There’s no question that fellow NHRA Top Fuel racers can’t sleep on driver Justin Ashley.
 
The young star is a force to be reckoned with week after week, and on Sunday, he was the last man standing at the Arizona Nationals near Phoenix.
 
In the finals, Ashley and his crew saved the best for last as he clocked a 3.705-second elapsed time at 329.34 mph to defeat Shawn Langdon’s 3.732-second lap at 329.58 mph at Wild Horse Motorsports Park.
 
This was Ashley’s sixth career NHRA Top Fuel national event win and his first in Phoenix.
 
Ashley moved to fourth in the points standings as he qualified No. 7 and defeated eight-time world champ Tony Schumacher, Mike Salinas, four-time world champ Steve Torrence and past world champ Langdon on Sunday.
 
“It was an incredible race day,” Ashley said. “To be honest with you, it really was an incredible weekend. We knew coming into the weekend that we would have to go through a gauntlet of opponents just if we wanted to give ourselves a chance to win on Sunday. My crew chiefs, Mike Green and Tommy DeLago, learned a lot, and they really approached this the right way. We made a lot of changes in the offseason, and they took Friday and Saturday to make quality laps down the racetrack and learn. We were in a good position to go rounds on Sunday. I think that proved to be the case.
 
“You have to have four perfect rounds of racing to just give yourself a chance to win, and there were a lot of really great racers out there. You had the eight-time champ (Schumacher), Gainesville champ (Salinas), the four-time champ (Torrence), and a one-time champ (Langdon). There was no escaping these guys, but I am just really proud of my team and grateful that we collected this win.”
 
Ashley also was thrilled his quickest E.T. happened when it mattered most in the finals.
 
“I knew before that round that they were going to try and step it up because Shawn (Langdon) had been running so well,” Ashley said. “I knew that they were going to try and take it from that 3.74 range to the 3.70 or 3.71 range. I couldn’t have been happier when I looked at the time slip. Just a total team effort, and they’ve been tweaking things. They’ve been working on things and we’re able to have four rounds today and collect the win, but maybe even more importantly, in the long run, we’ve got four more runs to collect data. So proud of our Phillips Connect Toyota team powered by National Debt Relief. It was just a really awesome, fantastic, and fun day.”

Early season success is nothing new to Ashley, but this year he did things opposite of what unfolded for him in the first two races of 2022.

“It’s ironic because last year we won the first race (Winternationals) and then lost in the first round at the Arizona Nationals,” he said. “This time was the opposite. We lost in the first round of the first race (Gatornationals) and came back and won the Arizona Nationals. It sets the tone for the year. You know you got to start strong, but you also got to finish strong, especially with the Countdown format. We learned last year that it may be more important to be able to finish strong, but just learning just, growing winning definitely helps us to collect some momentum. 

“Every point matters whether it’s early in the year or late in the year, so it’s we’re able to collect those points early on, I think is really significant. I’m just really excited to have this momentum now going into Pomona, which is one of my favorite races.”

A year ago, Ashley won three races and was runner-up four times, finishing fourth in the final points standings. When the team struggled at the season-opening Gatornationals, Ashley acknowledged plenty of brainstorming was going on.

“I think we did make some changes, maybe slightly back to our old setup, but I think we really stayed with the new one, and it just takes time,” Ashley said. “We knew that it was going to take time. It was going to take laps, so it’s just a matter of being patient. Mike Green and Tommy DeLago, they were really patient. I think maybe they went back to the old setup a touch with a few things, but for the most part, it was just them getting used to the new setup. Hats off to them and the guys. We have a resilient group, and it showed with their ability to put the past behind them and focus on just this race and focus on the future.”

When Ashley advanced to the Phoenix semifinals, he earned a spot in the Mission #2Fast2Tasty NHRA Challenge, a new program that debuted in Phoenix and will continue at the Lucas Oil Winternationals March 30-April 2 in Pomona, Calif.
 
During Saturday’s qualifying sessions, the drivers who reached the semifinals in Phoenix will re-run the semifinals and final, earning additional purse and bonus points.

“It is exciting, and my hat’s off to Mission Foods and NHRA for putting this on,” Ashley said. “This is just another opportunity to go out there and compete like it is race day. You might see some pedaling on Saturday. We are going to see a lot of people there because it is Phillips Connect’s hometown. So, we will have people from Phillips Connect and National Debt Relief on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. It is another opportunity to race for a prize, and it will be exciting and fun and a chance to double up.”