GAINESVILLE, FL – Warm temperatures cooled the performance numbers across the board at the 45th annual Amalie Oil NHRA Gatornationals. Robert Hight and the Auto Club Ford Mustang Funny Car team made their strongest run of the day during the second session posting a 4.132 second run at 303.78 mph which was good enough for the provisional No. 7 spot. With two more qualifying sessions tomorrow the most recent national event runner-up is ready for more improvement.

“This Auto Club Ford Mustang has been running in the low 4.0s for the first two events and we knew the conditions wouldn’t allow us to run that hard. We are just being smart and working our way systematically to a race day tune-up. No one is hanging their heads at any of our teams. The track was a little tricky today for all the Top Fuel and Funny Car teams,” said Hight.

While Hight was positioned in the top half of the field his teammates were not too far behind with team leader John Force sitting in the No. 11 spot and Courtney Force looking to move into the top 16 tomorrow. The elder Force’s best time today was 4.380 and the youngest Force’s best time was a tire smoking 8.184 second run. The unusual slow start did not dampen Courtney Force’s enthusiasm for being at one of the premier events on the NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series.

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YORBA LINDA, CA – The readers of RACER magazine turned out in record numbers to recognize two John Force Racing drivers for their high levels of excellence during the 2013 NHRA season. John Force the newly crowned 2013 NHRA Mello Yello Funny Car champion was voted Drag Racer of the Year and even more impressively recognized as the RACER of the Year for all forms of motorsports. Force, driver of the Castrol GTX High Mileage Mustang Funny Car, becomes just the third multiple time RACER of the Year winner joining four-time winner Michael Schumacher and two-time winner Jacques Villeneuve. Force won his first RACER of the Year award for his then record setting 15th Mello Yello Funny Car championship in 2010.

“This is the kind of thing that really makes you stop and think. Someone was just telling me how great I did last year, and I had to tell ’em to stop. I didn’t want to hear it. Still don’t. It’s like my dad told me once, a long time ago, when I came home bragging about how I’d just won 50 grand at some race. He said, ‘What makes you think you’re so great? Because you read that in the paper? You’re probably the one who told them how great you are.’ I never forgot that. I try to stay hungry and stay humble and not think about it, but this award from RACER makes you think about it. The 2013 championship was special, and this award makes it even more special. All I can say is what an honor it is,” said Force when he was notified of both awards.

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HIGHT TAKES FINAL ROUND MOMEMTUM EAST TO GATORNATIONALS

GAINESVILLE, FL – The first race of the NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series on the East Coast has always been a big deal. The 45^th annual Amalie Oil NHRA Gatornationals has so much history it is considered one of a handful of “major” races on the season long tour. For Robert Hight and the Auto Club Ford Mustang team racing at the Gatornationals is about history and momentum. Sitting in the No. 2 Mello Yello point standings after a final round appearance in Phoenix has the 2009 Funny Car champion looking to get one more win light this weekend.

“Losing in the final of Phoenix was tough. We had a great race car all day and in the final we just smoked the tires. We moved up in the points and (crew chief) Mike Neff has a great handle on the tune up. No one knew what to expect since the track surface was new in Phoenix but everyone knows Gainesville. It is cool that both Mike and I have won here. We are starting to get into a really comfortable groove,” said Hight.

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PHOENIX, AZ – John Force and the Castrol GTX High Mileage Ford Mustang held onto their No. 1 qualifying position at Wild Horse Pass Motorsports Park. On the strength of his run of 3.99 seconds on Friday night at the CARQUEST Auto Parts NHRA Nationals Force will start from the top of the order a record 148th time in his career and for the fifth race in a row dating back to Reading, Pennsylvania last season. Force has raced to six consecutive final rounds and has talked about having the “magic.”

“We have had the magic the last couple of races but this weekend we don’t have the magic. I will be honest it makes me feel better. I don’t like to live right on the edge. We know what we can’t do out there. We will go the other direction,” said Force.

