The final round barely had a chance to become a race.
Jordan Vandergriff’s Cornwell Tools Funny Car developed clutch issues before he could stage, ending his day before it started. DeJoria’s car shook the tires and she clicked it off almost immediately, coasting to an 8.301-second pass at 82.43 mph.
Nobody was rushing to frame the time slip.
The scoreboard still said winner, and that part looked just fine to DeJoria.
“Yeah, finally back in a winner’s area, whatever you want to call it, but just back to winning, it’s good,” DeJoria said. “It came at the cost of my teammate and it was a lackluster final, but we got the W and that’s all that matters and it went to a JFR car. So, that’s great.”
There wasn’t much surprise in her voice afterward. The circumstances caught her off guard. The result itself did not.
“I just had a feeling we were going to win it,” DeJoria said. “I just knew in my heart, it was one of those things. I didn’t expect it to end like that, but I had a good feeling about it.”
That confidence traces back to the start of the season.
DeJoria opened the year with a runner-up finish and believed wins would quickly follow. Instead, she found herself walking away from weekends knowing the car had speed but not always leaving with the result to match.
“Anything? Yeah, yeah, actually, yeah,” DeJoria said when asked if she was surprised it took this long. “Well, right, yeah. Yeah, definitely. I thought after our first race going to the finals, I thought for sure by the next race we were going to win. I just felt it. It was just time.”
Funny Car has a way of humbling people in a hurry.
A driver can do everything correctly and still find herself pedaling the car halfway down the racetrack or staring at a scoreboard wondering what just happened.
“So, we’ve had a little ups and downs,” DeJoria said. “Some of the tracks have been a little tricky and trying to figure out how to get the car down the racetrack the best way possible.”
“Had to do some pedal jobs and sometimes you come out on the good side, sometimes you don’t, unfortunately. But that’s why these cars are so hard to drive and so exciting, and that’s the challenge that I love about this class.”
There is also the reality of where she now works.
For years, DeJoria lined up against John Force and his teams. She raced against the organization, watched it from across the pit area and spent years trying to beat one of drag racing’s biggest institutions.
Now she races beneath the same awning.
“Yes. Came full circle,” DeJoria said. “I raced against him my whole career. I’ve been racing as a pro, I think what, 14 years now, total 22 years. My daughter’s 23, that’s how I can always tell. She was about a year old when I started.”
Then she described a moment that clearly still resonates.
“But yeah, I mean, he signed my license. I raced against him and now I get to race for him. So, that’s huge dream come true,” DeJoria said. “And he’s out there when I’m sitting in the water box, he’s out there and he points at me and I give him a little tug at the heart and point back at him. And that’s a great feeling.”
John Force Racing has also given her something racers trust almost as much as horsepower — belief in the car underneath them.
“Consistent wise, yes, definitely,” DeJoria said. “I definitely feel a little bit more confident coming in on a JFR car, honestly. Just the fleet of cars and the amount of information that they have, and the wins and just everything that they have at their fingertips, it’s incredible.”
Saturday’s win mattered because of where she entered the weekend. She arrived sitting 10th in points and understood every point available matters this early in the season.
There have been flashes all season. A runner-up here, strong qualifying runs there, stretches where the car looked capable of ruining somebody else’s Sunday. Then something would happen, and she’d be back loading up wondering where the missing piece went.
Drag racing has never cared much about scripts. Sometimes the breakthrough arrives with fireworks and a photo finish. Sometimes it shows up during a Saturday bonus race and leaves people realizing they probably should have seen it coming.
DeJoria believes there is more ahead than a Saturday trophy.
“You can go out here and not win one race, but if you keep going rounds and you keep getting your points up there, you’ll finish strong,” DeJoria said. “But I don’t want to do it like that. We want to win. We want to win multiple races and I know we’re going to do it. It’s just a matter of time.”
