Competition Plus’ random water-cooler topics from the FMP Arizona Nationals at Firebird Motorsports Park
1 – LANGDON GETS TOP FUEL THREE-PEAT – After spoiling Leah Pruett’s second race back from a maternity hiatus, Shawn Langdon credited crew chief Brian Husen and the Kalitta Air dragster team for making his third consecutive Phoenix triumph a reality.
“Honestly, it’s all about the team you surround yourself with,” Langdon said. He first gave a shoutout to team owner Connie Kalitta – “He’s at home, but I’m sure he’s watching … got one for you, Connie. And you surround yourself with good people. Obviously, we didn’t get the start we wanted with Q1, had a safety malfunction. So we got behind the eight-ball, but Brian Husen and the whole team, everybody at Kalitta Air, we got a great group behind us. We knew it was going to be a good final. It was pretty cool, man. We got a pretty good run here going on in Phoenix, so we might need to talk to you guys about putting on a second one now.”
2 – CAPPS ON FIRE, LITERALLY AND FIGURATIVELY – Funny Car winner Ron Capps and the swarm of people around him – some from his own teams and some from competing teams – pulled off arguably the season’s most stunning comeback. Denying final-round opponent Spencer Hyde his first victory in three tries, Capps powered back from a quarterfinal engine detonation that had engulfed the car in flames and caused it to smash the right-side headers into the wall with an already cracked body.
Paul Lee, last year’s winner here, courteously waited for the struggling NAPA Auto Care team to repair the car and get to the starting line. And Capps won their semifinal face-off. In his 165th final round, Capps ran a 4.124-second elapsed time at 303.23 mph to Hyde’s 4.326, 259.76 to record his fourth victory at Firebird Motorsports Park. Capps also has been runner-up at this venue five times.
That makes Capps the most successful Funny Car driver, behind John Force, at this suburban Phoenix facility. He has 78 overall victories, 77 of them in the Funny Car class. He’s also exactly 80 behind Force on the all-time Funny Car victories list. Capps’ elimination-round record is 943-573, meaning he has only 57 more round wins to go until he reaches the 1,000 plateau.
In his two 2025 finals, Hyde lost to J.R. Todd at Epping, N.H., and to Austin Prock at Sonoma, Calif.
Like Dallas Glenn, the Pro Stock winner, Capps oohed and aahed over the trophy: “Oh, it’s so heavy. And this is the coveted one right here, man. Snake [Don Prudhomme, his former boss and NHRA legend] was here all weekend. I mean, just think of the legacy and what’s gone into this. This is unbelievable. You want to just take these and chop them all up in a thousand, 6,000, different [pieces to share with those who have contributed to his success]. This is so awesome to win here. I can’t even get over this thing. This is awesome.”
3 – REMATCH, SAME RESULT – Pro Stock winner Dallas Glenn beamed as he held his NHRA 75th anniversary diamond “Wally” trophy and said, “I really wanted one of these diamond Wallys. Aren’t these things cool? Look at this.”
He didn’t have to try long to earn one. He defeated Cody Coughlin in the final round at this second race of the 2026 season, using a 6.627-second elapsed time and 206.39-mph speed to Coughlin’s 6.674, 207.30. It was Glenn’s 22nd career victory and an all-KB Titan Racing showdown. Coughlin was pursuing his first in a rematch of the September 2025 Countdown-opening Pro Stock final at Reading, Pa.
“Everybody at KB Titan Racing, they’ve had this car on rails today. This thing has been … glued to the track. It’s hot. It’s tricky out here. I don’t know how I got a [.0]27 out of that,” Glenn said, referring to his stellar reaction time against Coughlin’s equally outstanding .030 light. “It’s not easy to cut a light right now. This feels good.”
4 – CAPPS’ KABOOM – Funny Car owner-driver Ron Capps was unhurt Sunday at the FMP Arizona Nationals following his fiery engine explosion toward the end of his quarterfinal victory against Daniel Wilkerson at Firebird Motorsports Park.
His NAPA Auto Care entry sashayed a bit on the suburban Phoenix racetrack before the engine detonated in a spectacular ball of flame, cracked the body, and veered into the right-side guard wall.
Capps exited the car on his own power and indicated he would try to make the semifinal round against last year’s Phoenix winner, Paul Lee.
Shortly afterward he said, “Sunday, a round-win is pretty important these days. It’s tough. It’s a tough track. It’s spinning. Everybody’s spinning down there. What do you do? You don’t have time to say, ‘Oh, should I lift? Should I not lift?’
