The only thing worse than losing is winning and creating bad juju in the pits. Just ask Ron Capps.
Capps won the King of Nitro title at the Bader Family’s Night Under Fire earlier this month, and he is perfectly content if his fellow nitro racers stick to reading the articles and looking at the pictures.
As he sees it, putting on the crown and regal robe, then carrying the rather substantial scepter through the pits at Brainerd International Raceway, might be asking for trouble. Not that Capps is superstitious or anything.
He remains plenty proud of winning one of drag racing’s most distinctive specialty events. He just isn’t taking any chances, even in jest.
“The crown is actually up in my lounge,” Capps said. “Sometimes you win something, or you win a race, and you keep the trophy in there, but you sometimes feel like it might jinx you at the next race. But the crown, I think, is appropriate. The scepter, a lot of people don’t understand. That scepter was pretty cool, and it weighed about 70 pounds. That was a legit scepter. The top of it was all glass blown.”
The scepter has already been removed from active duty, which might be another layer of Capps’ insurance policy. Crew chief Dean “Guido” Antonelli made certain it was safely packed away.
“Guido actually took that back to the shop,” Capps said. “It’s all wrapped up, and I’m going to get it home at the end of the year. But what a weekend. It was a great test session, honestly, for us, and we were able to run the numbers that we wanted to run up there. But to hold that crown for a year and not hear it from Maddie… Thank God we beat Maddie, or she would have rubbed it in every day for the whole year. So yeah, pretty cool.”
Capps had to beat teammate Maddi Gordon in the Night Under Fire’s winner-take-all Top Fuel versus Funny Car finale. Gordon, driving the Ron Capps Motorsports Top Fuel dragster, had earned her spot in the showdown and had every intention of taking the crown back to her side of the operation.
Capps knows exactly what would have followed.
“Yeah. Yeah. I can’t even imagine if we had an alternate universe like Marvel or one of those movies where she won, because she would legit, out of the side of her eye, rub it into me every single day,” Capps said. “I guarantee it.I also couldn’t imagine the crowd noise that would have happened if she would have beat me on that run. So thankfully Guido had his… He was on it, and he threw down. So I was able to get the crown at least for a year.”
Anyone questioning whether Gordon possesses that competitive streak received another clue Friday night at Brainerd.
Gordon found herself opposite Doug Kalitta on the final run of the Battle for the Axe competition, which matched the quickest qualifiers from the professional categories. Kalitta won the Top Fuel side of the special event, and Gordon later posed with the axe raised in Kalitta’s direction.
It was a joke.
Probably.
That competitive edge is part of what made the Night Under Fire matchup interesting. Top Fuel dragsters and Funny Cars rarely race head-to-head, and Capps understood there was more involved than putting two nitro cars in opposite lanes and turning them loose.
“We did that at Bristol years ago, Dragster versus Funny Car, and there were some tips and tricks that the Dragsters used against us,” Capps said. “Remember Al Hoffman trying to whack the throttle to throw the Dragster guys off? In hindsight, I would have told her to leave on my amber, and it probably would have… I didn’t realize; I don’t think a lot of people realized, she went .73 at almost 340 trying to catch me. So they ran really good.
“It’s just we got the head start. She was not used to that sound right out of the side of her cockpit of my gas being hit. So if we did it again, I promise you she would be figuring out a way to leave better and probably would have whooped my ass, honestly.”
Capps got his head start, Antonelli gave him the race car he needed, and Gordon never caught him. The reward was the crown, robe and a scepter substantial enough to make an ordinary race trophy seem almost understated.
Those who know Capps understand he’s a windshield kind of racer and not a rearview mirror looker.
“Well, you know me. There’s a lot of drivers out here that wear their championship rings everywhere, and I mean everywhere, autograph sessions we go to, and I’m never [one to do that],” Capps said. “I wore mine to the banquet and maybe a few other sponsor occasions, but I’ve just not ever been that guy that would wear my stuff out and about like that. I feel like it makes me hungrier to keep and not be reminded of what we have already. So you would not find me walking around that crown. Definitely not.”
There is a distinction, of course. Championship rings fit in a pocket, while a crown announces itself from several trailers away.
Capps’ philosophy has never wavered. The trophies are reminders of where he has been, and he would rather concentrate on where he is going.
