Crowning the 2014 Champions

TAN Original Content
Photos courtesy of David Smith


TAD National Champion - Chris Demke
Three times a runner-up in the last four seasons, Chris Demke was determined to lock down his first NHRA Lucas Oil Series National Championship with team owner Jerry Maddern and the Peen Rite team. A "rollercoaster season" as the California driver described it, started with a powerful win at the season-opening Winternationals at Pomona then fell into a rough patch with early losses and hurt parts. The team regrouped and returned with a vengeance in late spring, picking up a win at the Billings regional. Regional wins at Columbus, Topeka, and Seattle followed, as well as victories at the Route 66 Nationals and 60th U.S. Nationals. Demke's highlight of the year was a rare three-win weekend at the NHRA Nationals in Reading, PA, where Maddern Racing locked up the national championship on Friday, the delayed Carolina Nationals event win on Saturday, and the actual event title on Sunday. Another notable 2014 accomplishment - Demke clocked the fastest blown alcohol speed at Reading, 277.94 MPH.

TAFC National Champion - Steve Harker
All eyes were on the Top Alcohol Funny Car class in 2014, watching to see who would replace 17-time champ Frank Manzo as the class champion at the end of the year. Australian Steve Harker filled the role fittingly, running a season that rivaled the dominating ways of "The Ace". Harker displayed deadly consistency, starting with consecutive wins at the Norwalk national and St. Louis and Bowling Green regionals. He fell in the second round at the U.S. Nationals, but won his next five national events - Charlotte, Dallas, Reading, Las Vegas, and Pomona. As if those wins weren't impressive enough, Harker ran seven 5.4s during late-season eliminations, including a 5.429 in the Reading final. The first non-North American driver to win an NHRA national championship, Harker also swept the potential three-win weekend at Maple Grove.

TAD East Region Champion - Jackie Fricke
Driving the JC Auto Glass/Accelerated Travel A/Fuel dragster, Jackie scored a runner-up at Virginia and regional event wins at Lebanon Valley and Epping to clinch her first TAD regional championship. Fricke's pedalfest win in the Epping final gave her the tie-breaker win over Rich McPhillips, who finished the season with an equal amount of points.

TAFC East Region Champion - Mickey Ferro
The Ryco driver bowed out in the second round of his first four regional events before winning Epping and claiming runner-up at Atco. Ferro clinched the championship by just one point over rookie Matt Gill.

TAD North Central Region Champion - Marty Thacker
While the now four-time regional/divisional champion didn't reach the winner's circle in 2014, Thacker consistently reached the final round, doing so at the Norwalk, Chicago, St. Louis, and Bowling Green regional races.

TAFC North Central Region Champion - Steve Harker

Speed City photo

TAD Central Region Champion - Randy Meyer
Meyer had his hands full this season, between racing his own car, tuning it to two national event wins with driver Shayne Lawson, and fielding a second Randy Meyer Racing entry with Chase Copeland driving. Meyer runnered-up at the Topeka event and won the Earlville regional, resetting the track record in the process. The accomplished driver/tuner/owner also fared well in national competition, winning the Spring Nationals at Houston and the Lucas Oil Nationals completed at the U.S. Nationals for a third place finish in national points.

Megan Meyer photo

TAFC Central Regional Champion - Dale Brand
A favorite to win the national championship for most of the season, Brand locked up the Central Region title with an impressive lead of over 100 points. The former IHRA Alcohol Funny Car standout won three of his five regional events, taking runner-up at the other two. Dale finished No. 2 in national standings with one win, a runner-up and five semifinal appearances.

TAN photo

TAD West Region Champion - Chris Demke

TAFC West Region Champion - Jay Payne
The PEAK-sponsored driver was victorious at the Houston and Billings regional events, also adding a runner-up at Phoenix. On the national level, Payne debuted the second Camaro TAFC body at the Chevrolet Performance U.S. Nationals with a win and finished the season third in points.

Booher Wins Third In a Row, Bohl Second of 2013

Courtesy of Todd Veney/Pro Sportsman Association
Photos courtesy of Steve Fuhrman

At National Trail Raceway in Columbus, Brandon Booher collected his third straight victory and took a commanding lead for the 2013 North Central championship in Top Alcohol Dragster and Andy Bohl won for the second time this season and assumed the favorite's role for the North Central Top Alcohol Funny Car title.

Booher, who never won a race until last month, padded his lead with a close final-round decision over Marty Thacker, who now has three final-round appearances this year. Thacker delivered by far his best run of the weekend, 5.48, and Booher his slowest, 5.46, but Booher's 5-mph better speed, 266 to 261, made for a car-length lead at the finish line.

"I had no shift light that time and got on the limiter a little bit on the 1-2 shift," Booher said. "For a second there, I was thinking, 'Where's the light? Where's the light?' but I guess I still ran good enough to win."

Booher qualified No. 2 (5.42) behind defending event champ Bill Reichert (5.38), who was upset by No. 8 qualifier Jared Dreher, 5.46 to 5.47, for what surprisingly was his third straight first-round loss in the North Central region. Thacker put away Cordova runner-up Robin Samsel in that round, 5.51 to 5.62, and Booher eliminated Norwalk national event winner Dave Hirata, 5.42 to 5.57.

