NHRA

Phoenix Finals John Force, Tony Pedregon Quick Facts

John Force moved a step closer to Bob Glidden's all-time drag racing record Sunday when he beat Ron Capps to win the Funny Car Championship at the 16th annual Checker/Schuck's/Kragen Nationals at Firebird Raceway. The victory was Force's ...

Edited: Apr 15, 2002, 11:45 PM

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John Force moved a step closer to Bob Glidden's all-time drag racing record Sunday when he beat Ron Capps to win the Funny Car Championship at the 16th annual Checker/Schuck's/Kragen Nationals at Firebird Raceway. The victory was Force's sixth in seven years at Phoenix and the 82nd of his career. Glidden won 85 times in a 25-year Pro Stock career. Force drove his Castrol GTX Ford to top speed of the meet at 313.88 miles per hour in the final and dedicated his win to the late Tripp Shumake, a former Funny Car rival who was killed near his Phoenix home last November in a hit-and-run accident.

WINNERS: Top Fuel, Tony Schumacher over Bob Vandergriff Jr.; Funny Car, John Force over Ron Capps; Pro Stock, Jeg Coughlin Jr. over Mark Pawuk. NEXT EVENT: MAC Tools Gatornationals, Gainesville, Fla., March 17-19. NHRA/WINSTON FUNNY CAR POINTS (two of 23 races complete): 1. Jerry Toliver, 193; 2. John Force, 175; 3. Tony Pedregon, 158; 4. Ron Capps, 122.

JOHN FORCE, Castrol GTX Ford Mustang Qualifying position: 2nd at 4.908 seconds. Race Results: Beat Johnny Gray, Scotty Cannon, Jerry Toliver and Ron Capps. Notable: First victory of new millennium Quotable: "I never let losing get me too down or winning get me too far over center but this was a good win. We needed to make a statement." – John Force

TONY PEDREGON, Castrol SYNTEC Ford Mustang Qualifying position: 4th at 4.938 seconds. Race Results: Beat Gary Densham, Del Worsham; lost to Ron Capps. Notable: Had to abort semifinal run because of an oil leak Quotable: "Apparently, it was a leak in the upper rear main seal. We changed motors before the semifinals and found a small leak on the warmup. We attacked it the best we could given the time allotted in the new system. But with only 75 minutes between rounds, you obviously don't have time to fix too much." – Crew Chief John Medlen

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