There’s one thing about NHRA Pro Stock standout Matt Hartford – he’s direct and to the point.

That definitely was the case when CompetitionPlus.com asked him about his goals for the 2023 Camping World Drag Racing Series season.

“Same thing as 2022, except tried to finish higher in the points,” Hartford said. 

Hartford finished sixth in the 2022 points standings, highlighted by his win in Denver and his runner-up effort at the Charlotte, N.C., fall race.

Hartford confirmed to CompetitionPlus.com all his sponsors would be the same in 2023. A year ago, his Camaro’s primary sponsor was Total Seal. His crew chief Eddie Guarnaccia also remains the same.

“Nothing has changed,” Hartford said. “I’m just really happy just all of our marketing partners are on board again. We want to go out there and just perform well and put on a good show for the fans and get some good exposure for everybody involved with our team.”

Hartford finished the final 11 races with a 13-10 elimination-round record, but he wasn’t about to make any guarantees about carrying that momentum into the upcoming season.

“I’ll let you know after the first couple of races,” Hartford said.

The 2023 NHRA begins at the Gatornationals, March 9-12 in Gainesville, Fla.

“Q1 in Gainesville,” said Hartford when asked if he was going to do any preseason testing. “Yeah, we all have so much stuff going on that we’re going to show up at Gainesville (KB) will rolling an engine over, we’ll stuff it in the car. We’ll go to the starting line, and when it’s our turn to start, we’ll start the car, we’ll do a burnout and hopefully, the numbers on the scoreboard are at least good enough to get us in the field.”

Hartford will be running engines from KB Titan Racing. He had run KB Racing engines before the merger of the engine-building frontrunners. 

“They’re great people,” Hartford said about Greg Anderson, who supplies the engines. “They’re very hardworking, and they’re very honest. They tell you that this is what the engine is; this is really what it should run. And if you have an issue and they give you another engine, they kind of tell you the same deal. So, they’re straight up with us. We know what we get from them. We never question if we have the power that they tell us that we have.

“I think Greg Anderson doesn’t mince words. He doesn’t say a lot. He doesn’t mince words when he does. He says this is what it is, and obviously, we’ve won against him with his own engine, so we know that we get the best stuff that we can get from him.”

Hartford has competed in 157 career NHRA Pro Stock races, winning five national events and finishing runner-up seven times.

“We’d like to think that we could win a world championship this year,” Hartford said. “It’s really hard to compete against some of the teams that have the amount of funding that they have. However, that doesn’t mean that we can’t go out there and be a real thorn in their side, and if we can get on a roll, there’s no reason that we couldn’t wear the No. 1 at the end of the season.

“Yeah, look, we literally are going to roll back into Gainesville the way we left Pomona (the last race of 2022). We’re making no changes. To us, it’s like it’s just the next race in line. It doesn’t matter that it’s a new year.”

Hartford acknowledged he is excited about going to Gainesville, not just for the Gatornationals.

“To be honest with you, I’m looking forward to Gainesville,” he said. “I always like Gainesville, but my brother just turned 40. He does the clutch on the car and the back half on our car, and for his 40th birthday, we (paid for him to go to) Frank Hawley’s (Drag Racing) School. So, we’re going to stay after Gainesville for a few days, and he’s going to get his Super Gas license. We’re actually really thrilled that Adam (Bastion), my brother, is going to get to jump in a car and make some passes at Gainesville after the race. We’re all looking forward to that.”

Although Adam has worked with Matt’s team for years, he has never driven a race car down the dragstrip.

“I think it’s going to be a lot of fun,” said Matt about Adam taking part in Frank Hawley’s School. “He is so talented at everything that he does. He’s going to do a phenomenal job in the car, but I just think it gives him another perspective for when he is working on our cars just to have an idea of what it’s like to be inside the car.”

Matt said the Frank Hawley Drag Racing School might be a springboard for Adam to do other things.

“I think we put him in a door car just because we’re in Pro Stock, and I think the door car is the best place for him to start,” Matt said. “I mean, obviously, he’s already got the needle in his arm. He loves being out here. But maybe if he’s been in a car, maybe he’ll want to jump in one more often.”