Photography: John Force Racing / Gary Nastase / Auto Imagery
EPPING, N.H. (May 31, 2025) – Jack Beckman raced to his second win of the season in the Mission Foods 2Fast/2Tasty Challenge Saturday, sharing center stage at New England Dragway with teammate Austin Prock who will start his Cornwell Tools Chevrolet SS from the No. 1 starting position in Sunday’s 12th NHRA New England Nationals.
Two-time Top Fuel World Champion Brittany Force will start her Monster Energy Chevrolet from the No. 5 starting position in pursuit of her 300th round win and 18th victory in the Mission Foods Series and will oppose Clay Millican in round one.
Overall, it was a qualifying performance that got the seal of approval from team founder and owner John Force who won here just one year ago, earning the 157th victory of his career.
“Congratulations to Beckman and Prock,” said the 16-time World Champion. “And Brittany’s right there in the hunt as well qualified fifth. That’s a pretty good weekend so far. We’ll see how it plays out on race day.”
“I’m really proud of how this Monster Energy team finished off qualifying,” Brittany said. “We ran a solid 3.71(3) on Friday and backed that up with a strong 3.70(3) in the final session (at a speed of 336.40 mph). Tomorrow’s conditions are going to be very similar (and) I believe we have a good shot at picking up our first win of the season.”
Prock, who came into the season’s seventh event as the Funny Car point leader, followed Friday’s best-of-the-event 3.860 with a solid 3.867 at 334.48 mph Saturday and will oppose No. 16 qualifier Buddy Hull in Sunday’s opening round.
“We went out there and laid down another strong run,” said the fourth-generation racer. “That’s two No. 1 qualifiers in a row for us and we’re just getting started. There’s still more on the table if we need to push it harder. I’ve always said, all I ever wanted to do was drive a Funny Car. Then all I wanted was to line up against John Force like my grandfather did. Now I’m doing it at this level with this team – it’s surreal.”
Sunday, the 29-year-old phenom will be trying to power the Cornwell Tools Chevy into the final round for the fourth straight race and for the 17th time in 27 career starts in the Funny Car division into which he was thrust when three-time World Champion Robert Hight was forced out of the seat by medical issues to start the 2024 season.
Nevertheless, while the Cornwell Chevy has been the top performer for most of this season, just as it was a year ago, Prock acknowledged that “this thing has been giving us a little grief (but it) went past the tree the smoothest it has all weekend on that run. So, we’ll see what we can do tomorrow.
“I think the conditions will be similar and nobody was really in our zip code all weekend,” he said. “We were the only car to go in the mid .80s, so hopefully we can put four of those together tomorrow and get this Cornwell Tools / HendrickCars.com Chevrolet in the winner’s circle again.”
If he is to do so, though, he likely will have to beat Beckman in a round other than the final.
Although he won the 2Fast/2Tasty bonus, “Fast Jack” couldn’t improve on his Friday time of 3.908 seconds and, like Brittany, will start Sunday from the No. 5 position, which places him and his PEAK Antifreeze and Coolant Chevy SS on the same side of the ladder as his teammate.
In winning Saturday’s bonus race, he first beat Cruz Pedregon before slipping past Matt Hagan in the final by a scant .012 of a second, a victory made all the sweeter because of problems that necessitated a complete engine swap in the PEAK Chevy between sessions.
The 59-year-old cancer survivor, who won the NHRA Super Comp World Championship in 2003 and the Funny Car title in 2012, grabbed a .005 of a second advantage at the start and made it stand up at the finish.
“This was one of the wildest Saturdays I’ve ever been part of,” said the 37-time Funny Car winner. “We had to do a full engine change before (the final) round, no warm-up, just bolt it in and go. I didn’t even know if we’d get it done today, but it looks cool as hell now. The Mission #2Fast2Tasty Challenge gives us a race within qualifying, and that adds so much more meaning.
“This place is as cool as it gets. Austin’s team makes it look easy (but) what both our crews did today, is awe-inspiring,” said the U.S. Air Force veteran. “I’m a huge historian of this sport and it means the world to be part of it like this.”
Beckman won in 3.913 seconds at a slowing 316.52 mph. Hagan was closing fast, crossing the line in 3.920 seconds with a finish line speed of 329.83 mph.
The victory made Beckman the first Funny Car driver with multiple wins this season in the 2Fast/2Tasty Challenge. He won earlier at Pomona, Calif., and the next day won the Lucas Oil Winternationals at In-N-Out Burger Pomona Dragstrip.
He will start Sunday’s New England Nationals against Daniel Wilkerson, driving the car in which John Force won the race a year ago, the last of his record 157 tour victories.
