Competition Plus’ Water-Cooler Topics From The NHRA Nevada Nationals

1 – Mike Salinas’ victory scrambles Top Fuel standings - The NHRA Top Fuel class has a new points leader with Leah Pruett’s first-round loss Sunday at the Nevada Nationals at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. And it has a rejuvenated contender with Sunday winner Mike Salinas, who scored a runaway final-round victory in the Valley Services dragster for Scrappers Racing over traction-troubled Justin Ashley.

In successive rounds, the top-three-ranked drivers lost, and the scramble left Steve Torrence at the top of the leaderboard with a 15-point advantage over No. 2 Doug Kalitta.

Torrence was disappointed with his semifinal finish and defeat by Ashley, but he knows the points structure at Southern California’s Auto Club Finals at In-N-Out Burger Pomona Dragstrip could help him.

“Obviously, we’ve got some work to do at Pomona, but it ain’t over yet,” he said. “The good thing is that there are points-and-a-half [available].”

While that might help, it also might help those chasing him.

Kalitta, winner of the first two Countdown races, lost to Josh Hart in the second round Sunday, but left Las Vegas without too much damage to his best shot in awhile for that elusive first championship. He leads third-place Leah Pruett by 19 points.

“Josh had a better light [reaction time] than I had. It’s unfortunate and obviously bad timing,” Kalitta said. “We’ll lick our wounds for a couple of weeks and get back at it. That’s all we can do. We knew it was going down to Pomona, that’s for sure.”

For his part, Ashley said, “I feel really good about the way the day went today. It was critical for us to be in the championship hunt and give ourselves a realistic chance going into Pomona by the time this race was over. I think that we did a good job of accomplishing that. One more round would have made a big difference and we would have loved to have come away with the win. Anytime you go to a final round in a race like this, at such a crucial point in the season that is super important. We feel good and I am just looking forward to trying to take those next steps.”

Salinas improved from sixth place to fourth, just 76 points off Torrence’s pace heading into the Nov. 10-13 Finals.

The victory was Salinas’ second of the year, and his first since the season opener at Gainesville, Fla.

“We’ve been working on this car since Gainesville. We have some real special things it's been doing. And it has showed signs of greatness, but the consistency has been a little evading us. So trying to get more consistent running these [3.]60 numbers and doing it today is the best day we've had all year. The car is showing amazing signs. If we can continue to do what we're doing here, it'll be a great weekend in Pomona, and that's what we're looking at.”

He said the grind of competing takes a lot of starch out of a team owner/driver and a success is overwhelmingly satisfying.

“You get beat down. You lose, you lose, you lose, you lose. And then one day everything falls in place and you need to pinch yourself. Stay humble, relaxed and look at it and like, ‘Wow. It is possible again.’ Look, we've been trying. It's not like we haven't been trying all year and stuff doesn't work. It's just, you get these moments and look, this stuff is hard. It's really hard to do. I mean, to be honest with,” Salinas said to reporters, “if you guys weren't up there, I'd be crying my eyes out, because I'm like, ‘It worked again.’ It's just ... you have these little battles with yourself.”

And he has battles with several others on the horizon.

2 – Funny Car winner Robert Hight puts pressure on leader Matt Hagan, No. 2 Bob Tasca III = Matt Hagan managed to hang onto the Funny Car points lead despite missing his chance for another final-round berth by nine-thousandths of a second. But event winner Robert Hight tightened the screws on him and No. 2 Bob Tasca III.

Hagan and his Tony Stewart Racing Direct Connection Dodge have a 15-points edge on No. 2 Tasca. Hight is two points behind Tasca, with points-and-a-half structure an added incentive at the Auto Club Finals at Pomona, Calif., in two weeks.

The Funny Car final came down to the top two qualifiers who for a time late Saturday night took turns being No. 1. Tasca was originally the top starter and Hight was second, but the NHRA Technical Department ruled that the headers on Tasca’s PPG Ford Mustang were out of compliance and granted Hight the No. 1 berth. That moved Tasca to second, and added some friction to a rivalry that was already simmering.

In the end, Hight won handily Sunday. Tasca ran into tire shake and ultimately was no threat.

But Tasca is a big threat – one of several – to Hight’s quest for a fourth Funny Car championship. So is fellow three-time champ Matt Hagan, who fell against Tasca in the semifinals.

Three-time and reigning champion Ron Capps saw his chance to break into the title mix at the season finale virtually vanish with a first-round loss Sunday, and is now a distant fourth in the standings.

“We dug ourselves a hole in Dallas [at the previous race]. It was almost a must-win situation,” Hight said after claiming the victory in his Cornwell Tools Chevy Camaro for John Force Racing. “These other guys are running right with us. We’re not running away with this thing.”

