{"id":92856,"date":"2023-10-16T16:50:21","date_gmt":"2023-10-16T23:50:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/?p=92856"},"modified":"2023-10-17T08:30:27","modified_gmt":"2023-10-17T15:30:27","slug":"pruett-hagan-enders-herrera-win-texas-fallnationals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/pruett-hagan-enders-herrera-win-texas-fallnationals\/","title":{"rendered":"Pruett, Hagan, Enders, Herrera Win Texas FallNationals"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Texas FallNationals Winners Circle: Gaige Herrera, Erica Enders, Leah Pruett, Matt Hagan – NHRA photo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Because everything really is bigger in Texas, NHRA\u2019s Camping World Drag Racing Series provided race-goers at Texas Motorplex with eye-opening speeds and furious action over three days of competition in the series\u2019 38th visit to the Dallas-area Texas Motorplex facility owned by the Meyer family. The NHRA FallNationals culminated a 10-day Stampede of Speed with records set from start to finish.<\/p>\n

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Leah Pruett, Tony Stewart, Matt Hagan celebrate Tony Stewart Racing’s first double-up in Texas – NHRA photo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In a first for the second-year squad, Tony Stewart Racing earned its first \u201cdouble-up\u201d on Sunday when Leah Pruett garnered the Wally winner\u2019s trophy in Top Fuel and Matt Hagan performed the same feat in Funny Car. That wasn\u2019t the only big news, as Erica Enders cemented her standing as the most successful woman racer in NHRA – and probably the world – with her 47th Pro Stock victory. During Saturday qualifying, Gaige Herrera, who would go on to earn his 12th No. 1 and win his ninth race this season, set a new Pro Stock Motorcycle elapsed time and speed national record when he posted a 6.627-second lap at 204.16 mph on his Vance & Hines Suzuki Hayabusa3.<\/p>\n

It was almost enough to have their competitors gasping for breath through a paper bag!<\/p>\n

These weren\u2019t normal conditions in Dallas but racers took full advantage of a fast concrete track. Pruett secured her second win of the 2023 season. It was her 12th career Top Fuel victory and moved her to the points lead in NHRA\u2019s Countdown to the Championship. After initially qualifying 11th after Friday\u2019s two sessions and bumping herself up to seventh the next day, Pruett marched through her side of the eliminations ladder, first removing Kalitta Motorsports\u2019 Shawn Langdon, Doug Kalitta and Clay Millican before facing local racer and four-time champion Steve Torrence in the final round.<\/p>\n

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Leah Pruett’s rail was on rails this weekend – NHRA photo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Pruett\u2019s four rounds of eliminations marked her most consistent winning runs of the year, as she posted four laps under 3.7 seconds: 3.678, 3.697, 3.681 and 3.684 seconds. In her final round against Torrence, Pruett had the better reaction time to post 3.684 to Torrence\u2019s 3.662, giving her a few-inch margin at the 1,000-foot timing beams. \u201cThis win,\u201d she said, \u201csurpasses my very first Top Fuel win. The emotion I have for it and the accomplishment of both Matt and I winning today and what it means for Tony Stewart Racing, this is going to be on my top memory list forever!\u201d<\/p>\n

With her season-long consistency, Pruett departs the Lone Star state with a minuscule four-point advantage over Kalitta, with Torrence in third place, lagging by 13 points. Justin Ashley, who led all comers in the regular season that ended in Indianapolis at the Dodge Power Brokers U.S. Nationals, is currently fourth, needing to make up 108 points. He\u2019s followed by three-time champion Antron Brown (-110), Mike Salinas, Clay Millican, Brittany Force, Austin Prock and Tony Schumacher, the latter two tied and 219 points in arrears.<\/p>\n

With standard points available in two weeks\u2019 time at Las Vegas and points-and-a-half on offer at Pomona the second weekend of November, Top Fuel should go down to the wire!<\/p>\n

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Matt Hagan has won a class-leading six races in 2023 – NHRA photo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Hagan earned his sixth victory of the 21-race season in Dallas. The three-time champion qualified fifth in his Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat after four qualifying rounds and posted victories against Paul Lee\u2019s Charger, Alex Laughlin in Jim Dunn\u2019s Funny Car, the Mustang of Tim Wilkerson and an easy victory over up-in-smoke 16-time class champion John Force\u2019s Chevrolet Camaro. The win gives Hagan 36 points over Bob Tasca III and his Ford Mustang, out after the second round, heading to Las Vegas October 26-28. Robert Hight, driving his John Force Racing Camaro is third (-69) after falling in the first round, with reigning Funny Car champ Ron Capps\u2019 Toyota GR Supra fourth after he, too, fell in round 1 to Laughlin in an ugly competition.<\/p>\n

Force moved up to fifth place with his runner-up result (-198), followed by J.R. Todd\u2019s Toyota GR Supra, Chad Green\u2019s Mustang, Wilkerson\u2019s Mustang, Alexis DeJoria\u2019s Supra and Laughlin, who is 267 points back. \u201cTony said, \u2018Let\u2019s double-up today,\u2019 and it\u2019s a great day for Tony Stewart Racing and all of our partners. I love seeing my teammate, Leah, jump into my arms in Victory Lane,\u201d Hagan said. \u201cWe needed back-to-back wins at St. Louis and Dallas to go after this championship. Now we have two more left and we re ready for them!\u201d<\/p>\n

There was an unfortunate incident in Friday qualifying that saw Dale Creasy Jr. depart his left lane and impact Dave Richards. Both Funny Car drivers emerged without injury but the cleanup took quite a while. This isn\u2019t the first time Creasy has swapped lanes this year\u2026 neither driver continued for the next two days of competition.<\/p>\n

