The Summit Racing Equipment NHRA Nationals contested at Summit Racing Equipment Motorsports Park in Norwalk, Ohio in late June rewarded the fans with a special set of winners in Top Fuel and Funny Car and a rare father-daughter win at the same event.
In Funny Car, Ron Capps, in his Napa Auto Parts Toyota, battled through a tough competitive field to advance to the final round, where he squared off against Fast Jack Beckman.
Beckman has been running very well this season after taking over for the now retired John Force in the Peak Chevrolet Camaro Funny Car. Force was back at the track, to cheer his teams on and greet the fans, as he continues to recover from injuries suffered in a crash in 2024. In the final, Capps got away first (0.048 to 0.051) and held on to a 3.969 at 328.54 mph to 4.011 at 323.43 mph win. It was the 80th career win for Capps and extended his championship point lead. But that was only part of Capps’ amazing race day.
In Top Fuel, rookie driver Maddi Gordon has been quickly showing that she is a very special driver and very competitive in the class. Along with her driving skills, she brings a special personality that has quickly made her one of – if not the most – popular drivers in the sport. Her excitement and knowledge within the sport makes her special, as she not only drives the car, but knows how to work on the car and has even assembled the entire engine on the car in order to fully understand how everything on the car works. She grew up working on her dad’s Alcohol Funny Car. She knows how to perform machine work to make parts and knows how to weld chassis and other parts.
After qualifying fifth, Gordon took out Spencer Massey. But it was not an easy task, as theCO2 air system that controls everything on the car shredded the airlines and needed to be very quickly replaced at the starting line area before the car could be started. Then, Gordon took out Tony Stewart in round two. In the semifinal round, she defeated the most dominating car of the season, the Kalitta Flying services dragster, driven by Shawn Langdon. The Langdon car has been nearly unbeatable this season and was the quickest and fastest at this event. Langdon is also known as one of the premier drivers in the category. In their semifinal match up, he left first (0.047 to 0.089). Langdon’s car then lost traction, but so did Gordon’s. At this point, both drivers fought to regain control of their cars. Gordon out did Langdon to take the win, 4.250 at 251.25 mph to 5.871 at 156.17 mph, to advance to her first final round appearance in only 10 events. In the final, she squared off against four-time champion, Antron Brown.
Brown got away first (0.0509 to 0.075) but could not hold off Gordon, as she sped by for her first career Top Fuel victory, 3.786 at 333.16 mph to 3.840 at 328.14 mph. For her team owner, Ron Capps, it was stressful. First, her car broke the airlines in the opening round. Then he watched her beat two big name drivers, Stewart and Langdon. He waited at the finish line for the results of her match up with Brown and finally, it was topped off by the high energy celebrations and interviews with live TV. For Ron Capps Racing, it was their first double up, earning a win in two different classes at the same event. For Gordon it was even more special, as her dad, Doug Gordon, won the Alcohol Funny Car class, defeating the most dominating car in that class, driven by Sean Bellermeur. This gave them a very rare father-daughter double up win at the same event. The last drivers to do that were John Force in Funny Car and Ashley Force in Alcohol Dragster as well as John Force in Funny Car and Brittany Force in Top Fuel. Gordon gave the crowd plenty to cheer about with extremely rare “double-double-up.”
Aaron Stanfield won in the Pro Stock category, defeating Matt Hartford in the final round, while Richard Gadson defeated Gaige Herrera to take the Pro Stock Motorcycle win.
The next NHRA event is the Denso Nationals at Sonoma Raceway, set for July 17 through 19, where Top Fuel, Funny Car and Pro Stock will be contested. There will be only eight Pro Stock Motorcycles competing at the Sonoma event, as they will be racing only in the special “Call-Out” race portion.