As for his rivalry with Tasca, Hight was diplomatic, saying, “Some guys you want to beat more than others. That’s a good car. He’s driving good. We have our hands full.”

He only half-joked that “I’d rather be in Gaige Herrera’s spot. If I had to trade that’s what I’d do.” He was referring to the Pro Stock Motorcycle sensation’s much easier path to a title at Pomona. 

“We’re here. We’ve got to make the best of it. We’ve got to perform, and those guys are going to be right there," Hight said. "More than likely, it’s going to go down to the final round at Pomona to win the championship, and it doesn’t get more dramatic than that. It’s cool, and to look back on it and you get the job done, boy, there’s not going to be anything more rewarding than that.”

Hagan said, “We have a big road ahead of us to try and win this championship in Pomona. That close loss is a tough one to swallow. We will get back to work this week, and I’ll keep working on my lights. We are still holding the points lead headed to Pomona.”

3 – Erica Enders gets 10th Las Vegas victory, 47th win in Pro Stock - In another classic showdown with 103-time winner Greg Anderson, Erica Enders won easily to remain perfect in four final-round appearances this season.

That prompted her colorful and often-unfiltered team owner Richard Freeman to point to her and declare, “That’s the baddest bitch on the planet.”

The No. 1 qualifier said what she has figured out is “that you can’t do it alone. No matter how much negativity is around you, as long as you don’t let it in your boat, it can’t sink you. That’s the biggest lesson from this weekend, with all the adversity we had to get through.” That included having one of her early qualifying rounds being disqualified on a technicality.

“When our backs are against the wall, our boys perform flawlessly,” Enders said of her Elite Motorsports crew on her Melling/SCAG Chevrolet Camaro. "We came in here with the lead, and Greg is on my heels. I’m just really proud.

“I give God all the glory,” Enders said. “When you dig deep and play with all the heart that you have, they can’t get you.”

In spite of all her success this season, Enders said she doesn’t feel like the championship is hers yet.

“We have to go out there and continue to earn it. Had you asked me that 12 races ago, I’d say you’re nuts if you told me we’d be contending for a sixth championship this year, because we were absolutely horrible," she said. "I don’t think that way at all. Sure, it’s 114 points, but Pomona is points-and-a-half. A lot can happen. A lot can change. So I just try to put that out of my mind. I know it sounds silly and cliché, but I just try to focus on what’s right in front of me. I don’t want to get the bigger picture in my mind too far ahead, but at the same time believe we can do it.

Anderson had wanted to produce a victory for sponsor Rick Hendrick. For the longtime NASCAR team owner Hendrick, this is a sadly memorable weekend. The Cup Series tour competed at Martinsville, Va. It was 19 years ago on Oct. 24 that Hendrick Motorsports’ private plane, which was carrying 10 people to attend the race at Martinsville, crashed into the mountains on a missed approach to the airport there. No one survived. Among the casualties was Rick Hendrick’s son Ricky, a Busch Series driver and heir to the family empire. Also on board were family members John Hendrick, his twin daughters, and members of the racing team’s staff.

Anderson said he “absolutely” wanted to give Hendrick a victory at Vegas and something of a salve for some of the lasting scars of the air tragedy. Hendrick will have two drivers -- Kyle Larson and William Byron -- in the final four vying for the championship this coming weekend in Phoenix.

“Anything I can do to help him out with all he's done for me and how he supports me. I just I feel like I can't ever do enough, so, if I could have a big weekend this weekend and ease some of those memories for him, make some of the bad memories go away for a little while, hopefully I can play a small part in that,” the KB Titan Racing headliner said.

Anderson said for Hendrick, the sting of losing his  loved ones “never goes away. But you can probably block it out for a few hours if you get some really good instant news. And that's the best news he can get. That man loves to win. That's why he races, because he loves to win. He doesn't just race to have fun or to go race. He races to win. When he wins, he has a great time. And yes, I think for a fleeting moment at least, he can forget about the bad memories.”

 

WANT TO SEE "THE TEN" FROM QUALIFYING? - CLICK HERE

 

4 – Gaige Herrera all but seals the Pro Stock Motorcycle title - Gaige Herrera will have to wait until Pomona, Calif., to make his Pro Stock Motorcycle championship official. But he left no doubt that the 2023 title will be his after dismissing Vance & Hines Mission Foods Suzuki Hayabusa teammate Eddie Krawiec for the third straight event and the fourth time overall.

Herrera earned his 10th victory of the season in 14 races and ran his elimination-round record to 46-4. He reset the track record on his final run with a 6.75-second quarter-mile elapsed time.

Six times this year, four times in final rounds, Herrera has denied four-time class champion Krawiec a milestone 50th victory.