Booher made his best run of the weekend, 5.41, to take out Ken Perry in one semifinal match, and Thacker won the other on a holeshot over Dreher, 5.58 to 5.51, which left him at a considerable disadvantage for the final. Thacker, who won Columbus four times in the 2000s, picked up a tenth but fell just short, 5.46 to 5.48.

"Last month, I had nothing but bills and computers on my desk, and now I've got three Wallys sitting there," Booher said. "I'm really getting used to winning. People keep telling me they thought I'd be more excited after I won, but I always saw the potential in this torque converter. It's not like, 'OMG.' It's more like 'finally.' I'm not going to say I always thought this would happen, but I'm competitive to the nth degree, so maybe I did. The way I look at it, we could have won the first two [Indy and Norwalk], too."

Booher now is a prohibitive favorite for the North Central Top Alcohol Dragster crown, and with his latest win, Bohl moved into a tie with yearlong leader Chris Foster in Top Alcohol Funny Car and with fewer races claimed and more in-division points has the upper hand.

Bohl, who opened the regional season with a victory at Indy, qualified No. 1 and won the final with a 5.78 over Brian Harvanek, who shut off to a 7.49. "That's the first time I've ever run the table – No. 1 qualifier, low e.t., and top speed," said Bohl, who had low e.t. and top speed not just of the event but of every round.

Bohl paced the field in qualifying with a 5.736, just thousandths ahead of Harvanek's nearly identical 5.739, and made the only run all weekend in the 5.60s, a 5.68, on a first-round single. "Having nobody in the other lane gave me a chance to go for it," he said. "It also gave me lane choice for the semifinals, and at this race that was really important because it was absolutely a one-lane racetrack."

Harvanek won the first round over Steve Franke, who was making his first appearance of the season, and the semifinals over Lance Van Hauen, who has gone rounds at his last several events, with a 5.719. Bohl beat Foster in the other semi in a race crucial to the North Central standings, 5.710 to 5.76, closing the gap on Foster and gaining lane choice for the final.

Harvanek, who has been to at least one final for four consecutive years, produced the best reaction time of the entire event in the final, but veered toward both the centerline and the wall and had to lift. "I saw him out there and just hoped he couldn't make it stick in that lane," said Bohl, who drove through shake for the 5.78 win. "You hate to just leave the car alone, but sometimes that's the smartest thing you can do and it won me the race."

 

Thacker, Foster Win Norwalk, Earn Allstars Bids

Courtesy of Todd Veney/Pro Sportsman Association
Photo courtesy of Steve Fuhrman

At the Lucas Oil Series event at Norwalk, which again hosted a capacity crowd Saturday and had fans lined up for miles both directions, Marty Thacker sealed a spot on the Jegs Allstars team with his first Alcohol Dragster victory since 2011, and Chris Foster beat John Anderika in the Top Alcohol Funny Car final for the second year in a row.

Thacker defeated 28-year-old rookie Kyle Michalek in a close final, 5.40 to 5.45, and never ran out of the 5.40s all weekend. "We were trying to get into the .30s in the final, and we might have made it if I'd wrung out 2nd gear another 100 or 150 rpm," he said. "He pulled on me through the middle and I pulled on him at the top end. It sounded like his car was fading a little at the end, but I've raced those A/Fuel cars too many times to ever take anything for granted."

It was Thacker's first victory since the national event at Norwalk two years ago; last year was the first year since he moved to NHRA competition with a screw blower that he didn't win at least one race. "Last year was tough on us, but that's over now," said the two-time U.S. Nationals champion, who defeated recent Indy regional winner Bill Reichert in a rematch of that Indy final in round one, 5.41 to 5.54. "To stand a chance against Bill, you've got to get to him early. The longer the race goes on, the better he gets."

Thacker's Rapid Transit/Total Flow team stayed in the .40s in the semifinals with a 5.49 against returning veteran Paul Fishburn despite Thacker stepping off the gas not far past the 1,000-foot clocks. "It nosed over, and I couldn't hear him beside me, so I took a chance," he said. Fishburn's car lurched forward and deep-staged when he brought the motor up, and, trying to avoid a foul start, he had a cautious.223 light.

Michalek, who, with brother Corey earned a sponsorship by winning Champion Spark Plugs' "Search For a Champion" contest, reached the final in his very first start in an A/Fuel Dragster. Driving Jared Dreher's car, he qualified No. 2 with a 5.39, easily won the first round when Jeff Veale kicked a rod on the burnout, and defeated Robin Samsel on a holeshot in the semi's, 5.48 to 5.47.

With the win, Thacker joins Reichert on the North Central Jegs Allstars team under the new two-drivers-per-region format. "We made the team for seven or eight years in a row, but that was a long time ago now," he said. "It'll be great to be a part of it all again in Chicago next month."

In the Top Alcohol Funny Car final, Foster defeated Anderika in a rematch of last year's finale – this time by a more comfortable margin, 5.65 (low e.t. of eliminations) to 5.72. Last year, the cars were separated by just two-thousandths of a second at the stripe.

