NHRA almost finished the 13th annual New England Nationals held at New England Dragway in Epping, New Hampshire. Three rounds of Mission Foods Drag Racing Series competition is complete for both Top Fuel and Funny Car. Only Pro Stock held its final round before inclement weather ruined the day for the multitude of fans on-hand to see NHRA’s stars in this 75th anniversary season.
The Mission Foods stars were able to complete four rounds of qualifying on Friday and Saturday, in addition to holding the Mission #2Fast2Tasty Challenge during Saturday’s qualifying sessions. On Friday, it was points leader Shawn Langdon of Kalitta Motorsports in Top Fuel, (3.709/334.98) Alexis DeJoria’s John Force Racing Chevrolet SS Funny Car (3.929/312.42) and Pro Stock’s Greg Anderson from KB Titan Racing (6.508/210.67) who all claimed the No. 1 Clawifier Award presented by NAPA.
On Saturday, Jordan Vandergriff supplanted his teammate DeJoria atop the qualifying ladder for his first career No. 1 and also claimed the Mission bonus race over Ron Capps’ Toyota GR Supra. Kalitta Motorsports split the Saturday takings in Top Fuel, with Langdon’s Friday time holding up for No. 1 while teammate and reigning champion Doug Kalitta secured his third Mission bonus title over Langdon, as this duo has combined to earn five of the six victories in the Mission #2Fast2Tasty Challenge over eight races in a 20-contest campaign. Anderson beat Troy Coughlin Jr. in the specialty race and his Friday Clawifier time held for the No. 1 position.
Unfortunately for Anderson, he was forced to meet his teammate and reigning titleholder in the semifinals on Sunday and Dallas Glenn prevailed with a hole shot win in that match-up, having to meet fellow KB Titan racer Matt Hartford in the final round. Glenn picked up round wins against Shane Tucker, six-time champ Erica Enders of Elite Motorsports and Anderson to get to the finals, while Hartford advanced to his third final round this year and 24th of his career, notching round wins against Deric Kramer and Eric Latino of KB Titan and Elite’s Greg Stanfield in the semis.
In that final round, Glenn used a .002 reaction time against a viable competitor to gain his third win of the 2026 season, at tracks where he’s not found the Winner’s Circle until this anniversary season. Glenn’s crew chief, Dave Connolly told him the track was going to be good in that final round and that he would be aggressive. “I hit the tree pretty good the round before, so I left everything alone. The car felt great and we just kept picking away at it all day, making it a little bit better every run.
“Historically,” he analyzed, “This hasn’t been one of my better tracks, but Dave and the team kept working on the car and we found enough to get the job done.” Glenn acknowledged that his wins in Epping and, earlier this year at Phoenix were both tracks where he’d not had success; he also prevailed in Maryland, a new track for the NHRA’s Mission racers. “Now we’re heading to Bristol, another place I haven’t won yet. Hopefully we can keep checking them off the list.”
Glenn left Epping with a 39-point advantage on Anderson, while Greg Stanfield, Hartford, Enders, Matt Latino, Aaron Stanfield, Jeg Coughlin Jr., Troy Coughlin Jr. and Eric Latino round out the top 10 in points.
Rain delays aren’t uncommon in NHRA competition and the finals for both Top Fuel and Funny Car will take place on Friday of next week at Bristol Dragway during the 25th annual Super Grip NHRA Thunder Valley Nationals. That race will mark the third consecutive competition for NHRA’s racers, but it can’t happen soon enough for the finalists in both nitro classes.
In Top Fuel, it will be Shawn Langdon, looking for his fourth consecutive title battling Tony Stewart Racing’s Leah Pruett. Langdon had a bye his first round, then beat Clay Millican and Kalitta to reach the finals. Pruett beat Scott Farley, Maddi Gordon and Billy Torrence to gain her slot in this final round. Pruett had a semifinal result in Maryland; it was her third semifinal of the season and fourth time in seven contests that she’s made it to the semifinals. She has yet to endure a first-round loss in eight races.
While Langdon didn’t do his customary leave in the first round, “I felt like our team rebounded very well in the second round and semifinals, and I felt pretty good about the final,” he said. “We can’t control weather, so we’ll head to Bristol, start going through some notes and get prepared there.” Pruett realizes, “It’s going to be a week of anticipation trying to wrap up the final round for Epping, but we kicked off this race weekend in great fashion. We missed the No. 1 qualifier by just a little bit,” Pruett reminded. “It’s more important than ever this year, with the low car count, to get that number one spot with a bye in the first round.”
Funny Car’s final round will be an all-John Force Racing battle between Vandergriff and Jack Beckman. The duo were in Epping’s staging lanes when the final bout of rainfall doused any hopes of completing this race on Sunday. When the duo make their way to the water boxes at Bristol Dragway, it will be the 58th time two JFR-affiliated cars battled for a trophy and the first since the 2025 Cornwell Quality Tools U.S. Nationals, when then-JFR Funny Car driver Austin Prock beat Beckman. This race also marks the fourth all-JFR New England Nationals final.
“I think,” Beckman mused, “with the track getting better and better here throughout the day,” on Sunday, “we could have set the two lowest ETs of the weekend, which our Chevy took in the semifinals today. But we’re not going to race in the rain and we’ll pack our cars and have three reasons to go right after it in Bristol: we’re going to have qualifying, the Mission Foods #2Fast2Tasty Challenge, the final round against Vandergriff for this race and the Bristol race. That’s four reasons to push hard right off the bat!” With a diamond Wally winner’s trophy already in his possession, Vandergriff was definitely looking forward to Sunday’s final round. “We have an all-JFR final and this is definitely what John would have wanted,” the first-year JFR racer said. “I hate it for all the great fans here in Epping who stuck it out, because they deserved to have everything get wrapped up here. But it was not to be.”
As the NHRA teams make their way to Bristol, TN for the ninth race in the 20-contest season, there are some happy faces, some not-so-happy and some relieved racers traveling southwest to the next venue. The Thunder Valley Nationals will have so much extra action that this upcoming 25th edition , set for June 12-14, will be a barn-burner.