This weekend marks the first of two consecutive four-wide NHRA Camping World Drag Racing Series events. Race No. 4 in a 21-contest campaign, the NHRA Four-Wide Nevada Nationals on The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway will see Top Fuel, Funny Car and Pro Stock combatants vying for difficult-to-earn Wally winner’s trophies, against three similar cars racing in four lanes.
Occurring every spring since 2018, the Four-Wide Nationals at Las Vegas is one of two such contests on Bruton Smith-family-owned properties, one in Nevada, the other in Charlotte, NC. Racing four-across is an exercise some teams and drivers love, but others would rather see NHRA races done the traditional way, with two cars only.
There are three drivers currently racing that have had good success at this race: Steve Torrence won the 2018 Top Fuel trophy and repeated in 2021 – there was no 2020 four-wide race, neither in Las Vegas nor in Charlotte – while J.R. Todd took back-to-back trophies in this spring classic in 2018 and 2019, driving his Toyota Funny Car for Kalitta Motorsports. The only other driver who repeat here is Erica Enders, the five-time and reigning Pro Stock champion, victorious in both 2021 and 2022 with her Elite Motorsports Chevrolet Camaro.
Pro Stock Motorcycle, which isn’t part of the program this season, has had two four-wide races in Las Vegas; the first one in 2019 went to Hector Arana Jr.’s Buell, while the 2021 edition was captured by the similar Buell machine of Ryan Oehler, the Chicago-area rider’s second Pro Stock Motorcycle victory after earning his first in Indy the year before.
Torrence is hoping his success in this Four-Wide venture will continue in Las Vegas. After losing his points lead in Pomona following a second-round departure, the four-time NHRA Top Fuel titleholder is hoping for his seventh win in this non-traditional straight-line format. Consistency counts in drag racing and, of late, Steve Torrence can’t seem to find the results he knows he’s capable of achieving. With two-time 2023 winner Justin Ashley currently in charge of the class and with Torrence trailing him by 45 points, Steve-O knows it’s time. Ashley, for his part, hopes to keep rolling along and noted, “Anything can happen when you have over 40,000 horsepower on the starting line at the same time.” It’s up to him to make sure he continues to race at his current level, despite never -yet – winning a four-wide round in Las Vegas.
A smaller number of Top Fuel cars are headed to this track, which is adjacent to Nellis Air Force base, nominally giving fans a good air show to go with the cacophony they experience on the grounds of The Strip. With 14 cars on the entry list, there will be at least one bye round and the ability to move up or down the points food chain is in play. Every driver you’d expect to see will be on site: Brittany Force, Antron Brown, Austin Prock, Ashley, Torrence, Josh Hart, Shawn Langdon and Doug Kalitta, Clay Millican, eight-time titleholder Tony Schumacher, Leah Pruett and Mike Salinas. Add to that list Buddy Hull, Rob Passey and Krista Baldwin, all of whom have the ability to mix it up with the regulars.
In the Funny Car arena, J.R. Todd, in particular, is coming off a troubling third race of the year, the 63rd Lucas Oil NHRA Winternationals, where he and his Toyota GR Supra got pummeled twice during the event. He was qualifying with John Force on Saturday in the 2nd of three sessions when the 16-time Funny Car racer’s Chevrolet Camaro SS collided with Todd’s Toyota GR Supra beyond the finish line, after hitting the wall. After untangling chutes and separating the two, the Kalitta crew had to pull out a replacement chassis and body for Todd to qualify and race with. The mangled chassis and body were taken back to Ypsilanti, MI for repair by a pair on Kalitta’s hospitality crew.
Todd had qualified fifth in Pomona and was set to race Alex Laughlin in Jim Dunn’s Funny Car. He was ahead as the duo got to the 1,000-foot finish line when Todd’s Toyota suffered tire spin and a massive engine explosion from the 11,000-horsepower machine ensued. The Toyota body folded into itself and Todd, once again was the highlight reel for race day. Despite his good qualifying session, the 2017 Funny Car titleholder left California in seventh place. He’s hoping to take his repaired primary car or a new backup chassis to the finals of this difficult race. A third four-wide win for Todd and Kalitta Motorsports might soften the blow of having to give it all up in Pomona and exit early with another destroyed machine.
