FUNNY CAR

Jack Beckman (Don Eckert photo)

Jack Beckman has been saying for the past month his only chance to win a first NHRA professional championship this year would be for his Valvoline NextGen Funny Car team to win a lot of rounds and for Don Schumacher Racing teammate and points leader Ron Capps to lose early.

Well, Beckman got both wishes answered Sunday when he won his 15th career Funny Car title and Capps lost in the second round of eliminations.

During qualifying on Friday, Beckman led the field with a track record time of 4.049 at 308.85 mph.

Beckman started the weekend trailing Capps by 96 points but cut deeply into the gap and will be 30 points behind Capps when the NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series competes next weekend at Reading, Pa.

"It's nice to know that we have a car that can challenge for the championship," said Beckman, who beat Alexis DeJoria, Jeff Arend and Tony Pedregon to advance to the final round.

"This wasn't do-or-die, but it's getting pretty close."

Matt Hagan (Ron Lewis photo)

Matt Hagan was trying to make something happen Sunday for the DieHard/Aaron's Dream Machine Funny Car team.