Jack Beckman went for a wild ride during the third round of eliminations at the NHRA New England Nationals.

The past NHRA champion, driving John Force’s PEAK-sponsored Funny Car, encountered severe tire shake, which caused his car to launch under power across the centerline and impact the retaining wall. It came to a stop after the impact.

Beckman was alert and exited the car under his own power and was examined onsite by NHRA Chief Medical Officer Dr. Surface before being released.

“I’m looking at the wall; I could see exactly what was going on outside of it,” Beckman said. “I pedaled, and it was one of those deals where when these things shake violent enough, your vision kind of shuts down for a second. And as soon as I pedaled, it just hooked left and then. You’re a passenger at that point. Clearly, I’d like a redo on that, and I wouldn’t have pedaled that way, but sometimes these things do some really unpredictable stuff out there, and that was one of them.

“It’s a shame. That was a great race car, and that’s a lot of extra work for us, especially with our first back-to-backs of the year. We will unload our spare, which was last year’s race car. So we’ll be ready to go for Bristol. I mean, as a driver, this is the last thing that you want to do. We had a car that could win the race.”