“I don’t see Daniel next to me. There’s a lot of things that go through your brain. I’ve been doing this a long time. This is not, I don’t think, worth a round-win, but if we go on to win the race, we’re going to look back at this,” Capps said. “And I don’t think I grazed … I couldn’t see out the front windshield. You’ll see the in-car camera. I couldn’t see, but I was looking at the porthole and watching Daniel. Thank God he was right next to me. And I was just kind of judging off of him.
“And then all of a sudden,” Capps said, “I felt the graze off the wall with the header. Not very hard. So I didn’t want to ruin this chassis. It’s a great chassis, but I did not want to get into Daniel first and foremost. So thank God I could see out the side. And our NAPA Auto Care guys are the best. Carlyle Tools will be flying around and all that, but we’ll have it ready.”
According to FOX Sports pit reporter Bruno Massel, Capps’ crew had some extra help as it thrashed to put a Funny Car together to race Lee for a trip to the final round. Justin Ashley’s crew chief, Tommy DeLago, came over from the SCAG pit to help strip down the chassis and install new components. So did Tim Wilkerson, the dad and tuner for Daniel Wilkerson – whom Capps defeated in that wreck-marred Round 2. Maddi Gordon’s father, Doug Gordon, a three-time Top Alcohol series champion, joined in helping his longtime friend. Gordon helped pull the short block from the car and put it into the stand.
Then Capps, who strapped into his cockpit back in the pit, took a wild ride to the starting line as opponent Lee, last season’s Funny Car winner here, graciously waited.
Capps beat Lee to the finish, earning his 165th final-round appearance of his career.
“I’m speechless,” Capps said. “I feel like I won a championship right now, just that one round. Huge, huge deal for our guys. These are those moments that, growing up as a kid, you imagine. I’ve had them throughout my career with our crew people and our family. We’re a small operation, family-owned.”
He said the car “wouldn’t even start in the pit area. So we weren’t even sure. And they changed one of the boxes in the ignition, and then it fired up for the burnout and I was shocked. So, listen, I know everybody was saying this place hates me.”
He was referring to accidents he has encountered here, especially the violent one last year that rattled him for some time. “Oh, my God, I love this place, and it’s been great to me,” the three-time winner and five-time runner-up at Phoenix said. “I’ve got a lot of wins here, a lot of success. It’s always a family trip. We love coming here. But these are the moments right now. Maddi in the semifinals again. We’re both in the [Mission Foods #2Fast2Tasty Challenge] at Pomona. It’s just like it’s gotten better and better.”
Crew chief Dean “Guido” Antonelli called the result “ small miracle” and said, “God blessed us, and we’ll go on.”
4B – LEE’S SPORTSMANSHIP STANDS OUT IN PHOENIX – Paul Lee’s return to Firebird Motorsports Park came with expectations after his victory at the 2025 NHRA Arizona Nationals, where consistency and execution carried him to the Funny Car title. This season, competing under the Mainline Sales banner, Lee again demonstrated competitive form by advancing deep into eliminations before bowing out in the semifinals.
Lee qualified sixth in a tightly packed Funny Car field and opened eliminations with a decisive first-round victory over Dave Richards. He followed that performance with another strong showing against points leader Chad Green, underscoring his ability to deliver under pressure on a demanding racing surface.
While the semifinal loss to eventual winner Ron Capps ended Lee’s bid for back-to-back Phoenix triumphs, his weekend became defined by more than elapsed times or round wins. Observers throughout the pit area took note of a display of sportsmanship that reflected both Lee’s character and the professionalism of his team.
Following Capps’ dramatic engine explosion in the previous round, Lee and his crew remained staged at the ready line for nearly 12 minutes as Capps prepared a backup Funny Car. The delay tested patience in a sport where rhythm and timing often influence performance, yet Lee never wavered from the decision to allow his opponent the opportunity to compete. – Bobby Bennett
5 – UPSET OF THE DAY – In the next-to-last pairing of Pro Stock’s first round of eliminations Sunday, No. 16 starter Chris McGaha delivered the shocking result of the meet, upsetting Greg Anderson
“That was pretty nice. I mean, we’ve struggled. We still are struggling,” McGaha said. “We don’t got enough smoke, clearly. You’re not only going to win off your left foot. Fun fact, I am the only one who’s ever won one of these with four slower times. Maybe I can do it again today.
McGaha reminded that he’s the only Pro Stock racer to win an event using four holeshots.
