CHEVROLET IN NHRA
2023 BETWAY NHRA CAROLINA NATIONALS
zMAX DRAGWAY
CONCORD, NORTH CAROLINA
TEAM CHEVY RACE REPORT
SEPTEMBER 24, 2023
CHEVROLET CAPTURES DOUBLE-UP FOR PRO STOCK AND FACTORY X VICTORIES IN CHARLOTTE
- Capturing his first win of the 2023 NHRA season, Greg Anderson raced to his 102nd career Pro Stock victory, as well as Chevrolet’s 378th, over Dallas Glen in an all-KB Titan Racing Chevrolet Camaro SS final round at zMAX Dragway.
- Racing to victory, Greg Stanfield defeated Allen Johnson to take Chevrolet to the Winner’s Circle in Factory X with his run of 7.100 ET at 190.70 MPH.
- Racing to his fourth final round versus Tasca, III, Robert Hight finishes runner-up for the second time this year in his fifth final round of the season as he marches on in the Countdown for the Championship.
- Earning his fifth No. 1 Qualifier of the season, and 82nd in his career, Robert Hight and the Cornwell Tools/AAA Chevrolet team topped the leaderboard with his qualifying effort of 3.824 ET at 330.15 MPH.
- Erica Enders set the pace on the Pro Stock field, earning her fourth No. 1 qualifier of the season with her run of 6.509 ET at 210.18 MPH.
CONCORD, North Carolina (September 24, 2023) – Chevrolet claimed two Wally trophies at Charlotte’s betway NHRA Carolina Nationals Sunday at zMAX Dragway, with Greg Anderson capturing his 102nd career Pro Stock victory, as well as the Bowtie brand’s 378th Pro Stock victory, and Greg Stanfield racing to the win in his COPO Camaro in the Factory X category.
Racing his way to the final round, Anderson, a Pro Stock veteran in his 174th career final round, captured his 102nd win in the category over KB Titan Racing teammate Dallas Glenn, with his fast pass of 6.590 ET at 206.73 MPH to Glenn’s 6.554 ET at 203.23 MPH. It was the effort that captured not only the win light, but also Chevrolet’s 378th Pro Stock win and 259th in the Camaro.
A home race for KB Titan Racing and Anderson, he said of the emotional win, “It’s huge. If I did what I did last week again this week, I was out, I was done. I think I saved a lot of people’s bacon today. That other team (teammate Dallas Glenn and the RAD Torque Systems team) is bad to the bone right now and fast as can be. Man, we are really racing tough on Sunday. You saw that these last two weeks we put two KB Titan (Racing) cars in the finals. This time it was my turn, and I had a heck of a HendrickCars.com Chevrolet hot rod.”
“Yeah. My dad has been trying to win here for Rick (Hendrick) for three years now, so this is big,” said Crew Chief, and son of Greg, Cody Anderson. “A big win, a big Playoff win. We’re not done yet. We’re here, and the car’s running great.”
Representing Chevrolet in the Funny Car final round, Robert Hight, driver of the Cornwell Tools/AAA Chevrolet Camaro SS machine, started his race day near Charlotte from the top position of the leaderboard after qualifying No. 1 for the 82nd time of his career and fifth of the year. Taking a bye run in the first round, then defeating Paul Lee in Round 2 and Alex Laughlin in the semifinals, he squared off versus Bob Tasca, III. With Tasca moving first on the tree slightly over Hight, a close race saw Tasca defeating Hight by just .001 seconds and forcing Robert to runner-up despite a strong effort run of 3.923 ET at 326.95 MPH.
“We wanted to win this thing, to have back-to-back victories but it just wasn’t in the cards today,” said Hight. “This Cornwell Tools Chevrolet team deserves all the credit still though, for the turnaround that they did from Friday into Saturday and then to come out here on race day in completely different conditions and make it to the finals, they’ve done a great job, Jimmy Prock and Thomas and Nate tuning, they’ve all worked hard.”
Making another appearance on track, Greg Stanfield raced to the final round in Factory X with his Chevrolet COPO Camaro machine, to face Allen Johnson. With Johnson getting the jump, Stanfield was able to race around him to get the win light and Wally with a strong lap in his Chevy at 7.100 ET at 190.70 MPH.
