Doug Kalitta earned his first Top Fuel victory in more than a year Tuesday at the rain-delayed Kragen O’Reilly Winternationals, the first event of the NHRA season.
Kalitta raced his dragster to a winning run of 3.822 seconds at a top speed of 308.57 mph to beat top qualifier Antron Brown, whose dragster trailed with a 3.847 at 307.16.
“We’re back,” Kalitta said after his 31st career victory. “It was kind of a dry spell for us last year. The new team I have this year is really great and they are hungry to win, so I am glad we were able to get it done today.”
After Scott Kalitta’s fatal crash nearly eight months ago, National Hot Rod Assn. racing underwent major safety changes. And Kalitta’s racing cousin, Doug, went without a victory.
But Doug Kalitta’s winless streak ended Tuesday when he beat Antron Brown to win the top-fuel race—shortened to 1,000 feet after his cousin’s death—at the rain-delayed NHRA Kragen O’Reilly Winternationals in Pomona.
It was the first win at Auto Club Raceway for Kalitta, 44, and his first overall since 2007.
Kalitta joined his uncle Connie (1967) and late cousin Scott (2005) as Winternationals winners and scored the first victory for Kalitta Motorsports since the tragic loss of Scott in a racing accident last summer. Kalitta, last year’s Mac Tools U.S. Nationals runner-up who scored his most recent win in late 2007 in Richmond, defeated low qualifier Antron Brown in a tight match, 3.82, 308.57 to 3.84, 307.16, to collect career win number 31.
“It’s pretty cool to win this because Connie and Scott have won here, and the roll cage of my car is actually the same one that was in Scott’s car when he won here in 2005,” said Kalitta. “I think of Scott when I’m up there on the line because he had a couple of things he would do to get himself worked up and I’ve followed that, so it reminds me of him when I do them. He’s with us all the time, and I’m sure he’s proud that all three of us have won at the Winternationals.
Kalitta raced to his 56th career final from the No. 11 spot, blasting past Urs Erbacher with a fire-trailing 4.64 Sunday and then pounded out a 3.82 to 3.86 decision over last year’s Winternationals runner-up, Cory McClenathan, in round two. Kalitta moved on into the final when Morgan Lucas shook and smoked his tires in the new GEICO dragster in the semifinals.
In the funny car class, the other elite division in the NHRA’s Full Throttle Series, Ron Capps of Carlsbad won his 26th race by beating veteran Jim Head. Capps, too, had not won since 2007.
Capps said that as he sat in his car watching the Kalitta-Brown race, he also felt the importance of the moment.
“I was fighting back tears a little bit,” Capps said. “I could imagine the emotions that Connie and that whole group were going through, with Scott and all.”
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