesn’t mean the grumblings about the Christmas tree from the previous race remained behind.
The Christmas tree at the NHRA Great Lakes Nationals didn’t just look different to Pro Stock and Pro Stock Motorcycle racers. It reacted differently enough that some competitors accustomed to chasing thousandths suddenly found themselves trying to manufacture ways to slow down.
U.S. 131 Motorsports Park uses an Accutime Timing System rather than NHRA’s traditional CompuLink system. The CompuLink tree wasn’t compatible with Accutime, and racers quickly discovered the track’s setup reacted quicker than what they’d been seeing all season.
Matt Latino knew immediately. On his first run, without trying to cut a light, he went .0000.
“I like that I can be consistent on it and dial in those zeroes, but I’ve got to soften the heck out of my clutch pedal and lengthen the throw on it just to not go red,” Latino said.
He eventually fouled in the opening round. Troy Coughlin Jr. went the opposite direction. He adapted, recorded three consecutive .00 reaction times during eliminations, and won the Pro Stock event at Martin.
“They’re a little bit tighter, meaning faster to react,” Coughlin said. “And, yeah, it’s consistent. I mean, it’s like Compulink in that note. It’s not giving wild numbers. It’s just a little bit quicker upfront on react.”
The motorcycle riders faced an even trickier proposition.
Richard Gadson fouled in the second round, his first race-day red light in more than two seasons. He said an exceptional starting line combined with the different timing characteristics created a “perfect storm.”
“But our situation was you could actually shallow stage, see yellow, and calmly leave and be .015 red,” Gadson said. “So, to get to the side of 30 or 40 required a whole ‘nother world of an approach to the start line, and I couldn’t figure that out.”
Gadson said Pro Stock Motorcycle racers weren’t included when competitors were consulted about potentially changing the tree.
“I wish that we had gotten asked,” Gadson said. “I guarantee you in our class it would’ve been 16 to zero on changing it.”
Matt Smith said he raised concerns with NHRA Saturday morning after his Friday reaction times were considerably quicker than expected. Then he watched Gadson foul.
“And second round, when I saw Richard red light, I was like, ‘Don’t do that. Don’t do it,’” Smith said. “And I just gripped a little harder, and hesitated a little bit, and was .70, and that’s what cost me the round.”
At least the riders have gotten somewhat accustomed to it now – Accutime is in use at Rockingham.
8 – HAGAN, LEE MAKE THEIR OWN HISTORY – For Paul Lee, there was no doubt about the last Funny Car driver he raced down Rockingham Dragway before NHRA returned. It was 2008, and Lee was in the IHRA World Finals against a Funny Car rookie named Matt Hagan.
Hagan won the race – his first nitro victory. Lee had qualified No.1, and was leading when a broken throw-out bearing ended his chances and allowed Hagan to drive past near the finish line. The interesting thing was that Hagan’s car wasn’t ablaze.
“We didn’t have too many races that we weren’t on fire in IHRA days,” Hagan said when initially asked if he was ablaze when he passed Lee. “Paul’s the one that reminded me about it. He says, ‘Hey, me and you got to run in the finals.’ He said, ‘You beat me.’ And I said, ‘No.’”
Hagan led IHRA Funny Car racers that season with three victories, yet finished third in points. Fires, broken parts, and the resulting oildown penalties took their toll, helping Terry Haddock claim the championship. “Won more races in IHRA than anybody [that season], but had more oildown points and penalties than anybody, too,” Hagan said. “So, lost the championship to Terry Haddock basically on being-on-fire-points.”
Lee’s Rockingham history didn’t end with Hagan. When IHRA dropped Funny Car after 2008, he moved to Top Fuel in 2009 with the Lagana brothers and became the first driver outside the family to drive one of their dragsters. Lee returned to Rockingham that season, beating Haddock in the opening round before losing to Bruce Litton.
For Hagan, Rockingham became the starting point for something much larger. Pro Mod led to nitro, with stints with Don Schumacher and eventually Tony Stewart Racing. Along the way, he collected four NHRA Funny Car titles.
Now he’s back at Rockingham chasing championship No. 5.
