The IHRA concluded its second national event of 2026 by crowning Dale Creasy Jr. (Funny Car), Scott Palmer (Top Fuel), Tony Wilson (Pro Modified) and Johnny Pluchino (Mountain Motor Pro Stock) as champions at the Outlaw Nitro Series event outside of Richmond, Va.
For Creasy, his second win of the season validated his opening victory at Dunn, N.C., when he soloed for the win. This time, he stopped Del Worsham for the second race in a row, outreacting and outrunning him to the finish line for a 3.194, 278.40 to 3.260, 277.32 victory.
The win marked his first back-to-back victory since 2007, when he captured the IHRA North American Nationals in Epping, N.H., and the IHRA Canadian Nationals in Cayuga, Ontario. It was also his 12th career IHRA Funny Car win.
“I don’t listen to people when they doubt us, we just do what we do and we work hard to do it,” Creasy said. “And running Del in the final, I knew he was going to run good, so we had to step up a little bit and we did.”
Top Fuel whittled down to a battle between the opening event winners from last season and this season. In a matchup that resembled a Saturday night feature, Palmer got the best of point leader Gary Pritchett in the final round.
Palmer overcame Pritchett’s holeshot to score the win by a 3.075, 270.54 to 3.183, 208.78 margin. With the victory, Palmer became the first two-time Top Fuel winner since the IHRA’s return last season.
There’s an old saying which suggests, “if Momma ain’t happy, no one is happy.” Palmer made sure his mother was happy by calling home after each round to report his progress.
“She was pretty proud,” Palmer said with a smile. “She told me my burnout was weak [in the semis], and I thought I did another pretty good burnout, but between Darren Mayer, Cupcake, we call him Cupcake, Chris, from CNCPE clutches, those are the two things I made adjustments on and it won us the race.”
Palmer races hard, but admits he and the crew party even harder.
“It’ll be ugly about daylight, I can tell you that right now, there’ll be some wounded soldiers laying around, I promise you that. But we just have a good time, anybody who’s out there, if you’re at the track, come on by, we share. And it was a great weekend. We raced Gary Pritchett, who’s like family to us. One of us was going to win, I wanted Lee Calloway to win, but I messed his car up, so he may fire me from tuning my own car.”
Wilson took advantage of Jason Harris’ tardiness on the starting line to score his first career IHRA national event victory, 3.586, 209.04 to 3.661, 173.74. He became the 65th different winner in the Pro Modified division.
“Oh man, this is awesome, I can’t thank Ed Burnley enough, and Jason, I don’t know what happened to Jason, but Jason has gave us a heck of a car, and I can’t thank him enough,” Wilson said. “My dad, Ed, Mr. Ed, for giving me this ride, this is awesome. So, we’re very stoked. And I don’t know if it’s happened yet or not since the rejuvenation of IHRA, but we won Pro Nitrous last year too, so I’ve got two Ironmans, two different classes, and glad to be taking this back to Maryland.”
For the second time in a row, the Mountain Motor Pro Stock division came down to Johnny Pluchino and Jordan Ensslin. Pluchino made it two in a row by stopping Ensslin with a 4.014, 180.21 to 4.032, 178.54 performance.
Pluchino not only won, but also established both ends of the national record in the process.
“A lot of respect for this team,” Pluchino said. “It’s going to be a battle all year long. My team, Ross Environmental Services, first of all, amazing partner to have with us, but the people that are here turning wrenches, driving the truck to the track, my dad for putting this team together. Everybody works their heart out. It’s just like this team, everybody does it because they love it. And that’s why these two teams are in the final round. And hey, we did it in style, I think he was pretty good in the final there, I saw a lot of purple. But it’s all right, we set the record, ET records, speed record, and we got that thing, it’s pretty beautiful.”
Cory Reed hasn’t missed a beat since moving from NHRA Pro Stock to the IHRA’s Lil Bratz division. Reed defeated Jimmy Dale to secure a second consecutive victory.
“Just letting that car do the work, it’s like I said last time, it’s easy when the hot rod’s fast,” Reed said. “You can relax, you can just try to drive and keep it straight in the groove, which is hard in those little things, and everybody in this class will tell you those things get squirrely, especially when the power ramp comes in. It squats down and wants to make moves. So, it’s good though.”
Other professional winners included Bubba Stanton (Outlaw Pro Modified), Paul Miller (Fuel Altered), Jason Leeper (Nitro Harley), Phil Esz (Top Alcohol Funny Car) and Jackie Fricke (Top Alcohol Dragster).
The IHRA returns to action May 7-9, 2026, in Montgomery, Ala.
