NHRA - National Hot Rod Association

Matt Smith enjoys a sizable lead in the battle for the 2020 NHRA Camping World Drag Racing Series Pro Stock Motorcycle championship, but he’s not home free yet. His own teammate, Scotty Pollacheck, and the pesky Harley-Davidson trio of Eddie Krawiec, Andrew Hines, and Angelle Sampey are still in the running.

The situation: Smith comes into the season finale at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway with a healthy edge over Houston winner Krawiec and U.S. Nationals champ Pollacheck, who are tied for second facing a deficit of 78 points. Reigning champ Hines is 86 points back while Sampey is on the fringe of contention, 135 points back.

How we got here: The Pro Stock Motorcycle class has run just seven events during the COVID-19 shortened 2020 season and Smith has been to the final round in three of them with two wins aboard his Denso EBR. Smith won back-to-back races in Gainesville and St. Louis to claim the top spot. He’s also been the undisputed leader in qualifying this season with five poles to go with a No. 2 and No. 3 starting spot.

Pollacheck finally go his long-awaited first NHRA professional victory when he won the Denso Spark Plugs NHRA U.S. Nationals. He left Indy as the leader in the class but slipped to second even though he went to the final in St. Louis. Pollacheck’s Achilles heel has been his own teammate Smith, who has beaten him in three of the last four events.

Krawiec is a bit late to the party but his win last week in Houston gave him new life in the battle for what could be a fifth world title. Krawiec broke a winless drought that has lasted more than two seasons when he stopped Ryan Oehler in the Houston final. Before that, he was ranked No. 5 in the standings.

Hines is winless so far this season, but he does have a pair of runner-up finishes and a very respectable 13-7 record in final eliminations. One thing he does not have is a first round loss.

The scenarios: Smith’s lead is such that he essentially leads by three rounds with four rounds remaining. That means he can secure the title simply by reaching the semifinal round no matter where he qualifies or how many bonus points his rivals pick up. It’s possible that Smith could extend his lead to more than 90 points in qualifying, which means he could clinch by reaching the quarterfinals. In order to do that, he’d need to score 14 points more than Krawiec or Pollacheck on Saturday. He could do that by picking up the maximum of eight qualifying bonus points and earning the top spot while his rivals earn zero bonus points and qualify in the bottom half of the field although that’s an unlikely scenario.

One scenario that is likely is that the Harley team intentionally tries to qualify one of their riders (most likely Hines) at the bottom of the ladder in order to force an early match-up with Smith. That’s a risky strategy but it might be their best chance to hold on to the top spot. Since he’s Smith’s teammate, Pollacheck obviously won’t be a part of that maneuver. His best course of action is to simply try and win the race and let the chips fall where they may.

Quotable:

“For us to clinch the world championship, we just have to make four runs and have no bad luck on those four runs. If that happens, we will win our fourth world championships and that will mean the world to myself and this team.” – Matt Smith

"This weekend I am just looking for consistency. We proved that we could get the job done last week, and if I can find a little bit of that Vegas magic that I've had in my career, maybe we can come out on the right side of this deal. – Andrew Hines

“The way I’m viewing this this the championship is [Smith’s] to lose and our to gain. If he makes a mistake, we just need to be in a position to capitalize on it. There is a lot less pressure being in second place than being in first. All we can do is win some rounds and see if opportunity presents itself.” – Eddie Kraweic

"We've had an awesome year winning the U.S. Nationals and joining the Denso 200 Mph Club so the way I look at it, we have nothing to lose. If we accidently win the championship that would be amazing but we're not stressing about it." -- Scotty Pollacheck