![\"John](\"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/509193070289639.cU1l52HMAIunbwy4laZb_height640.png\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
John Force is always excited about something. This winter he\u2019s got plenty to keep him talking, thanks to his team\u2019s 19th and 20th NHRA Mello Yello championships. 2017 will be marked as the year his third daughter, Brittany Force, achieved her initial Top Fuel championship on the final day of the 24-race season; son-in-law and John Force Racing president Robert Hight earned his second Funny Car title, also on the final day of the Auto Club Finals on Auto Club Raceway at Pomona\u2019s dragstrip.<\/p>\n
It wasn\u2019t the greatest professional year for the 16-time Funny Car champion and 148-race flopper national event winner, who earned a single No. 1 qualifier and Wally winner\u2019s trophy in March at the Amalie Oil Gatornationals in Gainesville, Fla., giving NHRA\u2019s winningest racer a seventh-place result for the year. But that didn\u2019t matter as much as the wins earned by Brittany Force and Robert Hight, even as daughter Courtney Force finished third in the championship without taking home a single trophy.<\/p>\n
Force\u2019s joy couldn\u2019t be diminished. When he realigned with Chevrolet, the boisterous Californian told the company he \u201ccould turn it around again. I\u2019m tickled pink to be a champion, as part of this championship team with Robert winning and with my daughter Brittany. It\u2019s amazing what took place,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Still, John Force simply \u201ccan\u2019t get off this train. I love it. I\u2019ve lived for racing. I\u2019m still living it and it\u2019s all I know,\u201d he said. \u201cEveryone, our crew guys and all, went on vacation after the Finals. Robert and I went back to work. I love it – I love racing and now I get to be with my kids and do it – and my granddaughter, well, she\u2019s driving junior dragsters,\u201d he said of Hight\u2019s daughter Autumn, a regular in all Force family pits.<\/p>\n When both Brittany and Robert secured their championships, it was almost more than the veteran could take. \u201cI was on straight nitro; I was on straight adrenaline; I couldn\u2019t believe it. I wanted to do a burnout to the lights. I had always dreamed of doing those big ol\u2019 smoky burnouts, so I gave it a pretty good one, got after it pretty good. Then I realized it\u2019s time to get my focus and win for Peak. I wasn\u2019t able to get the job done, but at the end of the day John Force Racing ended up with 20 championships. Pretty dang good day,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n When both Ford and Castrol elected to leave professional NHRA drag racing and John Force Racing, it left a financial hole from which most racers could never recuperate. For John Force, it was just another challenge for a man who\u2019s battled for everything he\u2019s got. Peak, the primary on John\u2019s car, was already part of his cadre of partnerships when the other two left. \u201cThey stepped up and bought half a season to see where it would go,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n \u201cOld World Industries (Peak\u2019s parent company) have tons of brands. They know I understand that business, how to sell to the store chains and they know I know how to promote them and be there.\u201d Force\u2019s work ethic is legendary, his willingness to promote equally so. \u201cThey gave me an opportunity and I\u2019ve got to win them championships. The 2018 season will be a very good year for John Force Racing,\u201d he predicted.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" John Force is always excited about something and this winter he\u2019s got plenty to keep him talking.<\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":65,"featured_media":47672,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3465,3470,5029,3399],"tags":[5614,424,75,423,41,7,1632,440],"class_list":["post-47671","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-drag-racing","category-news","category-racing","category-nhra","tag-anne-proffit","tag-brittany-force","tag-john-force","tag-john-force-racing","tag-news","tag-nhra","tag-racing","tag-robert-hight"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/509193070289639.cU1l52HMAIunbwy4laZb_height640.png","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p42YSK-coT","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47671","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/65"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47671"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47671\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47674,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47671\/revisions\/47674"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/47672"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47671"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47671"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47671"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"John](\"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/NHRA_JForce_head.jpg\")