Earns Toyota’s Fourth NHRA Funny Car Driver’s Championship
POMONA, Calif. (November 13, 2022) – Toyota driver Ron Capps won his third career NHRA Camping World Drag Racing Series Funny Car Championship on Sunday night with a final round appearance in the season finale at Auto Club Raceway at Pomona. Capps’ championship marks the fourth Funny Car championship for Toyota, and the first for the GR Supra Funny Car.
TOYOTA FAST FACTS
• Since joining Team Toyota in Charlotte, Capps won four races, advanced to three final rounds and scored 36 round wins over 17 races to claim the 2022 NHRA Top Fuel Championship.
• This is Capps third championship, and second consecutive. Capps previously won the championship in 2016 and 2021.
• The 57-year-old California-native is second all-time with 72 career Funny Car wins. Combined with his one Top Fuel victory, Capps ranks sixth in NHRA history with 73 career wins.
• This is Capps’s first title as an owner-driver for Ron Capps Motorsports. Capps won the previous two championships with Don Schumacher Racing.
• This is the first title for the Toyota GR Supra Funny Car. Cruz Pedregon won the first Funny Car championship for Toyota aboard a Toyota Solara in 2008, and Del Worsham (2015) and J.R. Todd (2018) won their Funny Car titles aboard the Toyota Camry.
TOYOTA QUOTES
RON CAPPS, NAPA AUTO PARTS Toyota GR Supra Funny Car, Ron Capps Motorsports
What would you say to anyone looking to take a risk like you did to start this race team?
“It’s like anybody in Amrica, anything you put your mind to, you can do with great people around you. I told you earlier I knew we deserved it because of the great group of people I have around me. I can’t even begin to say what it feels like right now. I mean, NAPA Auto Care people, all the NAPA Auto Care owners, 6000 strong and for everybody at home that puts on the Ron Capps NAPA jersey and watching on the couch there on Fox Sports, and GearWrench and Toyota coming on board – to give them a championship means so much. But my family and more than anything we have take on this role this year. That’s been unbelievable. I’m sure you’ve all seen me age quite a but in the last year or so. And I’m sure there were some upset people on the starting like including Slugger (Labbe, TRD) from Toyota and his guys. They thought I was going to shut it off and I planned on it, but I didn’t see Cruz (Pedregon) and I knew I couldn’t get across the centerline so I hugged the wall all the way down. I hope everybody appreciates that. I ran it to the finish line because that was a hard decision to make. For the fans, I did the longest burnout.”
PAUL DOLESHAL, group manager, motorsports, Toyota Motor North America
“We are thrilled to celebrate with Ron and his entire team on their third Funny Car championship in the first season for the Toyota GR Supra Funny Car. To see the efforts of the entire Toyota Gazoo Racing North America team culminate in a Funny Car championship this quickly is extremely rewarding. Ron has fully embraced the Toyota culture and Toyota family since our partnership began this season and we couldn’t be more thrilled to call him a Team Toyota champion.”
About Toyota
Toyota (NYSE:TM) has been a part of the cultural fabric in North America for more than 60 years, and is committed to advancing sustainable, next-generation mobility through our Toyota and Lexus brands, plus our more than 1,800 dealerships.
Toyota directly employs more than 48,000 people in North America who have contributed to the design, engineering, and assembly of nearly 43 million cars and trucks at our 13 manufacturing plants. By 2025, Toyota’s 14th plant in North Carolina will begin to manufacture automotive batteries for electrified vehicles. With the more electrified vehicles on the road than any other automaker, more than a quarter of the company’s 2021 North American sales were electrified.
Through the Start Your Impossible campaign, Toyota highlights the way it partners with community, civic, academic and governmental organizations to address our society’s most pressing mobility challenges. We believe that when people are free to move, anything is possible. For more information about Toyota, visit www.ToyotaNewsroom.com.
