{"id":89191,"date":"2023-01-18T07:06:56","date_gmt":"2023-01-18T15:06:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/?p=89191"},"modified":"2023-01-18T07:06:56","modified_gmt":"2023-01-18T15:06:56","slug":"alex-laughlins-road-to-funny-car-competition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/alex-laughlins-road-to-funny-car-competition\/","title":{"rendered":"Alex Laughlin’s Road to Funny Car Competition"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Alex Laughlin will race anything – this year he’ll be competing full-time for the legendary Jim Dunn in his Funny Car. Photo: Anne Proffit\u00a0<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Remember when a racing driver would compete in anything with wheels? Open wheel, closed wheel, tin-tops, sports cars, Indy cars, straight-line racers, even racing boats? That era seems far removed from the specialists that race today, although some drivers choose to cross from their comfort zones to try and race different vehicles.<\/p>\n

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Laughlin loved driving Scott Palmer’s dragster – Anne Proffit photo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

One of the most diverse racers in NHRA\u2019s Camping World Drag Racing Series in 2023 is Alex Laughlin, the Texan who has most recently seen part-time duty in Scott Palmer\u2019s Top Fuel dragster during the 2021 and 2022 seasons. He\u2019s raced successfully in Pro Stock with Elite Motorsports, in Pro Mod and driving Scott Palmer’s dragster in Top Fuel. Now he\u2019s got a new gig, one that was introduced during the December 2022 Performance Racing Industry show.<\/p>\n

This upcoming season, Laughlin will be driving the Jim Dunn Racing Dodge Charger Funny Car on a full-time basis, taking the reins of an 11,000 monster that\u2019s usually very tough to tame. Recently licensed in the most difficult-to-drive nitro class in Camping World competition, Laughlin was over the moon about his opportunity to work with the legendary team owner and tuner Jim Dunn and his Jon Dunn-led team, even before he got into the car and began to put it through its paces.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

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Jim Dunn’s Funny Car at the 2022 Pomona season finale – Anne Proffit photo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Good weather greeted the team and its new driver at Famoso Dragstrip outside Bakersfield. It was the lull in a January filled with storms throughout California. Let\u2019s just say the team and Laughlin got lucky?<\/p>\n

\u201cNever in my wildest dreams would I imagine my name being on the side of any of these machines: Pro Stock, Pro Mod, Top Fuel and now a Funny Car,\u201d Laughlin said before making his first pull. \u201cthe realization of the dream I\u2019m living doesn\u2019t go unnoticed. I\u2019m fully aware and forever thankful for these incredible opportunities and the good people that have been behind them. I couldn\u2019t do this on my own.\u201d<\/p>\n

Over two clear days in California, Laughlin performed seven passes. As Laughlin explained, he experienced tire shake, grenaded parts, figured out how to pedal the car, had a pass where he dropped a hole and the car \u201cshoved me to the wall, one [run] with no parachutes and a couple of fast and straight runs as well,\u201d he said afterwards. \u201cI\u2019m happy to learn this way because I was able to experience so many scenarios and learn how to react to each one.\u201d<\/p>\n

And so he departed California with a \u201cDunn deal, officially licensed as a Funny Car driver.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

There\u2019s nothing left but the waiting for the Amalie Motor Oil Gatornatiionals the second week of March. From the excitement of his first taste of Funny Car, that first official run down the 1,000-foot Gainesville Raceway drag strip can\u2019t come too soon.<\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Driver Alex Laughlin is mastering his fourth style of drag racing with his recent Funny Car seat.<\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":65,"featured_media":89192,"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":[3465,17,3470,5029,3399],"tags":[4564,9267,1704,1858,7,9513],"class_list":["post-89191","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-drag-racing","category-guest-column","category-news","category-racing","category-nhra","tag-alex-laughlin","tag-camping-world-drag-racing-series","tag-elite-motorsports","tag-jim-dunn-racing","tag-nhra","tag-scott-palmer-racing"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/Alex-Laughlin-mug-min.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p42YSK-ncz","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89191","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=89191"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89191\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":89200,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89191\/revisions\/89200"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/89192"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=89191"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=89191"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=89191"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}