He’ll have to cling to that memory. He gave himself no chance to advance past Cody Coughlin in the quarterfinal, cutting a regrettable .233 light.
6 – ‘WE’RE GOOD PEOPLE’ – Austin Prock, saying his DNQ at Gainesville already was ancient history for him, was full of hope Sunday morning, reckoning that if he could make four strong passes Sunday, he could win this race. He got only one shot at it. Racing against J.R. Todd in Round 1 for the first time, Prock lost traction around half-track and watched Todd advance to the quarterfinals.
At the top end of the track, Prock still was upbeat.
“We’re having fun right now. We’ve got a lot of work ahead of us. We’re making progress,” the Tasca Racing and Ford newcomer said. “I’m proud of this progress we’ve made this weekend. It’s getting close to being competitive. Got to the 330[-foot mark] and it came loose there, so we were pushing. We were trying to throw one down and show what us Procks are all about.
“But this team’s jiving and I’m driving,” Prock said, “so we’ll be a force to be reckoned with.”
Asked what he wants fans to know, the two-time and reigning Funny Car champion said, “We’re good people. A lot of haters out there, and they just don’t know anything. So that’s fine. Everybody’s got a right to their opinion. But we have a job to do, and our job is to come out here and make this Ford win races. And that’s what we’re focused on. We’re not focused on anything on the Internet.”
7 – BOND GETS ‘MIRACLE WIN ‘ – Three weeks ago, Pro Mod driver Justin Bond suffered a broken ankle, run over by his own car at a non-NHRA event at Orlando. He ditched the crutches, traveled to Chandler, Ariz., and got back in his race car, winning Sunday’s FMP Arizona Nationals.
“It’s a major miracle to be here,” the businessman from Mission, B.C., Canada, said.
He said he “sucked all day” and gave full credit to his team for his seventh triumph: “I had a real awesome car.”
Bond also had a tricky strategy that paid off. He said he “tried to rush” final-round opponent Stevie “Fast” Jackson at the starting line “and it worked.” Something uncharacteristically wonky happened on Jackson’s launch, and he was charged with a -.146 foul start, while Bond registered a winning 5.736-second elapsed time at 251.81 mph.
Bond’s company, JBS Equipment, is the NHRA Pro Mod series sponsor this season. “I love this class. This is our golf. This is our fishing. This is it. You can’t always take from the sport. This is my way of contributing.”
8 – CONGRATULATIONS! – Reigning nitro kings Austin Prock and Doug Kalitta received their championship rings and jackets Sunday during opening ceremonies. They were scheduled to do so at Gainesville, but Kalitta missed the ceremony because he and his crew had to deal with a problem that occurred during the warm-up in the pits. Prock was not on the property at the time. Kalitta quipped to the faithful fans who endured nasty heat all weekend, “We were saving the presentation for you guys here.” Prock, who missed the qualifying cut at the season-opening Gatornationals, was making his Tasca Racing / Ford and 2026 debut Sunday. Both Kalitta and Prock are two-time champions.
9 – REMEMBERING CHUCK NORRIS – Back in 2021, NHRA driver “Nitro Joe” Morrison partnered with C Force Bottling Company, which has been owned by Chuck and Gina Norris… THE Chuck Norris: martial arts practitioner, actor, and icon of rugged toughness.
And with Chuck Norris’ passing Thursday, Morrison remembered his connection with the family and its unique, fresh bottled water.
“I never met Chuck or his wife Gina. I did work with their son, Tyler, and the marketing team,” Morrison said. “I do know that Chuck and Gina were aware of what I was doing and thought it was very cool. We had tried to get them out to a race, but the schedule never worked out.
“One thing for sure, everyone knew that Chuck Norris was the baddest of the bad, and I thought that fit in great with nitro racing,” he said.
The Norris family built C Force’s facility directly on top of its fully sustainable source deep under their Lone Wolf Ranch at Navasota, Texas, which is between College Station and Houston.
10 – POMONA PAIRINGS – Mission Foods #2Fast2Tasty Top Fuel competitors will be Maddi Gordon vs. Shawn Langdon and Leah Pruett vs. Doug Kalitta as the series moves west April 10-12 to Southern California’s In-N-Out Burger Pomona Dragway. In Funny Car, the contenders will be Spencer Hyde and Matt Hagan in one first-round match and Ron Capps and Paul Lee in the other. The Pro Stock pairings will feature Cody Coughlin against Jeg Coughlin and Dallas Glenn taking on Greg Stanfield.