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No woman has won more NHRA races than Erica Enders – NHRA photo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As she acknowledged there have been \u201cmore valleys than peaks\u201d leading up to her ascension to the top of the heap in Pro Stock, earning five championships over 20 years of competition and 47 victories, more than any woman in NHRA and possibly in all of motor sport, Erica Enders admitted, \u201cThis one means a lot. As a little girl that was eight years old with big dreams to be a professional driver one day – in my Jr. Dragster – then making my way through the Lucas Oil Series, this Wally will sit proudly among a few other special ones,\u201d Enders said with emotion.<\/p>\n

Texas native Enders qualified third after four rounds and proceeded to humble Eric Latino, fellow Elite Motorsports driver Cristian Cuadra, teammate Troy Coughlin Jr. before defeating Dallas Glenn, KB Titan Racing\u2019s regular season top runner. The victory solidified her hold on first place in the Pro Stock standings, after teammate Aaron Stanfield defeated second place Greg Anderson in the quarterfinals. He\u2019s needing 85 points to catch Enders and has to watch his back, because Glenn is now -93 points to Enders in third, while Matt Hartford needs to make up 108 points and Stanfield lags by 123.<\/p>\n

That this championship battle will be an Elite Motorsports vs KB Titan Racing is a given. as second through fourth places are all KB Titan while Enders and Stanfield\u2019s Elite entries bookend them. Elite\u2019s Troy Coughlin Jr holds sixth, followed by KB Titan\u2019s Deric Kramer (fastest on Friday in Dallas), Kyle Koretsky and Camrie Caruso, with Elite\u2019s Mustang driver Cristian Cuadra in 10th place, albeit 266 points in arrears to his teammate.<\/p>\n

Are there any more superlatives available for Gaige Herrera and his Vance & Hines Suzuki team? HIs results are giving the rest of the field nightmares as he marauds through his competition as though they were standing still, which they\u2019re not. This weekend saw V&H-affiliated Kelly Clontz join the 200-mph club with her lap of 6.705\/201.99 as she landed in the second qualifying position. Unfortunately Clontz didn\u2019t make it out of the first round, losing on a hole shot to Joey Gladstone, who was riding the injured Angie Smith\u2019s pink Buell for Matt Smith Racing. In another first-round upset, Chris Bostick defeated fellow Suzuki rider Steve Johnson, while rookie Chase Van Sant was unable to ride on either Saturday or Sunday after using his left knee to stop his White Alligator Racing (WAR) from impacting the wall when the bike got out of shape.<\/p>\n

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Gaige Herrera’s 6.627\/204.16 lap was a history-maker – NHRA photo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Herrera\u2019s Sunday saw him defeat a slowing Blaine Hale\u2019s Suzuki, a fouling Bostick, win a straight-up fight against Hector Arana Jr.\u2019s Buell and win a close race against 49-race winner and teammate Eddie Krawiec, 6.644\/203.30 to 6.706\/202.56. This weekend\u2019s results leave Herrera a gaping 156 points ahead of Krawiec, with six-time champ Matt Smith (out in round 2 to Krawiec) on a Suzuki in third (-174), Arana Jr. fourth (-179) and Van Sant in fifth place, 306 behind Herrera. Angie Smith\u2019s Buell lies sixth, Jianna Evaristo is seventh on her Matt Smith Racing Suzuki, Marc Ingwersen eighth on his Buell, Steve Johnson and Kelly Clontz rounding out the top 10. At this point, everyone but Herrera is racing for second through tenth-place points.<\/p>\n

Andrew Hines, Herrera\u2019s Vance & Hines crew chief noted, \u201cIt was a weekend for the books. The things we accomplished as a team, including making six runs under the old national record and the four quickest 60-foot times in class history, are a testament to our preparation and dedication,\u201d he said. While Krawiec advanced to his third final round in 2023 and 84th of his career, his teammate Herrera is \u201cliving the dream. This bike has been flying all weekend and this whole weekend has been cool. This is a special one right here and one I\u2019ll never forget. My bike has been flying and it\u2019s crazy how fast it is and how easy it has been to ride.\u201d<\/p>\n

In Top Alcohol Dragster, Angelle Sampey won her first race on four wheels against No. 1 qualifier and former class champ Mike Coughlin (5.252 to 5.299) and her second against an out-of-the-groove Tony Stewart, but fell in the semifinals to Kirk Wolf when she couldn\u2019t manage the car and clicked off early. Wolf lost to Julie Nataas in the final round as she won for the third time in 2023 and seventh of her Top Alcohol Dragster career.<\/p>\n

NHRA takes a one-weekend breather before congregating the final weekend of October on The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway for the NHRA Nevada Nationals, scheduled October 26-29.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tony Stewart Racing doubled-up on the victories at the Texas Fall Nationals.<\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":65,"featured_media":92862,"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":[3465,3470,16,5029],"tags":[9267,9952,1704,3477,9524,9474,8458,128,7,6695,1329,515,1883,5759],"class_list":["post-92856","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-drag-racing","category-news","category-pro-stock","category-racing","tag-camping-world-drag-racing-series","tag-dodge-charger-srt-hellcat","tag-elite-motorsports","tag-erica-enders","tag-gaige-herrera","tag-kb-titan-racing","tag-leah-pruett","tag-matt-hagan","tag-nhra","tag-suzuki","tag-texas-fallnationals","tag-texas-motorplex","tag-tony-stewart-racing","tag-vance-hines"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/Ericas-47-wins-min-1.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p42YSK-o9G","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92856","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=92856"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92856\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":92871,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92856\/revisions\/92871"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/92862"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=92856"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=92856"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=92856"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}