The 25th annual NHRA 4-wide Nationals featured some challenging weather conditions, temperatures in the mid-90s one day, followed by better conditions with some wind. Then it was hot temperatures, again, with little wind. This challenged the teams, crew chiefs and tuners in their efforts to get their race cars to perform consistently. The four-wide format has been run at the spring event in Las Vegas since the DENSO NHRA Las Vegas Nationals in April, 2018.
The event takes place using both 2-wide tracks, located side by side. Instead of the standard two car pairing format, the event is contested in 4-car quads. The first two cars/drivers to the finish line (without fouling) advance to the next round of eliminations. Instead of four rounds of 2-car racing, the race consists of three 4-car pairings. This opens it up to some interesting results, as each driver needs to finish at least second in each quad to advance. In the final round (quad), the first one to the finish line is the event winner, second is runner-up and third and fourth are semi-finalists.
In Top Fuel, Doug Kalitta (3.73 at 331.04 mph), Brittany Force (3.754 at 331.16 mph) and Antron Brown (3.787 at 326.08 mph) were the top three qualifiers and the only drivers to run in the 3.7’s second zone. Steve Torrence (3.809 at 332.02 mph) and Tony Stewart (3.821 at 321.98 mph) rounded out the top five. In Stewart’s case, most people sensed that he was a win just waiting to happen and wondered if this would be the event. By the end of the opening round, Force was gone, but Kalitta, Brown, Torrence and Stewart were still in. In the second round, Kalitta fouled out, throwing Torrence off his concentration, leading to a 0.230 reaction time. That allowed Stewart to win the quad (though Torrence had the quicker car) and Justin Ashley to finish second. In the final round, the quad consisted of Stewart, Brown, Jasmine Salinas and Ashley. It was Ashley who got away first (0.049), followed by Brown (0.058), Stewart (0.082) and Salinas (0.086). Ashley lost traction before 300 feet, leaving Brown in the lead followed by Salinas and Stewart. Then destiny took over, as Salinas’ supercharger let go just past half-track, followed by Brown’s engine exploding just before the finish line. This allowed Stewart to thunder into the record books with his first career Top Fuel event win, Brown ended up second. It was a historic event, as Stewart’s wife (Leah) and infant son (Dominic) were present for the celebration. Stewart made history by becoming the first driver to win in all three major American motorsports at the top levels. Not only did he accomplish that, he also became the only driver to win at all of the Las Vegas motor speedway tracks, so the race proved to be quite an emotional jackpot in Vegas for Stewart. The Top Fuel Mission Foods NHRA championship battle now shows Shawn Langdon first, Stewart second and Brown third.
In Funny Car, Paul Lee and his McLeod Engineered Drive Line Components Dodge SRT, tuned by Jonnie Lindberg and John Medlen, dominated the performance aspects of the class. He qualified on the pole with a 3.940 at 326.08 mph (low elapse time and top speed of the event for the class). He was coming in off strong performances in Phoenix (winner) and Pomona (runner-up to Jack Beckman) and showed no signs of falling off. Lee won his first quad and finished second in his second quad to advance to the final round quad, where he would square off against Austin Prock, Dave Richards and Matt Hagan. Lee got away first with a 0.046 reaction time, but his 4.042 at 311.77 mph could not hold off Prock, who ran a 4.009 at 316.01 mph run on the hot, tricky race track. Richards and Hagan took third and fourth, as semi-finalists. In the Mission Foods NHRA season championship battle, Lee sits first, Beckman second and Prock third.
In Pro Stock, the two major powerhouse teams are Elite Motorsports and KB Titan. Elite had a strong hold on the class for several years, with Erica Enders getting her sixth world championship in 2023. In 2024 things started to change and Greg Anderson collected his sixth world championship. For the Elite team, much of the troubles are occurring due to health issues with two of their main tuners. It takes a lot to make these cars perform at the optimum and these two tuners (currently out suffering from medical issues) have made it tough. In fact, Enders failed to qualify for this event, the first time since 2016. The final round quad featured an all-KB Titan tuned, supported, supplied or assisted teams. It was Dallas Glenn, Matt Hartford, Greg Anderson and Matt Latino. Glenn won the season opener in Gainesville and Anderson won in Phoenix and Pomona. In this final, Anderson got away first (0.021) ahead of Glenn (0.030), but could not hold him or Hartford off, as Glenn took the win with a 6.649 at 206.83 mph to a quicker 6.638 at 205.85 mph by Harford.
Anderson, Glenn and Hartford now sit first, second and third in the Mission Foods NHRA Pro Stock championship battle. The highest Elite Motorsports car, driven by Jeg Coughlin, sits seventh, after four events.
The next event on the schedule is the American Rebel Light 4-wide Nationals at zMax Raceway in Concord, North Carolina.
