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Top Fuel Q3/Mission Challenge round one

Doug Kalitta, winner of Friday’s Right Trailers All-Star Top Fuel Callout, kept alive his hopes of a rare triple-win weekend by advancing past Jasmine Salinas in the opening round of the Mission #2fast2Tasty NHRA Challenge, which pits the semifinalists from last weekend’s NHRA Arizona Nationals in a series of rematches for bonus bucks and points

Kalitta ran 3.801 to advance to the final where he’ll face off with his Kalitta Motorsports teammate, Shawn Langdon, who won the Mission challenge in Phoenix and then went on to win the race as well. Langdon defeated Brittany Force on a holeshot, 3.70 to 3.69,

Air temperature was 64 degrees with a track temperature of 107 degrees, so a but warmer than Friday on both counts, and some cars struggled making full runs.

Force’s pass was quickest of the round but not an improvement on her Friday field-leading 3.64 with Langdon second quick. Antron Brown was next best with a 3.704.

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Funny Car Q3/Mission Challenge round one

Because he sat out most of the regular season last year before filling in for John Force and missed the two years before that, this was Jack Beckman’s first appearance in the Mission Challenge and it paid off as he beat teammate Austin Prock on a 3.83 to 3.87 count to reach the final. Last year, Prock won seven of the 10 Mission Challenges in which he competed.

Beckman, who run was second quickest of the session extending the Peak team’s streak of bonus points to seven straight sessions, will take on the hottest Funny Car driver on the planet, Arizona Nationals winner Paul Lee, who took the pole with a 3.829 in beating Bob Tasca III, whose 4.189 is his best run of the race and currently has him on the bump spot.

Steven Densham, Dave Richards, and Bobby Bode all made their first three-second passes of the event in Q3, and so 14 cars are now qualified in the three-second zone as we continue to look for the first all-three-second field. We know Tasca can run in the threes, as can Jason Rupert above him and Blake Alexander and Daniel Wilkerson below him, and the Jim Dunn car of Buddy Hull has also run in the threes previously with different drivers.

Here's where we sit with one session to go.

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Pro Stock Q3/Mission Challenge round one

Matt Hartford, the No. 1 qualifier a week ago a the NHRA Arizona Nationals, pushed his way back to No. 1 with a 6.490 to beat Dallas Glenn’s 6.519 to make it to the Mission Challenge final. Harford’s only win in the Mission Challenge came at this event two years ago.

Hartford’s qualifying lead didn’t last long as right behind him, Greg Anderson ran an identical 6.490 but his faster speed (210.77 to 210.67) gives him the pole. That was the good news for Anderson; the bad news is that it came on a red-light against Aaron Stanfield, who shook hard at the green but nonetheless will get the win, eerily similar to how Anderson won the Arizona Nationals last weekend on Glenn’s four.

THIS JUST IN: Aaron Stanfield came up light at the scales so Anderson has been reinstated and will run Hartford in the Mission Challenge final.

Pro Stock rookie Stephen Bell looks like he will have a spot in the field for the first time after the former Factory Stock Showdown star carded a 6.531 and his Elite Motorsports teammate Erica Enders also made her best run of the race with a 6.532. Again, that’s the good news – the bad news is that they’re currently qualified No. 8 and 9, meaning they’d race in round one Sunday if nothing changes,

Rookie Matt Latino is on the bump spot with a 6.563 with Chris McGaha, Kenny Delco, and Joey Grose looking to bump their way in during the final session.

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Top Fuel Q4/Mission Challenge final

The Mission Challenge Top Fuel final was a rematch of last weekend’s NHRA Arizona Nationals, where Shawn Langdon won the final round over Doug Kalitta the day after winning the season’s first Mission Challenge.

Langdon again beats his teammate, 3.66 to 3.68, which means eight straight win lights for the former Top Fuel champ and a big lead in the early Mission Challenge standings. Langdon's speed of 338.68 mph is a career best and the second fastest in history behind Brittany Force's 338.94 at the 2022 Finals here in Pomona.

Langdon’s run also was the best of the round, with Steve Torrence (3.665) and Clay Millican (3.675) earning the other bonus points. Kalitta’s run was fourth best.

Brittany Force stayed atop the qualifying field, her fifth No. 1 in the last six Winternationals, though she’s yet to ever win the event. Langdon’s Q4 run moved him to third behind Fore and Kalitta’s 3.657 from Friday night.

Force will race Steve Chrisman in round one and the winner will get a bye run in the second round as a result of the 14-car field.

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Funny Car Q4/Mission Challenge final round

A first-time Funny Car winner in the Mission #2Fast2Tasty NHRA Challenge was guaranteed before the green light ever flashed, and it’s Jack Beckman in a walk with a 3.831 after Arizona Nationals winner Paul Lee goes into early shake. Beckman’s run is the second quickest of the round and extends his team’s streak to 10 straight sessions, earning a bonus point as one of the three best performers.

Beckman won the Challenge, but it was his teammate, world champ Austin Prock, who took over the No. 1 qualifying spot with a dazzling 3.816 at 338.26 mph.

The other drama of the round was the possibility of the first all-three-second Funny Car field. Here’s how it went down:

Daniel Wilkerson, who entered the final qualifying session outside the field, became the 15th three-second qualifier after his father, Tim, discovered a clutch-flow issue that had dogged them the first three tries, and he raced to a solid 3.924.

We’re so close to the first all-three-second field. The 2019 U.S. Nationals was the first and only other time that 15 cars qualified in the threes.

Blake Alexander and Buddy Hull both missed their shots to make it all threes with respective runs of 4.011 and 4.348, and Hull’s DNQ run got even worse as the Mooneyes entry ended up in the sand trap; not hard, but enough to add insult to injury.

Alexander went to the bump spot, which was still not a record – that honor still belonged to Justin Schreifer’s 4.005 from that 2019 Indy race – but the three-second-capable cars of Bob Tasca III and Jason Rupert are still to run, so the hopes are high.

Incredibly, Tasca falls short with a 4.055 and will not make the field. The launch looked good until he started spinning the tires and the pipes went wet. Alexander breathes a sigh of relief, but Rupert is still to come.

Nope. Not gonna happen as Rupert slows to a 7.38 and the all-three-second field eludes us again. On top of that, it’s not even a record bump spot.

Alexander hangs on to the bump spot but draws Austin Prock in round one. Out of the frying pan and into the fire …

Pro Stock Q4/Mission Challenge final round

Matt Hartford put an end to Greg Anderson’s lucky streak, leaving on and outrunning Pro Stock’s most successful driver in the final of the Mission Challenge, 6.496 to 6.499. It’s Hartford’s second challenge win, the first coming here in 2023.

Those two passes were the best of the session with Dallas Glenn’s 6.519 as third, but Anderson’s Q3 6.490 stayed atop the qualifying pack ahead of Hartford’s matching number thanks to Anderson’s superior speed on the runs, 210.77 to 210.67.

Class rookies Matt Latino, Cody Coughlin, and Stephen Bell will all make their first raceday starts.

Mason McGaha improved in Q4 just enough to get into and stay in the field in the No. 16 spot, though his father, Chris, is a DNQ for the second straight event. McGaha will take on low qualifier Anderson in round one Sunday.