Force, Herbert Light Up Pomona

Fire-breathing, nitro-burning dragsters returned to Southern California for a Saturday night show for the first time in more than 20 years and gave a sellout crowd of approximately 38,000 at Pomona Raceway what they came to see.

The inaugural NHRA 50th Anniversary Nationals were a late addition to the National Hot Rod Assn. schedule to celebrate the golden anniversary of the Glendora-based drag racing organization. From the success of Saturday night’s program, it probably will become a midseason fixture between the season-opening Winternationals and the season-ending Auto Club Finals.

After a series of spectacular side-by-side runs in earlier rounds, the finals proved anticlimactic as John Force in his Mustang funny car and Doug Herbert in his top fuel dragster rolled to one-sided wins. Each winner won $40,000.

Force beat Whit Bazemore with a 4.85-second elapsed time run at 317.64 mph, and Herbert upset Winston champion Gary Scelzi, running 4.600 at 320.58 mph.

“This win belongs to Austin Coil, Bernie Fedderly and the boys in the shop,” said Force. “We broke a number of engines this week, but they kept changing ‘em and we hopped it up for the final and won.”

Bazemore, whose Firebird slowed about mid-track, said even losing was a thrill when it was to Force on the legendary Pomona track.

“I know that Force is my biggest rival,” Bazemore said. “I don’t know what he thinks about me and it doesn’t matter because he is the guy I think about when I am thinking about drag racing and who we have to beat.

“We were fortunate enough to do it here at Pomona earlier this season [in the Winternationals], and we did it again the other night to grab the low qualifier. Two out of three ain’t bad.”

Herbert, unlike Force, said he used the same engine all day long.

“Is this my greatest win?” Hebert repeated a question. “Well, it’s big, no doubt about it, winning in Pomona has to be big, but for my No. 1 win it’s hard to beat that $100,000 I won a couple of years ago in Houston.”

Herbert, from Cherryville, N.C., was the first driver to win the $100,000 Winston No Bull Challenge.

Angelle Savoie, in defeating Antron Brown in the pro stock motorcycle final, moved into a tie with top fuel driver Shirley Muldowney for the most national events won by a female. Each has 18. Savoie’s Suzuki hit 180.14 mph in 7.246 seconds for her third win this season. Brown, who red-lighted in the final, is the only black driver to have won an NHRA national event in the pro category.

“I knew Antron had red-lighted and I had already won, but I wanted to do my best and give these great fans a good run, and I did it,” Savoie, the defending Winston champion, said. “I had my best run of the weekend. I don’t think much about being even with Shirley because she has those three championships and I’ve only got the one.”

Winston pro stock champion Jeg Coughlin Jr. won his final, defeating Mike Edwards in a battle of Chevrolet Cavaliers. Coughlin’s 6.911 was the winner even though Edwards was faster, 200.05 mph to 199.16.

Wally Parks, founder of the NHRA 50 years ago, missed his first event. The 88-year-old drag racing patriarch was hospitalized with a leg injury. Force dedicated his win, the 96th of his career, to Parks.

Scelzi, who had not won since last year’s Auto Club Finals at Pomona--a total of 12 events--put together a remarkable series of runs to reach the finals. First, he beat 4.644 to beat John Smith, then followed that with 4.665 against Tony Schumacher and 4.551 against Larry Dixon.

The wins over Schumacher and Dixon were two of the closest of the competition. His margin over the Army-sponsored Schumacher was the result of a quicker reaction time. Scelzi came off the line .041 second quicker than Schumacher and crossed the strip with a minuscule .008 margin. Against Dixon, his margin was .150.

“It was like running two different events out there,” Dixon said. “In the first round, it was hot like a summer race in the Midwest, and then when the sun went down it was a whole different race track. The change put a lot of pressure on the crews.”

Herbert put an end to the remarkable Pomona win streak of Darrell Russell. Since being named by five-time champion Joe Amato as his replacement, Russell had won six consecutive races, including the Winternationals final last February. Amato, who had won six national events and six Budweiser shootouts at Pomona, was honorary starter and for a while it appeared he might have the winner too.

In a tense second-round match, Russell upset points leader Kenny Bernstein, 4.653 seconds to 4.766. In the first round, he had sidelined former U.S. Auto Club sprint car champion Doug Kalitta.

In the nostalgia finals for front-engine dragsters, Jack Harris defeated Rance McDaniels in a close race that had the fans on their feet, recalling an era from the 1960s and ‘70s. Harris reached 234.45 mph in 6.152 seconds.