GAINESVILLE, Fla. — John Force is perfect on the season: three NHRA events and three harrowing engine explosions.
The 16-time Funny Car champion blew another one during Friday’s qualifying for the Gatornationals, creating a fireball that sent the fiberglass body of his Chevrolet dragster flying dozens of feet in the air and landing halfway between the strip and the grandstands.
The 68-year-old Force sustained a cut across the back of his right hand. He had it bandaged at the end of the track but did not need stitches.
Force joked that at least he didn’t get hit with another bill for an ambulance ride.
« I really thought we had it, » Force said, referring to the « gremlin » that caused engine problems in each of the first two events in 2018. « I thought we were there. … That was another body, and that hurts the financial. I was out $500,000 to $600,000, and now we are probably out $800,000 going on a million. In drag racing, you have to be tough. »
No one in NHRA has had to bounce back more than Force this season.
He endured the first blown engine during a qualifying run at the season-opening Winternationals in Pomona, California, in early February. As he neared the finish line, his engine erupted so violently that it sent the car body flying through the air in pieces. Force walked away unscathed.
One of his two racing daughters, Brittany, wasn’t as lucky two days later.
The 31-year-old Force was hospitalized overnight following a hard crash in an elimination race. She escaped internal injuries and sustained only « upper-body soreness. »
Brittany Force was back in the car two weeks later in Chandler, Arizona. She qualified 14th and was beaten in the second round of eliminations.
« It’s what we do, like the people in the circus, the ones that swing from the ceilings, the trapeze, » John Force said then. « It’s what you do. It’s your living. »
Force found more trouble in Arizona last month.
He blew another engine at the finish line during an elimination run at the Arizona Nationals and ended up crashing into fellow driver Jonnie Lindberg.
Force tried to keep his car straight following the fiery explosion, but he drifted across the track in front of Lindberg and whacked the right wall so hard that his rear tires came off the ground. They landed on Lindberg’s windshield.
The front of Force’s car then got tangled in Lindberg’s parachute. Lindberg dragged Force into the right wall again and then pulled him back across the track. They tagged the left wall before slowing to a stop.
Lindberg walked away without assistance. Force was conscious and alert as he was transported to a hospital.
He got back in the car at Gainesville Raceway and was hoping for better results.
He shut the car off after 500 feet as a precaution in the first qualifying run Friday. He was going to go a little bit farther in the second pass, but the engine let go and shredded the body.
Force was back in the pits an hour later, helping his crew try to figure out what happened and how to fix it by Saturday. The engine was being pulled apart while fiberglass body parts remained stacked up near their landing spot.
http://www.espn.com/racing/nhra/story/_/id/22799589/sixteen-nhra-funny-car-champ-john-force-endures-another-fireball-engine-explosion