With only four races remaining in the 2023 season, NHRA next heads to World Wide Technology Raceway near St. Louis for the NHRA Midwest Nationals, Sept. 29-Oct. 1, 2023. In competition and representing Chevrolet, Top Fuel, Funny Car, Pro Stock, and FlexJet Factory Stock Showdown take to the track that weekend. Broadcast of Sunday’s eliminations air at 3 p.m. ET on FOX Sports 1 (FS1). Coverage streams live throughout the weekend on NHRA.tv, and is available via AppleTV, Android TV, and Roku devices.
WHAT THEY’RE SAYING (QUOTES):
Brittany Force, driver of the Flav-R-Pac/Monster Energy Chevrolet Top Fuel dragster for John Force Racing:
This Flav-R-Pac / Monster Energy team is leaving Charlotte sitting No. 6 in the points standings after a strange, tough weekend for everyone out here. We were trying to move up in points and make progress and we had two out of three good qualifying runs to finish fourth when it was all said and done. Completely swapped conditions into race day, from a cool killer track to a hot track. There were a lot of adjustments and changes for the tuners to make but in round one we had a solid run down there at 3.73 and in the second round we couldn’t get off the line and it was a pedal fest with my teammate Austin Prock. Luckily, it was against a teammate so he got to move on. Just wish it had been in the final round.”
Austin Prock, driver of the Montana Brand/Rocky Mountain Twist Chevrolet Top Fuel dragster for John Force Racing:
“A good healthy points day for us. It was fun to go some rounds today with this Montana Brand/Rocky Mountain Twist team. Any way that you can get those flashing win lights makes you feel good. For me, getting to recover the race car out of tire smoke is a lot of fun and I got a few shots at it today. Leaving Charlotte with our heads up, we’ve got some momentum going into St. Louis next weekend.”
John Force, driver of the PEAK Antifreeze and Coolant Chevrolet Camaro SS Funny Car for John Force Racing:
“Not the day I thought we’d have after how qualifying went. It’s tough, but we’ll move forward. Still four races left and things are tight in the points. A lot of upsets first round, there’s a lot of variables. We aren’t out of it, just have to keep our heads down and keep working hard.”
Robert Hight, driver of the Cornwell Tools/AAA Chevrolet Camaro SS Funny Car for John Force Racing:
“We wanted to win this thing, to have back-to-back victories but it just wasn’t in the cards today. This Cornwell Tools Chevrolet team deserves all the credit still though, for the turnaround that they did from Friday into Saturday and then to come out here on race day in completely different conditions and make it to the finals, they’ve done a great job, Jimmy Prock and Thomas and Nate tuning, they’ve all worked hard. When you have partners like Cornwell Tools and Chevrolet and AAA, Flav-R-Pac, we’ve got everything we need to do the job. The guys do the hard work and they perfect what they do, that’s how you win the close races. We were in another final and that’s what you’ve got to do to win a championship, just keep going rounds but it’s going to take wins, too.”
Erica Enders, driver of the Johnson’s Horsepowered Garage/SCAG/Melling Chevrolet Camaro SS Pro Stock for Elite Motorsports:
“It took a hard left on me, and just blew smooth through the clutch in low gear. That’s where we get all of our momentum and we make all of that torque down low, and we utilize it the best that we can. Unfortunately, it just wasn’t our day today in Charlotte, but that’s okay. JHG has had an awesome performance here. I was the lone soldier left for Elite Motorsports, and when usually we are, we survive. But today’s not the day. We have four more left. It ain’t over, it ain’t even close.”
