This weekend’s 36th DENSO Sonoma NHRA Nationals promises to be packed with action. All four Mission Foods NHRA Drag Racing Series classes are in action again – Top Fuel, Funny Car, Pro Stock and Pro Stock Motorcycle – along with the GETTRX NHRA All-Star Pro Stock Motorcycle Callout and Mission’s #2Fast2Tasty Challenge.
It’ll be a busy weekend in the Wine Country of northern California, with four qualifying sessions and, of course four rounds of Sunday eliminations. Once the customary patchy fog clears out all three mornings, competitors and fans get mostly sunny skies and temps around 80 degrees during the daytime, while night and early morning temps are forecast around the 50-degree mark. It gets chilly in Sonoma most evenings and that could make for some quick and fast times and speeds on the Sonoma Raceway dragstrip. After all, it was at this track where Robert Hight flirted with 240-mph speeds in Friday night qualifying several years ago, before NHRA banned laid-back headers on nitro-burning Funny Cars.
Once again, Top Fuel is faced with a short field of dragsters for the second race of this Western Swing. Part-timers from the eastern sector of the United States can be loathe to truck from their home bases to work two races in succession, especially when they’re not priming for NHRA’s Countdown to the Championship that begins after the 70th annual U.S. Nationals on Labor Day weekend. Still, it is a shame that only 14 dragsters signed up to compete at this beautiful and well-maintained facility.
Fresh off his first 2024 victory after winning the Northwest Nationals last week, Steve Torrence has vaulted to third in the Top Fuel standings, behind the powerhouse Kalitta Motorsports duo of reigning dragster champ Doug Kalitta and his teammate Shawn Langdon, who was Torrence’s opponent in last weekend’s final round. Kalitta has 120 points on Langdon, while Torrence is 159 points in arrears. Justin Ashley, who was the “regular season” points leader in 2023, is having a subdued season as his SCAG Racing team prepares for the Countdown; he’s in fourth place, 170 behind Kalitta. Norwalk victory Antron Brown holds onto fifth pace, 233 points back.
The balance of the Top Fuel top 10 are eight-time champ Tony Schumacher, Clay Millican, Billy Torrence, rookie driver Tony Stewart and Brittany Force in tenth place. Force, who returned to competition last weekend after staying close to her father, the legendary John Force, didn’t have the return race that she was looking for, exiting in the first round against Schumacher, but her P3 qualifying showed the layoff hadn’t hurt much. This group is joined by Josh Hart, who made it through to the quarterfinals last weekend, ever-improving dragster rookie Jasmine Salinas, Shawn Reed and local racer Ron August Jr.
The Funny Car field led, of course by four-race-winner and points leader Austin Prock in his John Force Racing Chevrolet Camaro SS, shows a 19-car contingent for this Sonoma race. John Force is on the entry list that had [likely] been finalized before his June 23 accident; he’s back home in Southern California and receiving outpatient care for the Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) suffered at Virginia Motorsports Park. Prock has a gaping, 256-point lead in the current standings over both Bob Tasca III’s Ford Mustang and reigning, four-time class champion Matt Hagan, driving Tony Stewart Racing’s Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat. 2018 Funny Car champ J.R. Todd’s Kalitta Motorsports Toyota GR Supra is 22 points behind the tied second-place duo while John Force remains in fifth place 351 points back.
Despite his own engine explosion and first-round departure at Pacific Raceways last Sunday, Ron Capps and his Toyota GR Supra hold onto sixth place (-443) , followed by Daniel Wilkerson’s Mustang (-504), Blake Alexander in Jim Head’s Mustang, 542 back, Paul Lee’s Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat, after that driver went to his first final round last Sunday and six-race-winner Alexis DeJoria in tenth place. This group is joined by Chad Green’s Mustang, Buddy Hull’s Dodge, two-time class champ Cruz Pedregon’s Charger, Dave Richards’ Toyota Camry, Steven Densham in dad’s Mustang, Jeff Diehl’s Camry, Jason Rupert’s Mustang, Christopher Morel’s Charger and Alex Miladinovich’s Mustang.
Pro Stock did not race at Sonoma in 2023, but this class returns to the wine country in 2024. While she’s not leading the Pro Stock standings for the moment, six-time class champion Erica Enders of Elite Motorsports is enjoying her nomination to the Texas Sports Hall of Fame for its 2025 primary ballot. The Houston native has been competing in drag racing since she was eight years old and is intending to embark on a Top Fuel career once the necessary partnerships can be found.
At this time Enders is third in the Pro Stock standings, trailing KB Racing’s Dallas Glenn by 151 points and his teammate, five-time class champ Greg Anderson by 13 points. Elite’s Aaron Stanfield, who has won two races in succession this season is fourth (-229), followed by Pacific Raceways winner Jeg Coughlin Jr. (-236), Troy Coughlin Jr. (-362), both Elite competitors. Elite’s Jerry Tucker and Cristian Cuadra are seventh and eighth, with KB’s Deric Kramer (-554) and Eric Latino (-581) completing the top 10.
This DENSO Sonoma NHRA Nationals has 18 Pro Stock contenders in the paddock; once again none of the Cuadra Boys are part of that group. KB’s Matt Hartford and Brandon Foster are on the entry list, as is Elite’s Sienna Wildgust, while Kenny Delco returns, along with Chris and Mason McGaha, Joey Grose, Derrick Reese and Cory Reed, the latter making his second start on four wheels in this category.
There are only 12 bikes on-hand this weekend for one of the biggest Pro Stock Motorcycle meetings of the year. Eight of the top motorcycle riders in NHRA competition are ready to compete in the weekend’s GETTRX All-Star Pro Stock Motorcycle Callout, a race-within-a-race that features champions and standout riders: reigning world champion Gaige Herrera on his Vance & Hines Suzuki Hayabusa3 has the top seed, which gives him the first pick, while six-time champ Matt Smith, riding his Buell gets second choice, followed by Hector Arana Jr.’s Buell and Jianna Evaristo’s Buell. The four remaining riders for this specialty race are veteran Steve Johnson (Suzuki), Angie Smith (Buell), Pacific Raceways winner Chase Van Sant’s Suzuki and John Hall, riding his Matt Smith Racing Buell.
With those eight preoccupied by their Callout fortunes, there are others available to take over the proceedings, including Vance & Hines’ Richard Gadson, who won his first Mission #2Fast2Tasty Challenge race in Norwalk on the team’s Suzuki Hayabusa3, Chris Bostick and teammate Eiji Kawakami’s Suzukis, along with local Clayton Howey on an older-model Suzuki
In addition to Sunday’s pro eliminations at this 36th DENSO Sonoma NHRA Nationals, be ready for Thursday evening’s “Throttle & Bottle Nationals” that benefit Speedway Children’s Charities at Three Fat Guys Winery that features several drivers, crew chiefs and media members creating custom winery blends for taste-testing and reviews. On Saturday, together with GETTRX Pro Stock Motorcycle Callout, there’s the latest edition of Mission’s #2Fast2Tasty Challenge. With the weather forecast, fans and racers are apt to see some exceptional runs on Sonoma Raceway’s beautiful racetrack.
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