Photography: John Force Racing / Gary Nastase / Auto Imagery
MOHNTON, PA. (SEPT. 14, 2025) – All three John Force Racing teams had their day end early in the NHRA Mission Foods NHRA Nationals presented by Nitro Fish when each lost their second-round matchups at Maple Grove Raceway.
It was the first time since June 8, 2025, at Bristol Motor Speedway that John Force Racing didn’t advance at least one car into the semifinals.
Brittany Force qualified eighth in Top Fuel while Austin Prock and Jack Beckman qualified second and fourth, respectively, in Funny Car. Each had lane choice in the first round of eliminations, and each earned relatively easy victories.
Force ran 3.798 seconds at 337.41 mph against Dan Mercier’s 6.453 at 94.86 but lost lane choice for Round 2 to Clay Millican 3.764-second run. She got the holeshot by 12-thousandths-of-a-second (0.076 to 0.088) but the Monster Energy dragster smoked the tires just a couple hundred feet off the starting line while Millican ran 3.866 seconds at 313.88 mph.
“It was a tough start for all of our John first racing teams coming into the first race of the Countdown. For our Monster Energy team, we had a solid first round pass but lost lane choice for the second round. That moved us over into that left lane, which we had a lot of concern for, and we did exactly what we did in qualifying when we drove into smoke right at 150 to 200 feet. We’re all out early but we head straight to Charlotte next weekend for the Four-Wide race. We will regroup, take a look at what went wrong and fix it for next weekend.”
The two-time NHRA Top Fuel Champion is seventh in the 2025 Countdown to the Championship point standings after the first of six Countdown races. The Top 10 are: 1. Doug Kalitta, 2,185; 2. Tony Stewart, 2,167; 3. Shawn Langdon, 2,152; 4. Justin Ashley, 2,135; 5. (tie) Clay Millican, 2,118; Shawn Reed, 2,118; 7. Brittany Force, 2,113; 8. Steve Torrence, 2,090; 9. Antron Brown, 2,075; 10. Josh Hart, 2,053.
Prock’s run of 3.911 seconds at 333.99 mph in Round 1 was more than enough for Joe Morrison’s 5.995 at 120.55, earning him lane choice in Round 2 against Cruz Pedregon, who ran 3.928 at 330.07. The Cornwell Tools Chevrolet SS was in the preferred right lane and Prock took the holeshot (0.053 to 0.098) but dropped a cylinder early and then hit the timing lights at the top end after Pedregon, who had his own issues, had already turned on the win light. Pedregon ran 4.219 seconds art 228.89 mph while Prock ran 4.405 at 228.04.
“To not turn on the win light is one thing but when you mow over the cones, that stings as a race car driver. That’s the first time I’ve ever hit the cones since 2018 when I started driving these cars so definitely frustrated. The Cornwell Tools Chevy had a hole out (lost a cylinder) and I had my hands full. Then it came loose and I tried pedaling it and it just hung a left on me. I’m really frustrated. We’re going to have to get our stuff together but we’ll be fine. You can afford to lose an early matchup when you come in as the points leader. Apologies to my sponsors, Cornwell Tools, HendrickCars.com, for letting you down. I should be able to catch that thing and turn on the win light. We’ll get them next week.”
In Rd. 1, Beckman ran 3.941 seconds at 328.54 mph, easily defeating a tire-smoking Dave Richards at 5.356 seconds at 148.71 mph. Beckman has lane choice in Rd. 2 against Ron Capps, who ran 3.950 seconds at 331.85 mph. Fast Jack took the left lane and beat Capps off the line (0.062 to 0.087) but the PEAK Antifreeze and Coolant Chevrolet SS slowed to a run of 4.013 seconds at 325.77 mph while Capps ran 3.974 at 327.74.
“To win this championship is going to take the team that best takes advantage of opportunities and I am so proud of the PEAK SQUAD. When we went to warm up the car for the second round, we had a main bearing injured in our engine, and it’s the one you can’t get to on regular maintenance. We thrashed. The guy’s got a new engine in, didn’t even warm it up. Then there was that on-track incident that bought us a little time, so we just warmed it on gasoline for 15 seconds. We dragged the PEAK Chevy up to the starting line and it did everything it was supposed to do. The track got a lot hotter during that long delay, and we backed it down some. We just backed it down a little too much and it’s an opportunity gone with our teammate (Prock) going out right in front of us.
“There are five more races in the Countdown, and that’s 19 more rounds of competition … I’ve done the math. It’s just going to be whoever takes advantage of every opportunity, including qualifying sessions. Those bonus points likely could decide a championship. I have no reason to not be optimistic rolling into Charlotte. It’s been a while since I’ve been in a Four-Wide winner’s circle, and this is the only one that we’ll likely ever race in the Countdown, so I’d like PEAK’s name to be on the trophy.”
Prock and Beckman still hold the top two spots in the 2025 Countdown to the Championship after the first of six races: The Top 10 are: 1. Austin Prock, 2,173; 2. Jack Beckman, 2,148; 3. Ron Capps, 2,144; 4. Paul Lee, 2,138; 5. Matt Hagan, 2,118; 6. Cruz Pedregon, 2,108; 7. J.R. Todd, 2,082; 8. Spencer Hyde, 2,080; 9. Alexis DeJoria, 2,073; 10. Daniel Wilkerson, 2,070.
NEXT RACE
Round 16 of 20 of the 2025 NHRA Mission Foods Drag Racing Series is the NHRA 4-Wide Nationals, Sept. 19-21 at zMax Dragway in Concord, N.C.
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