There are a total of 19 Funny Car entries for this race, 18 of whom are chasing current points leader and three-time champ Matt Hagan, wheeling a Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat for Tony Stewart Racing. His closest pursuer is former teammate and reigning three-time champ Ron Capps, piloting his self-owned team’s Toyota GR Supra. While neither Hagan nor Capps has won the four-across race at Las Vegas, each one of them has won at the track. Hagan has two wins this year while Capps has two runners-up and a single No. 1 qualifier, placing him 26 points behind his former teammate. By virtue of her three semifinals appearances and that consistency, Alexis DeJoria’s DC Motorsports Toyota GR Supra lands in third, lagging by 64 points, while Phoenix winner Robert Hight’s John Force Racing Chevrolet Camaro SS and the Ford Mustang of Bob Tasca III make up the top five in class.
They’ll all be fighting for that four-wide win, along with the balance of the top 10: Chad Green’s Mustang, Todd’s Supra, Tim Wilkerson, Terry Haddock and Blake Alexander with their Mustangs. On-site to mix up the standings this week are: Alex Laughlin in Jim Dunn Racing’s Flopper, Paul Lee’s Dodge Charger, Jeff Arend in the Russo Racing Toyota, Steven Densham’s Mustang, Jeff Diehl’s Toyota Camry, Jason Rupert’s Mustang and Bobby Bode III in his family’s Mustang. The field is deep and, with three extra combatants this weekend, there will be three rather disappointed teams, drivers and their fans.
The only other driver who has won a four-wide more than once in Sin City is Erica Enders, who could surely use some of her vaunted luck this weekend, at the site where she earned her fifth championship last October. The 2023 season hasn’t been what she’d hoped for after such a stellar run to the title in 2022. She didn’t even make the bell for Gainesville, was out after running against teammate Bo Butner in the initial pairing in Phoenix, and fell to Matt Hartford in the second round at Pomona. And now she’ll have to put up with both her own teammates and the denizens of KB Titan Racing, most of whom lead her (she’s 10th at the moment) in the points standings after three events.
By virtue of his consistency and that win in Pomona, Dallas Glenn of KB leads the standings, followed by KB Titan affiliate Matt Hartford, Phoenix victor Camrie Caruso, Elite Motorsports’ Troy Coughlin Jr., Bo Butner III and Aaron Stanfield. Greg Anderson and Kyle Koretsky of KB Titan are seventh and eighth, followed by Gainesville runner-up Mason McGaha and Enders. We haven’t seen the pioneering Enders this far down the pecking order since she drove a short-lived Dodge product for less than a single season, once NHRA dictated fuel injection. This weekend the full top-10 in Pro Stock will be on-site and it’s a 19-car field, with Shane Tucker, Kenny Delco, Elite’s Jerry Tucker and Steve Graham hoping to bring anguish to the top 10. The full Cuadra family entry is on-site as well, all of them in Mustang-bodied cars, while the balance of the field drives the Chevrolet Camaro. No sign of Alan Prusiensky or his Dodge Dart on the entry list.
It’s a full weekend for teams and fans, with eight Lucas Oil sportsman classes coming out for this weekend’s race: Top Alcohol Dragster and Funny Car, Competition Eliminator, Super Stock, Stock Eliminator, Super Comp, Super Gas and Top Dragster. They’ll all be met by warm temps and primarily sunny skies in this desert locale. There’s no chance of rain for the NHRA this week in Nevada, as Friday is expected to top out close to 80 degrees, while getting warmer by the day, Sunday promising temps close to 90 degrees and mostly sunny skies. All but sportsman activities are expected to conclude well before sundown with Sunday’s Camping World finals scheduled to take place by 3:20PM Pacific time. With so much racing activity this weekend, NHRA will be shown on FS1 and FS2 for both finals and re-airs.
they need to dump the corporate sponsorships, insurance company controls, and get back to grass roots driveway build racing, and the stands won’t be empty anymore, and they’ll be more real racers and fans, like in the heyday of past century. 4 wide is a fad, and a gimmick