Herrera said his motorcycle “has been on rails all weekend – all season. A year ago, I never would have expected to be in this situation. I’m very thankful for the opportunity. That was a big one, three [straight] finals for us]. I took Ed out again, not allowing him his 50th. All in all, we’re going home with the Wally, and I’m really happy.”   

5 – Mike Castellana earns Pro Modified championship - Once Mike Castellana eliminated Dmitry Samorukov in Round 2 on Sunday, he had to wait through Sidnei Frigo’s victory against Mason Wright in the next pairing to find out if he clinched the NHRA Fuel Tech Pro Mod championship. For Castellana, it came down to the Kevin Rivenbark vs. Justin Bond match-up, and Rivenbark won to hand the crown to Castellana.

The veteran Pro Mod racer from Muttontown, N.Y., said his goal simply was to win the race. He did that, too, recording his first triumph of the year with a runaway victory over former PDRA champion Rivenbark in the final round.

“I had no clue we could win a championship. We’ve been chasing this one a long time,” Castellana said. “We came so close a few years back, but we got it this year.”

He capitalized on the fact that points leader and 2022 champion Kris Thorne crashed his car and lost to Frigo on Saturday night.

6 – Tasca puts costly tossed run behind him, focuses on Funny Car chase - At least in public, Funny Car racer Bob Tasca III shrugged off the surprising late-Saturday news that the NHRA had tossed out his No. 1 qualifying run because of a technical violation. His assessment of Saturday evening's disqualification was, "It's [NHRA's] basketball court and their basketball. We just play here.”

Tasca's 3.842, 336.74 run was disqualified when his headers had a width discrepancy. (Usually, violations occur when the laid-back header angle is out of compliance.)

"My problem with the whole situation is all weekend, there's been a witch hunt out here for header issues," Tasca said. "On Thursday, we brought all our headers down to NHRA, wanted to make sure all the angles were right. All our angles were correct, no issues. All our headers passed. The car runs great. Saturday night they [NHRA] decide to measure the overall width of the header." Evidently, width either wasn't a problem or was not checked beforehand. He said the problem is that in time, headers tend to sag. 

"You run them, and you can have some variances," Tasca said. "We happened to have had an older set on. We passed all the angles, no issue, which is, in my opinion, the critical dimension, because that determines a performance advantage. If you lay the header back more, it's more of an advantage."

Regardless, Tasca is adamant the width of the headers provides no performance advantage whatsoever. He said his headers were between an eighth of an inch and a quarter-inch outside the bounds. "The header sagged a little bit, a little bit outside the guidelines," Tasca said. "All of the header angles were perfectly fine. No issue.”

Tasca alleged his PPG Funny Car was declared legal and then abruptly was disqualified.

He said the NHRA’s attitude was “Here's your No. 1 qualifier hat. See you tomorrow.” Tasca said, “That's how it went down. The [NHRA] press release, everything is good. Hours later, the decision was reversed. And from my standpoint, it shows, in my opinion, it's very unprofessional within the NHRA Tech community – because clearly there was a difference of opinion, and NHRA Tech officials were overridden by powers that be. And it makes the teams look stupid, because they handed us the No. 1 qualifying hats after they teched my car, and then they changed their mind. So, it is what it is. I accept the ruling."

Tasca said Sunday morning he is moving forward and was focused on Sunday's eliminations.

"We just play here," he said. "And we're going to go out here focused on winning the race.

“That's the truth. The truth is not harmed by the truth,” he said.

“So, I'm not disrespectful. It is embarrassing to them and us, because let's be honest. They said it was good and it is what it is. So we're here playing their game, and we're going to go and do the best we can within the rules they've come up with. If it was a performance of safety, I would be visibly upset with my own team, because to me, that is unacceptable. 

"Eighth of an inch dimension, quarter of an inch dimension on overall width, which has no effect to the angle of the header. To me, it's ludicrous, but what it is. It's their ball field," he said.

 

WANT TO SEE "THE TEN" FROM QUALIFYING? - CLICK HERE

 

WANT TO SEE "THE TEN" FROM QUALIFYING? - CLICK HERE

7 – Extended Salinas gang going motorcycle racing - It’s no secret that Top Fuel Countdown contender Mike Salinas is interested in racing in the Pro Stock Motorcycle class. But after qualifying No. 1 in his dragster, Salinas revealed that he and brother Carl Salinas plan to join Mike Salinas’ daughter, Jianna Evaristo, in the bike class.

Moreover, he mentioned that his Scrappers Racing team one day also will include a Pro Modified entry.

“My brother and I got this bright idea. We do everything together. So, we're going to go try Pro Stock bikes. We have bikes coming. We want to race bikes. We’ve been riding motorcycles our whole life. So where else can you do stuff together with your family? I mean, I want to beat him – and my daughter,” Salinas said.