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PHOENIX, AZ – John Force and the Castrol GTX High Mileage Ford Mustang did not lose a step in the off-season and he hasn’t slowed down with an off-week after his season opening win at the Circle K NHRA Winternationals. Force’s Jimmy Prock and Danny DeGennaro tuned Ford Mustang set the track elapsed time and speed record at Wild Horse Pass Motorsports Park with his Friday afternoon run of 3.990 seconds at 317.79 mph. It was another dominant performance from the winningest driver in NHRA history.

“I am excited. I love this sport. I came here in 1985 at the first national event. I was learning how to drive and our NHRA announcer Alan Reinhardt was learning how to announce. I match raced here almost ten years before that. I know this race track but so does Jimmy Prock. They gave us a good surface and a good race track. NHRA prepped it right and we are going to try and keep giving these fans a show,” said Force, the provisional No. 1 qualifier.

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PHOENIX, AZ – For any professional driver, they say you’re only as good as your last race. For John Force, that’s a good thing to have as his Castrol GTX High Mileage Mustang Funny Car heads to CARQUEST Auto Parts NHRA Nationals in Phoenix. By blasting both ends of the NHRA record books, qualifying number one and winning the season opener, John Force fired the opening salvo in what is shaping up to be dogfight for Funny Car supremacy this year.

With Pomona in the rear view mirror, John goes into Phoenix in first place with a 50 point lead over fellow competitor and arch rival Matt Hagan. With this season is still in its infancy, John is not on cruise control despite his domination at the NHRA Circle K Winternationals.

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POMONA, CA – For the seventh time in his career, John Force drove his Castrol GTX High Mileage Mustang Funny Car to victory at the 54^th running of the Circle K NHRA Winternationals at Auto Club Raceway in Pomona. This was John Force’s sixth final in a row going back to the 2013 NHRA Mello Yello season but today’s final can be described as an epic rematch between two of the strongest Funny Cars in recent memory. It was at this same spot at the conclusion of the 2013 NHRA Mello Yello season during the Auto Club Finals that John Force and Matt Hagan squared off against each other with John coming up on the losing end.  

Fortunately for John, today’s outcome was much different when he defeated Matt Hagan with an earth shattering time of 3.965 seconds at over 323 MPH to Hagan’s tire smoking time of 6.61 seconds.  “I get really excited racing Hagan and the ESPN announcer in the semi-round said ‘Do you see those muscles on that kid, do you think you can beat him?’ I said what is this, the WWF, we aren’t in a cage,” said John Force.

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POMONA, CA – John Force and the Castrol GTX High Mileage Ford Mustang Funny Car will start the 54^th annual NHRA Circle K Winternationals as the No. 1 qualifier. On Friday Force reset the track record twice on the way to establishing a potential (records do not become official until after an event) national elapsed time record, with his runs of 3.983 seconds and then the record run of 3.966 seconds. He also set the track speed record with his mph run of 324.12 mph. This if the first time John has set the elapsed time record at Pomona. 

“We were trying to run what we ran last night. We couldn’t do it in the first session but we thought we could in the second session. We pushed it hard. (Crew chief) Jimmy (Prock) said there was more out there. He just wanted to know. We had nothing to lose unless (Ron) Capps could pull it off in the next lane. We are also looking at conditions for tomorrow. It is supposed to overcast tomorrow so we will have the same conditions. If it was going to be hot you would not want to try this. We got the record and we should get the points,” said Force.

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POMONA, CA – John Force picked up right where he left off in 2013 when he raced to his unprecedented 16th Mello Yello Funny Car championship. On the first day of the 2014 NHRA season at the 54^th annual NHRA Circle K Winternationals the winningest driver in NHRA history lowered the track elapsed time record he set in November at the Auto Club Finals twice en route to unofficially setting the national elapsed time record. NHRA national records become official at the conclusion of the race but his 3.966 second pass to close out the second qualifying session has a great chance of standing up for a long time.

The last time Force held the national E.T. record was November 11, 2006. For good measure Force piloted his mean green Castrol GTX High Mileage Ford Mustang Funny Car to the national mph record with a blast of 324.12 mph which was the fastest speed ever for a Funny Car at 1,000 feet.

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