GREG ANDERSON, driver of the HendrickCars.com Chevrolet Camaro SS Pro Stock – Charlotte 2 Winner’s Press Conference:
YOUR 102ND CAREER WIN, FIRST OF THE SEASON, AND FOURTH AT ZMAX DRAGWAY. YOU MOVE FIFTH INTO THE POINTS. GO OVER YOUR RACE DAY…
“It was incredible. It was my day. I haven’t had many “my days” this year. It’s definitely sweet. To do it here at Charlotte, my home track, with all of my family here, my friends, all my support, the Hendrick group, it’s perfect. It’s totally perfect. I have a couple of storybook wins last year. This one is right up there. It’s been a long year for me. My team has been doing a great job all year long, and I’m very, very proud of that. But, just, sheesh. I wish I could’ve won one. It’s been a struggle, and it’s been a tick off each race. We’re capable of winning, we just haven’t been able to make four perfect runs down the racetrack. The car didn’t either made a mistake, or the driver didn’t made a mistake. We did that today. We’re four and zero. We did not make any mistakes. The car was fantastic and I didn’t screw it up. Here we are in the winner’s circle at the betway Carolina Nationals. Feels pretty dang good. It’s been a long year for me, but I never give up. I could definitely see that things were trending in the last couple of months. We’re climbing the mountain and being a race winning car again. We weren’t that the first couple of months, but the last couple of months, we’ve had a car that could win races. We just had to put everything together. When you’ve got the depth I’ve got on my race team, it’s hard to win when you’re racing against a great group like Elite Motorsports. It’s tough out there. It’s hard to win. Especially when the Playoffs come around, everyone brings their A-Game. You saw it last weekend when everyone’s effort ratcheted up. It’s tougher yet when everyone’s to try and race and win. We found way to race better than they did on Sunday. We made it a final round with two KB Titan (Racing) cars last weekend, and again this weekend at zMAX Dragway. Great, great day. Couldn’t be prouder of my guys. What a day. Couldn’t be prouder than my guys, it was a team effort all day long. Beautiful weekend, fantastic weekend, couldn’t be proud than to do it here.”
ARE WE SEEING TODAY THE RESULT OF WHAT YOU’VE BEEN WORKING FOR?
“I hope so, yes. We didn’t back into a win today; we earned a win today. We earned one. We earned one. We did a better job racing than everybody. We’re peaking at the right time, without a doubt. With Dallas (Glenn) in the final right alongside me, it’s not just one car of our six or seven car fleet, it’s all of them. Pretty safe feeling, pretty great feeling. It’s going to be an exciting Countdown. I’m sure today scrambled the points up quite a bit, and it put a lot of people right back in the hunt, myself being one of them. I’m not out of it. I certainly felt like that a little bit last week, and if I would have had another weekend this weekend like last weekend, I would be out of it. We climbed the mountain this week, and we’re back in the game, back in the hunt. We’ve got four races to go and at least 10 cars that can win this thing.”
TALK ABOUT THAT ‘GO OUT AND WIN MENTALITY.’ HOW IMPORTANT WAS IT THIS WEEKEND?
“I think so. It’s obviously what I need. I lose focus of that every once in a while. But you’ve got to get tough; you’ve got to tell yourself you can do this. You’re not over the hill; you’re not washed up. Sometimes you want to think that way, and sometimes it looks that way. Today it didn’t look that way, and today I didn’t think that way. This year, I’ve been asked “can you win anymore?” Today proved I can. So great, great day. Cody (Anderson), you’re just going to have to wait a bit longer.”
HOW’S THAT SWAGGER?
“You’re only as good as your last race, and I know that better than anybody. Any race win could be your last race win. It’s 102 today, but you never know. You never know if there will ever be 103. I’m sure as hell going to try to make it 103, but you never know. You’ve got to appreciate every day and every opportunity you’ve got, and I had an opportunity today and we made the most of it.”
WAS THERE A POINT TODAY YOU JUST FELT IT WOULD BE YOUR DAY?
“To be honest, even after the first round when the win light came on, I haven’t seen a lot of win lights lately, so yeah. I told myself after first round, ‘maybe things would be different today.’ You can turn on a win light, so I think first round was a great confidence booster for me, and that sounds kind of silly, but I’m telling you in this class, you can get beat first round or final round, like many times you go out there. There are so many guys that can win. Unless the wheels fall off, you can absolutely get your butt whipped any round you go up there in this class. That’s what great about it, and that’s why you feel so good when a win light comes on. To have four win lights come on in one day, it seems like a long time since I’ve seen that happen. But it happened today.”