The plan, Salinas said, was to “go practice Monday morning, test session, burnouts, launches, and see where we go with it. And our goal is to go run Pro Stock bikes as a family, you know, and just have a great time with it. And we’ve got Pro Mods coming, too. Just live your best life. Family’s around. We have a great time with it. Honestly, we don't care about much other than that, having a great time and enjoying all of this with great people.”

8 – Bobby Cottrell undefeated in Nostalgia Nitro Funny Car in 2023 - Bobby Cottrell has nearly done it all behind the wheel of a Nostalgia Nitro Funny Car. Over the past seven seasons, Cottrell, at the wheel of the Bucky Austin-owned green Bardahl machine, has won countless races, including six consecutive NHRA Heritage Series Funny Car Championships. However, on Sunday at the Nevada Nationals, Cottrell did the impossible and accomplished what nearly every drag racer hopes to do in a season, and that's go undefeated. The six-time champ took home the trophy, winning the Legends Nitro Funny Car division at Las Vegas for the second year in a row, defeating Geoff Monise in the final round to complete his perfect season, not losing a single round of competition all year. 

"We're excited. It's surreal," Cottrell said. "I had to take a moment by myself and just realize what has gone on this year, you know, with all the heartache and everything. Unfortunately, we weren't able to race Geoff Monise and his team, but a win is a win, obviously. You know it's awesome. I got the best team and the best car. Bucky (Austin), Mike (O'Brien), Jeannette, the whole team, my girlfriend Heidi, my parents were here, my brothers were here. I couldn't have asked for a better ending. It's been a whirlwind the past seven and a half years. I would have never ever expected this. Hats off to them like I always say. We're excited for next year, Bucky is already talking about the March Meet, so we're excited." 

It was no easy road to the trophy for the Southern California native. In the opening round, which was run in the cool temperatures on Saturday night under the lights at the Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, Cottrell, the No. 1 qualifier, laid down the second-best run of the session, stopping the thousand-foot clocks with a blistering 4.777 second past at over 239 miles to defeat an always tough Tim Boychuk in the "Happy Hour" '69 Camaro. 

Cottrell backed up his strong opening round pass in the semifinals on Sunday afternoon with an even quicker 4.755 at 241, this time taking out the popular "California Hustler" car and driver Kamaka Pocock. 

The Bardahl team was going to have their work cut out for them in the final as they were set to square off against the driver of the "Quarter Pounder" Nitro Funny Car Geoff Monise in a rematch of the Legends Nitro Funny Car final from Thunder Valley in Bristol, Tennessee. Monise was strong all weekend long, qualifying in the No. 3 spot with a stout 4.770, then improved on that by one-thousandth of a second in the first round on Saturday night with a 4.769 to defeat Billy Morris, which held for low elapsed time of the round. 

Unfortunately, Monise hurt a motor in his semifinal win over Derrick Moreira and was unable to make the call in the final, giving Cottrell a single for the win. Nonetheless, despite having already secured the victory, crew chief Bucky Austin did not go up to the starting line gun-shy in the final. He tuned Cottrell to a scintillating 4.731 at 242, which was low elapsed time of the event and finished the year in style. 

"We went 242 (miles per hour) which is big for our class. Obviously, with this association, we run 1,000 feet, so it takes a little bit of a different setup. I never want to lift off the gas pedal. But we're just excited we came home with the win, and we're going to celebrate now."  -- Darin Williams

 

 

 

9 – Summit E.T. Motorcycle racer Jason Drnach hurt in Round 1 accident - Jason Drnach was transported to a local hospital after he fell from his bike after crossing the finish line during the opening round of the Summit E.T. Motorcycle eliminations.

The Taylor, Michigan, racer reportedly was “conscious and communicating” with emergency medical personnel immediately after the accident. Dr. Phillip Surface, the NHRA’s medical director, attended to Drnach before the racer was sent to the hospital for further evaluation and treatment.

No further word about his condition or the nature of his injury/injuries was available Sunday.

Before the wreck, Drnach cut a perfect (.000-second) light, but he ran too fast and broke out against Robert Sanders.

9A - Millican goes three-wheelin' - Clay Millican took quite the ride in E1, as his tire apparently exploded. He went through the traps and as he lifted off the throttle, the tire exploded. There was no visible sign of an engine failure or any other failure. Compounding the pain of the wounded race car, Millican lost the race to Steve Torrence. There has been no immediate cause of the tire's failure determined. 

"It was a heck of a ride," Millican surmised.

10 – Some sportsman classes will finish Monday at The Strip - Racing was suspended for some sportsman classes Sunday evening. Top Sportsman and Comp Eliminator will finish eliminations starting at 9:30 Monday morning.