Bob Bode, a former champion boat racer, recorded his first career win in Funny Car, beating Jack Beckman in the final at the NHRA Nationals on Sunday.
Bode, in his first career final, won when Beckman’s ride lost traction near the start line.
Larry Dixon (9-0 in finals this year) took the Top Fuel class, Jeg Coughlin won his 52nd Pro Stock title, and Andrew Hines won in Pro Stock Motorcycle. Tampabay.com
Andrew Hines completed an impressive weekend by winning the Pro Stock Motorcycle over Jim Underdahl. Hines was the No. 1 qualifier and also moved ahead of season-points leader Hector Arana to clinch the No. 1 seed entering the Countdown to 1 playoffs. USA Today
“All of this is kind of like a dream I’m afraid I’m gonna wake up from,” said Bode. “I didn’t know if it would ever happen, but now that it did, I can’t believe it happened. It’s the best thing that ever happened to me in my entire life in the racing world. I have a wife and kid, wonderful things there, but the racing world, this is it.”
“I feel fortunate,” said Dixon, whose engine suffered damage right as he hit the finish line. “When I lifted it popped, but I saw the win light and the 78 on the board and so I knew they weren’t taking Cory and the Schumacher team lightly. I got heat-treated a little bit.
“We’ve won finals so many different ways this year and there are so many variables that if you have just one hiccup someone else wins. I’ve had seasons where I haven’t won one race so to win nine is overwhelming, These races are so hard to win; to win nine period let alone to win nine straight in finals is something.”
“I do have to say, the Gray family has done an unbelievable job and they’re getting a program from nothing to several final-round runnings between the two of them,” said Coughlin “Shane did a heck of a job and had he turned that thing green by a couple of hundredths, he would have smoked the yellow and black car. We got away with one there because I was late on the Tree in the final.
“This is as close as we’ve been to the points leader all year. That’s the way the playoff and the Countdown to 1 works. We’ve had that work to our advantage for a couple of years and had that work against us last year. This year, we were probably no way shape or form going to contend for our sixth world title, but we are.”
“Big win,” agreed Hines. “I’ve never been No. 1 going into the playoffs so it’s nice to be in this position. Three or four races ago we were looking at the point and Hector had something like a 160-point lead and we just wrote it off that we wouldn’t make it there. Luck turned to our side, the motorcycle started performing better and Hector faltered a little bit and we capitalized on it.” NHRA.com
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