Round 1 Recap:
Top Fuel:
No. 10 Austin Prock defeated No. 5 Josh Hart with his run of 3.722 ET at 323.27 MPH to Hart’s 5.109 ET at 139.18 MPH.
No. 4 Brittany Force defeated No. 11 Clay Millican with her run of 3.736 ET at 332.67 MPH to Millican’s 3.777 ET at 330.47 MPH.
Funny Car:
No. 1 Robert Hight moved on to Round 2 on a bye run with a pass of 7.473 ET at 87.25 MPH.
No. 5 John Force fell to No. 13 Alex Laughlin after smoking the tires early on the run.
Pro Stock:
No. 1 Erica Enders defeated No. 16 Mason McGaha with her run of 6.544 ET at 209.65 MPH to McGaha’s 6.629 ET at 205.82 MPH.
No. 8 Matt Hartford defeated No. 9 Fernando Cuadra, Jr. with a run of 8.162 ET at 163.87 MPH to Cuadra, Jr.’s 11.895 ET at 74.59 MPH.
No. 4 Bo Butner, III fell to No. 13 Christian Cuadra with his run of 6.570 ET at 208.14 MPH to Cuadra’s 6.584 ET at 208.59 MPH.
No. 3 Greg Anderson defeated No. 12 Jerry Tucker on a run of 6.559 ET at 208.65 MPH to Tucker’s 6.604 ET at 209.14 MPH.
No. 2 Camrie Caruso defeated No. 15 Chris McGaha with her run of 6.597 ET at 206.80 MPH to McGaha’s 6.639 ET at 206.36 MPH.
No. 7 Kyle Koretsky fell to No. 10 Deric Kramer on his run of 6.586 ET at 207.66 MPH to Kramer’s 6.576 ET at 208.59 MPH.
No. 3 Aaron Stanfield defeated No. 14 Eric Latino with his run of 6.596 ET at 208.81 ET to Latino’s 6.674 ET at 207.02 MPH.
No. 6 Troy Coughlin, Jr. fell to No. 11 Dallas Glenn on his pass of 6.569 ET at 209.36 MPH to Glenn’s 6.580 ET at 207.78 MPH.
Round 2:
Top Fuel:
Prock defeated teammate B. Force in a pedal fest after both smoke the tires early on the run, with Prock running 4.655 ET at 223.17 MPH to Force’s 4.834 ET at 195.90 MPH.
Funny Car:
Hight defeats Lee with a run of 3.963 ET at 314.68 MPH to Lee’s 4.643 ET at 176.70 ET while smoking tires mid-track.
Pro Stock:
Glenn defeated Stanfield with his run of 6.590 Et at 207.75 MPH to Stanfield’s 7.660 ET at 140.36 MPH.
Enders defeated Hartford 6.567 ET at 208.68 MPH to Hartford’s 6.564 ET at 209.46 MPH.
Anderson defeated Cuadra with a pass of 6.561 ET at 209.17 MPH to Cuadra’s 9.692 ET at 88.26 MPH and get loose mid-track.
Kramer defeats Caruso with his run of 6.596 ET at 208.39 MPH to Caruso’s 6.580 ET at 206.92 MPH.
Semifinals:
Top Fuel:
Prock fell to Salinas after running 4.189 ET at 305.77 MPH to Salinas’ 3.898 ET at 257.68 MPH.
Funny Car:
Hight defeated Laughlin with a pass of 3.934 ET at 325.22 MPH to Laughlin’s 4.200 ET at 305.77 MPH.
Pro Stock:
Glenn defeats Kramer after Kramer redlights on the start.
Anderson defeats Enders on his run of 6.546 ET at 209.30 MPH to Enders’ 6.590 ET at 208.97 MPH.
Finals:
Funny Car:
Hight falls to Tasca, III with his run of 3.932 ET at 326.95 MPH to Tasca, III’s 3.933 ET at 329.26 MPH.
Pro Stock:
Anderson defeated Glenn with his run of 6.590 ET at 206.73 MPH to Glenn’s 6.554 ET at 203.23 MPH.
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