John Force Feature

As promised, here is the feature on John Force, Winner of RACER of the Year 2010, check up my previous post for other winners and runner-up's.

John Force (born May 4, 1949 in Bell Gardens, California) is an NHRA drag racer, a 15-time Funny Car champion driver, and a 17-time champion car owner. Force owns and drives for John Force Racing. He is one of the most dominant drag racers in the sport with 132 career victories.
Current drivers racing under him are son-in-law Robert Hight,daughter Ashley, and Mike Neff, who was the crew chief for rival driver Gary Scelzi for the 2005 season, earned his NHRA Funny Car license in October 2007 and raced for Team Force from October 26, 2007 at the AC Delco Las Vegas NHRA Nationals through the 2009 season.

Early in his career, Force drove a Corvette, Monza and then in the 1980s switched to an Oldsmobile Cutlass through the end of the 1993 season. He drove a Chevrolet for 1994, quickly changing to a Pontiac in 1995 and 1996. Since 1997, Force has been a Ford driver and team owner.

Here's a look at his most recent events.

In 2005, Force won 5 events, but only finished third in the championship standings, 32 points behind champion Gary Scelzi,

In 2006, John Force won his 14th NHRA World Funny Car Championship, defeating Ron Capps.

2007 was a very tough, tragic season for the Force team, beginning early in the year with the death of team driver Eric Medlen, followed later by Force's own crash in Ennis, Texas at the 2007 O'Reilly NHRA Fall Nationals. Force started the year poorly, suffering a DNQ ending a 20+ year consecutive qualifying streak. He rebounded, winning the O'Reilly NHRA Thunder Valley Nationals in Bristol, Tennessee, then proceeded on to three more final rounds, winning another race in Sonoma, California, putting him fourth in points and allowing him to make the first cut in NHRA's new point system, the Countdown to the Championship aka the "Countdown to Eight". He stumbled again in the next two races but, again, rebounded until his crash.



2008 was not a very good season for Force, finishing out of the top five for the first time since early in his career. He ultimately finished 7th . However, after the death of driver Scott Kalitta, he was instrumental in the development of some of the safety precautions that were implemented throughout the rest of the season, and also, along with retired 6 time world champion Kenny Bernstein [4 Funny Car titles, 2 Top Fuel titles], and seven-time Top Fuel champion Tony Schumacher

2009 once again saw Force finish outside of the top five. John finished 9th, daughter Ashley finished 2nd, and Mike Neff placing 10th. However, he would win his 16th overall championship as a car owner, with teammate Robert Hight's championship, placing Force as the winningest car owner in NHRA history.

The start of the 2010 season saw Force celebrate 25 years with the same sponsor, as well as 34 years in the NHRA. On February 14, Force won the season opener at Auto Club Raceway at Pomona in the 50th Winternationals in California defeating Ron Capps. After 13 events, Force has 4 wins, and lead the Funny Car points standings with 933, 58 ahead of teammate Robert Hight. November 14, 2010, Force needed some help to win the championship. He started the day 38 points behind 28-year-old Matt Hagan, who ran for team rival Don Shumacher and his team. In order to capture the championship he needed to finish two rounds ahead of Hagan. With Bob Tasca III taking Hagan out in the first round, Force won his first round over Gary Densham and second round win over Bob Bode, securing the championship.

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