The winning ways of reigning NHRA Funny Car champ Austin Prock continued Sunday.
Prock, driving his John Force Racing Camaro, won his second national event in a row, the latest being the NHRA Four-Wide Nationals at ZMax Dragway in Charlotte.
Prock claimed the win by clocking a 3.870-second elapsed time – the quickest ET of eliminations – at 332.92 mph to win the final quad over Ron Capps (3.920), Matt Hagan (3.939), and Alexis DeJoria (3.933).
“It was a great day. Anytime you’re holding one of these Wallys, it’s a great day, and the Prock Rocket bailed me out there in the finals,” Prock said. “I had my worst light of the weekend, just have to be driving this Cornwell Tools Chevrolet SS. Especially that round there.”
Prock broke a four-race winless drought – dating back to last season – by capturing the title at the NHRA Four-Wide Nationals two weeks ago at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
“We battled a lot of difficult scenarios with this race car, and my dad (crew chief Jimmy Prock) and brother (Thomas) and Nate Hildahl, and the whole Cornwell Tools team did their homework all week and got the thing dialed in and made a killer run there in the final. I mean, that was a jaw-dropper. So, when I get out, usually I can catch the ET board. It’s hard to do these four-wide (races) when you’re in a center lane and when I saw the ET, I was like, ‘Whoo.’ There was a barnburner there.
“So, yeah, it was really cool. Great weekend. Super cool to go back-to-back at the four-wides, and we got one more coming up in the fall in the Countdown (Sept. 19-21 in Charlotte). So hopefully we can keep that four-wide momentum all the way till then.”
This was Prock’s 14th career Wally – 10th in Funny Car – along with his four Top Fuel victories.
When Prock stepped out of the cockpit at the top end, he saw legendary NASCAR owner Rick Hendrick, a sponsor with JFR.
“That was awesome. That was the last thing I expected for him to be down at the top end, and when I saw him, I just lit up,” Prock said. “That was a pretty cool celebration down there with him. And then got a photo with him and my Wally. That was really special. So, yeah, this Wally means a lot, and sh*t, I’m going to go broke. I have to go buy a car from HendrickCars.com now.”
This was quite the weekend for Prock as he won the race within the race Saturday – the Mission Foods #2Fast2Tasty Challenge. Prock was the runaway winner of last year’s #2Fast2Tasty championship.
On Sunday, Prock won his first quad with a 3.902-second elapsed time at 330.96 mph. He defeated Ron Capps (3.936), Buddy Hull (4.020), and Cruz Pedregon (4.339).
He followed that up by winning his second quad with a 3.930-second lap at 327.59 mph. He came across the finish line in front of Ron Capps (3.945), Hunter Green (4.073), and J.R. Todd, who had a red-light start.
“Well, we hope so,” said Prock when asked if this was the start of another winning binge. “I mean, that’s what we aim for every year. We just got to keep our heads down and keep reading the racetrack and making the right calls and I got to do a good job behind the wheel of the Chevrolet. So, I don’t look into the future. It doesn’t do anything for anyone. All it does is make you worry thoughts that you don’t need in your head. So, one round at a time, one race at a time, and so far, so good.”
Although Prock is 2-for-2 in winning Four-Wide races in 2025, he said there’s no secret formula to his success.
“I don’t treat it any different. It’s still the same job,” Prock said. “You can overthink it and you can get caught up in everything that the other drivers tell you or the media tells you. It’s still the same procedure. There’re two more balls up there. It’s not that big of a deal the way I look at it.
“So, we came off of a two-wide race, went to Vegas, drove the race car the same, left the same off the starting line, came here. I was actually quicker off the line consistently than I have been all year long. And I think that’s just me getting my groove and just believing in yourself, really, driving these race cars. It’s 90% mental and 10% driver. So, yeah, just getting comfortable, and we’ll worry about that one when we get to it. Hopefully we’re in the hunt for the championship. And if we could win all three, I think we’d be the first one to do that.”
A year ago, Prock, in his first season driving a Funny Car as a replacement for Robert Hight – sidelined for medical reasons – won a class-best eight national events with his final win of the season coming at the Ford Performance NHRA Nationals in Las Vegas on Nov. 3.
Fast-forward to the present, and Prock has won 10 of the last 25 national events, which is an impressive 40 percent clip.
“I had absolutely no idea of that stat,” Prock said. “We were watching one of the qualifying recordings this morning and they’d spit up my stats and it was like 24 races and … I don’t know, nine or 10 finals and five runner-ups. And I was like, ‘Wow, that’s pretty impressive.’ I had no idea, to be honest. … They matter, but they don’t really matter. So, yeah, that’s pretty incredible. Glad we still got fans after all these wins. Everybody likes the winner until you win too much, so we might be right on the cusp.”
Prock was then reminded he drives for legendary John Force, who has won an NHRA-record 157 national-event Wallys.
“He’s the man of the people, that’s why,” Prock said about his boss. “We just got to keep chugging away at it. And it’s early on in the season. Nobody wants to peak too early, but I don’t really ever look at that as peaking. If you keep your head down, you can keep ripping off wins, and I got the best team behind me right now.
“I know how hard my dad works. I’ve watched it my entire life. He would come home from work and literally walk in the front door and go straight back to work. And my brother, that apple didn’t fall far from the tree, and Nate’s right there as well. So, everybody’s doing a really good job and giving me an opportunity to go up there and get reps, and repetition is huge in this sport from a driving aspect. So, I was really proud of my weekend behind the wheel all the way up until the semifinals. I ruined my 50-streak and then looked like a complete blank there in the final, but the old Prock Rocket carried me.”
Even more impressive is that Prock accomplished his latest feat wearing shoes that were too small.
“I don’t know what’s up with these shoes. They’re too small to get on and they’re way too big to get in my throttle pedal. But I started out the week .50s (on the Christmas tree) and carried it 75% through the week. But they’re uncomfortable, I guess I’m going to have to wear them next week.”
One thing is for sure, Prock does enjoy coming through in front of his big-time sponsors and he hopes that continues at the next race, near Chicago.
“I’ve not had much luck in Chicago throughout my career, and we had a pretty good race car last year and had some ignition failures that kept us from winning the second round, I believe, against Daniel Wilkerson,” Prock said. “I’m looking forward to going to Chicago. That’s kind of like a home race for me. I was born and raised in Lansing, Michigan. And I have a lot of family in Michigan, so hopefully we’ll have a lot of family members out there and to win there, that would be really special for our team – obviously for Peak and my family as well.”
