What started out to be a discussion about next weekend’s NHRA Four-Wide Nationals at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway ended up being a declaration of love.
All that moderator Brian Lohnes asked John Force toward the end of an NHRA-arranged Zoom press conference with the John Force Racing (JFR) team was which lane in a four-wide race he prefers.
Before he closed the session by saying, “Robert [Hight] stole my line: the one you win in,” Force poured out his heart about drag racing and its premier sanctioning body and pronouncing the sport has a bright future.
“The pandemic about took me out, mentally and financially. And the sponsors stayed by me, by us. In the process, I changed a lot of how I looked at things,” he prefaced. “But I know how to get my mind right.”
It took a little family field trip the weekend before, from his home at Yorba Linda, in Southern California, to Barona, near San Diego, for a Jr. Drag Racing League meet. They went to support brothers Jacob and Noah Hood, sons of daughter Ashley and her husband Dan Hood, Force’s Funny Car crew chief.
“Seeing the families, seeing the kids, seeing the future of the sport, it just made me mentally right,” Force said.
He said wife Laurie told him, “On the road down here, you were terrible, and on the road back, you’re a different person.”
His explanation was passionate: “It’s our sport that gave me everything I love. And I do it, and sometimes that gets me in trouble. I love it so much. But watching these kids coming up . . . that’s what gets my mind right. [NHRA President Glen] Cromwell works hard to keep this whole thing put together [then he praised the broadcast team]. I think we have a great property in NHRA, and I think there’s a big future there. And I’m looking forward to it.”
Force said Autumn Hight, the 17-year-old daughter of his own daughter Adria Hight and JFR company president and Funny Car teammate Robert Hight, is eyeing a move to race in the pro ranks sooner rather than later. The 16-time Funny Car champion said Robert Hight “is working with the Torrence family to build her a car. Right now, she’s 17. Another year she could go pro. We’re looking at where the future’s going to go. We’ve already had sponsors ask us. But she’s got school. She’s got things.” But he said he is overjoyed “to watch her move up [from racing a Jr. Dragster], how much she loves it.”
As the Camping World Drag Racing Series tour heads back west for the fourth of 22 events this season, Robert Hight correctly said the warm, sunny temperatures in the Las Vegas forecast will be a welcome contrast – “more normal conditions,” he put it – to the cold, rainy chills at Gainesville.
“I love the Four-Wides, because on Sunday, it’s only three rounds,” he said. “And the first two, you kind of get some freebies, if you just have your act together, if your car’s running good. You have to be first or second to the finish line to advance. If your car’s running well and you’re driving well, boy, that’s a couple of easy round-wins. So it’s a good race to make some points up.”
He said that for him, the secret is keeping the staging process simple: I don’t try to keep track of who’s in which lane. That’s too much thinking. It’s really not a difficult task to watch two more cars stage and be ready for the [Christmas] Tree to come down.”
JFR Top Fuel racer Brittany Force said a four-wide race “is a challenge.”
Curiously, she said, “one of the biggest challenges is the simplest thing at the same time. It’s knowing what lane you’re in. To me, it seems like the easiest thing: you stand in your lane and you look at your Christmas Tree. And it’s pretty simple. But there’s been moments on qualifying and race days where you forget where you are. Somebody flickers the bulb, and just for a second you forget where you are.
“It’s great, and it’s a great experience for the fans. It’s fun to watch. It’s fun to be a part of. But it’s definitely a challenge for every single team out there competing – for the drivers, keeping their focus where it needs to be, making sure you know what lane you’re in, and pushing your car all the way you can . . . and for the crew chiefs, as well,” Force said. “We get only the one qualifying chance in each lane, and it’s tough. It’s a challenge, but it’s definitely worth it when you win.”
Her father, who said he’s grateful for racetrack mogul Bruton Smith’s extensive investments in drag racing, said, “Watching two cars side by side, that’s always been spectacular. But watching four, it’s unbelievable. Fans just got to come and see it. The crowds will be great, because they come to see the spectacle of four cars racing each other.”
Each of the four JFR drivers has his or her own strategy about which lane to choose or hope to get to race.
Top Fuel’s Austin Prock missed the two four-wide races last year and sat out all but the first two events in 2020 [which resumed in July with no four-wide events the rest of that season]. He said, “Shoot, it’s been so long since I’ve raced four-wide, but I would probably say [he prefers] one of the outer lanes. I feel like that’s probably the simplest of all four. But whatever lane’s the best lane I’m going to be happy in. Hopefully we can get this Montana Brand / Rocky Mountain Twist car rolling down the racetrack real quick and be able to choose our lane come Sunday.
Brittany Force said she will defer to crew chief David Grubnic for the decision about lane choice when that situation arises. She set the national Top Fuel speed record at Las Vegas with 338.17-mph blast in the fall of 2019 (and won that traditional-format event), so it’s no surprise she called the facility “one of my favorite tracks on our circuit.” But she agreed with Prock that “you have to go with Lanes 1 and 4. Those are the easiest lanes for the driver. That’s the closest to the real deal.”
Carrying on with his theme of simplifying everything, Hight said his favorite lane is the one “that has the blinking light at the end, the win light.” He said, “It doesn’t matter to me” where he has to stage, that he’s “just excited to get back to Vegas.”
The same goes for Prock, who said, “It’s been a long two weeks off, especially after a tough week at Gainesville [in the Gatornationals]. Looking forward to getting back in the seat. Can’t wait to stand on the gas again.”
For him and for Funny Car points leader Hight, that’s love.
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