“To think from going from out there being on fire and blowing stuff up and burning bodies up and IHRA days to here we are now leading the points in NHRA and trying to win our fifth championship within this next five races,” Hagan said. “If you’d have told me that, I’d have laughed at you, man. I’d have been like, ‘You’re full of s***.’ But here we are.”
9 – WELCOME TO TOP GUN – Tony Stewart doesn’t necessarily see himself as instructor material, but on a hot afternoon in Indianapolis ahead of the NHRA Brainerd Nationals, there he was, killing it.
Stewart, along with wife Leah Pruett, was at the test for Erica Enders and Aaron Stanfield, helping the Pro Stock veterans turned Top Fuel license candidates get a handle on an assignment where 12,000 horsepower has a way of changing the lesson plan.
The irony wasn’t lost on Stewart because a year earlier, Enders and Stanfield had been his teachers when Stewart climbed into Richard Freeman’s Pro Stock car at Tulsa. This time, the classroom had changed considerably, and Stewart was the guy with the answers.
“Erica worked with me in the car, and Aaron worked with me in the lounge on the computer and looking at shift points and everything there,” Stewart said. “To have two great world champions there to help teach you how to drive a car, it was an honor for me to be able to flip the tides and be able to try to help teach them how to drive a Top Fuel car.
“I was probably more nervous about that than I was driving the Pro Stock car in all reality because I wanted to make sure that I gave them the same attention to detail that they gave me.”
Stewart understood exactly what Enders and Stanfield were experiencing because his introduction to Top Fuel wasn’t ancient history. The intimidation factor doesn’t disappear just because someone already owns a stack of championships.
“The experience with them was amazing and I wanted to make sure, obviously doing something drastically different like that, they were just as nervous about it as I was when I got in the first time,” Stewart said. “But it was really fun working with them. Aaron and Erica are both awesome people to work with.
“They’re great teammates, obviously, but to get to take my side of it and help those guys get acclimated and get them their first laps in a Top Fuel car was pretty cool for me.”
Don’t start calling Professor Stewart a Top Fuel elder just yet.
“I don’t know. I just still feel like there’s a lot of things that haven’t happened yet in a Top Fuel car that you hear other drivers talk about that it just takes time,” Stewart said.
“I mean, you look at reaction times from 10 years ago, and you look at reaction times now, and part of that’s the car, but part of that’s the drivers, too. So I think we got a good start at it. I don’t think I’m a rookie anymore, but I don’t think I’m a veteran quite yet.”
10 – JUST A HOMETOWN BOY – Matt Smith has raced Pro Stock Motorcycles just about everywhere worth racing one, but there are certain places where unloading the bike feels a little different.
Rockingham Dragway is one of them. For the North Carolina native, the NHRA’s return to The Rock isn’t another stop on the schedule as much as it is a home game.
“I like being at home,” Smith said. “We hadn’t raced here at Rockingham in a long time, but we’ve tested a lot, so I think we’ll be pretty good here.
“I don’t know if it’d give us an edge, but one thing about it is just being home. We got a lot of North Carolina fans here, and hopefully we got a good turnout, and I’m sure they’ll be pulling for us.”
There is another reason Smith doesn’t exactly arrive at Rockingham as a stranger.
His father, Rickie Smith, has been part of the fabric of drag racing in the Carolinas since the 1970s, and his history at Rockingham runs deep. Around these parts, the Smith name doesn’t require an introduction.
“My dad’s done a lot here at this track and no different than Bristol,” Smith said. “So, all in all, I think we’ll do good, and hopefully me and him can put it in the winners circle together.”
For Matt Smith, that’s the potential payoff of NHRA returning to Rockingham. There are championship points to chase and a race to win, but there is also an opportunity to do it with family and plenty of familiar faces watching.
The six-time NHRA Pro Stock Motorcycle champion has accumulated enough trophies during his career that he doesn’t need the hometown treatment to validate anything. Still, adding a 75th anniversary Wally at The Rock would carry a different flavor.
Asked if a victory might officially make him Rockingham royalty, Smith didn’t require much time to consider it.
“Yeah, that’s right.”
10 – ON TAP – Qualifying continues at noon, EDT on Saturday at the NHRA Nationals at Rockingham Dragway.
