Battling NHRA’s big budget nitro Funny Car teams is quite the challenge.

However, it is one nitro Funny Car team owner/driver Chad Green welcomes.

Green was clearly up to the challenge at the season-opening Amalie Motor Oil NHRA Gatornationals in Gainesville, Fla., last Sunday notching a semifinal finish.

“Well, I can't say enough about it really,” Green said of his team’s performance. “Always at racing, I've always thought how you start the very first race really gives you an edge or puts you behind the eight ball in this nitro Funny Car category. I definitely couldn't be happier that we started that way and our goal for this year is to be in the 10 (in the points standings), making it to the Countdown and yeah, that goes a long way, to start off like that.”

A year ago, Green finished 12th in the points standings. 

Green clocked a 3.922-second lap at 326.40 mph to qualify No. 7. He then proceeded to beat Paul Lee with a 3.943-second pass and then upset legendary John Force. Green came in at 3.934 seconds to edge Force’s 3.942-second effort.

Green’s day came to an end when J.R. Todd muscled past him. Todd clocked 3.903 seconds compared to Green’s 3.967-run.

“Well, I think it's a combination of things,” said Green about his team’s season-opening success. “We had a full season last year and the car was really coming around.

“We thought we had some really good runs, really fast runs, towards the end of the season. We made a few changes parts-wise in the offseason to hopefully help give us a little more performance. So, we were excited to come out and try that out. We tested before the race for the week before the race hit.”

NHRA offered testing for Top Fuel and nitro Funny Car teams March 6-8 in Gainesville the week of the Gators, which Green took full advantage of making six runs.

“That definitely helped,” Green said. “Had we had not have done that, we definitely wouldn't have had the performance we had during the race. We definitely worked out some issues during testing. I mean, we struggled during those runs during testing, so it was good that we got all that out of the way because at the race, our car went down the track every run. I feel like we just, the car picked up where we left off last year and maybe it's a little better now, hopefully, and I'm excited to see what this year brings.”

Green has 30 starts in nitro Funny Car and is searching for his first win. He now has four semifinal efforts on his resume, including two at the Gators in 2022 and 2023. 

Green will be back in action at the Arizona Nationals, March 24-26 in Phoenix.

“I hope we can just keep the momentum going. We ran actually pretty good at Phoenix last year, so I'm excited about Phoenix. I'm excited about the way the car's running right now. I just hope we could pick up where we left off.”

His strong start for the is something Green knows gave his crew a boost.

“I mean, there's nothing better for crew morale than to have success and go rounds and to start the season off like that,” Green said. Actually, we had the same team as we had last year, but we're actually one man down from last year that we did not replace. So, we had to shuffle a couple guys around into new positions this year. I'm really proud and excited how they performed and yeah, I'm excited for the season.

“I mean, it's a really tough category (nitro Funny Car), like you said, when you're going against (the bigger budget teams). But I'm lucky to have (Tim) Wilkerson on my side. He's one of these guys, he's been able to be competitive with that group for years and do it more on a budget than they do. It really helps to have his help. And Daniel (Wilkerson, Tim’s son), I think you can't say enough about Daniel. He's just a bright young guy and I'm excited that I have him as my crew chief.”

​