Foster had low e.t. of all three rounds after qualifying in the middle of one of the closest fields in class history. The top seven cars were within three hundredths of a second, from Anderika's off-the-trailer 5.63 to Ray Drew's seventh-best 5.66. Half the field ran a 5.66, and John Bojec set the bubble with a 5.75.

Foster won the opening round with a 5.70 when Drew's car lost the crank trigger near the top of low gear. In the semi's, he advanced easily with a 5.69 when reigning North Central region champion Mickey Ferro went up in smoke right off the line. Anderika won the other semifinal when recent Indy regional winner Andy Bohl was charged with a red-light despite leaving with Anderika. The front of Bohl's Mustang body was deemed to be too low, which led to a -.069 foul and a 1.17 60-foot time.

The win landed Anderika in a final for the ninth time in his career and the second time in 2013. He's been to two regional events this season, reached the final at both, and qualified No. 1 at both – both times with a 5.63.

Reichert, Bohl Win Indy North Central Opener

Courtesy of Todd Veney/Pro Sportsman Association

At the rain-plagued North Central opener in Indianapolis, five-time world champ Bill Reichert got his second win in three starts in Top Alcohol Dragster, and Andy Bohl became one of the few drivers in years to beat Frank Manzo in a Top Alcohol Funny Car final. Eliminations, already postponed a week, were run in their entirety on Monday after racers in all classes except the Top Alcohol Dragster and Funny Car headed home Sunday night following a long day sitting in the rain.

In the Top Alcohol Dragster final, Reichert left within thousandths of Thacker in a battle of former U.S. Nationals winners and scored with a consistent 5.42 opposite Thacker's close 5.46. "Bill's no fun to race anymore," Thacker said. "I've never seen anyone completely turn his reaction times around the way he has. If this was a couple of years ago, I would have beat him on a holeshot."

"He would have," said Reichert, who cut a .048 light in the final. "After all these years, I've figured out how to let my experience work for me instead of against me. All you have to do is hit the gas when the yellow light comes on – why does that have to be so difficult? Trying to force yourself to have a good reaction time never works. You have to trust yourself and just let it happen."

Running quick and fast has never been a problem for Reichert, and neither has being consistent, and it wasn't at Lucas Oil Raceway, one of his favorite tracks. After qualifying No. 1 with a 5.30 last week under vastly different conditions, the Rislone driver reeled off a 5.41 against Dave Hirata, who went up in smoke in round one, and a 5.43 against defending event champ Jared Dreher in the semifinals to reach his second final of the season, including the 4-Wide Nationals. His only loss this year came in the semifinals of the Gatornationals, one of the few races he hasn't won at least once.

Thacker came from the bottom half of the field by winning both preliminary rounds at the starting line. He beat No. 3 qualifier Ken Perry with a 5.53 when Perry red-lighted and 2012 Central Region champ Gord Gingles on a holeshot in the semi's, 5.43 to 5.42.

Bohl got his first victory of the season and one of the most rewarding wins of his career when he stopped Manzo in the final with a 5.70 at 251, coasting across the finish line after banging the blower near the five-second mark. "It's always been an honor just to be in the other lane from Frank Manzo," he said. "I've run him I don't know how many times and never beat him. Never left on him, either." He did this time with a clutch .048 reaction time, his best of the weekend, and won easily when Manzo's car got sideways in low gear.

"The thing just drove right into smoke, and I was staring at the wall in the other lane," Manzo said. "I don't know why I never got back on the gas – a senior moment, maybe? I'm usually a lot smarter than that in finals."

Manzo qualified No. 1 with a 5.52 and unloaded a 5.51, low e.t. of the meet, on his first-round single when opponent Dale Brand was unable to return for the rain date. In the semi's, his backpedaling 5.60 was enough to handle Chris Foster's tire-shaking 5.82.

Bohl, the only driver to make it to the finish line under power in all three qualifying sessions last weekend, beat John Bojec in the first round, 5.67 to 5.87, and defeated last year's runner-up, Brian Harvanek, in the semi's with a 5.63.

"It would have been nice to run a little better against Manzo, but I didn't want to beat myself," said the Wisconsin owner/driver/tuner, who went out earlier than expected in Gainesville and Charlotte after strong qualifying performances, including a career-best 5.50-flat in Gainesville. "It's hard not to go for it against somebody like him, but I let the track come to me, and this weekend is something I'll never, ever forget."

Perry, Foster Win Norwalk in Front of Packed House

Courtesy of the Pro Sportsman Association/Todd Veney
David Smith Photos

Former U.S. Nationals winner Ken Perry claimed Top Alcohol Dragster and two-time Division 3 champ Chris Foster took Top Alcohol Funny Car at the B'laster Cavalcade of Stars presented by Budweiser at Summit Motorsports Park in Norwalk, Ohio, Race 2 of the North Central regional series.

Perry came from behind in the final to nip veteran Marty Thacker, who had a .017 reaction time, 5.38 to 5.48. The Canadian driver was the class of the field throughout eliminations, running low e.t. of all three rounds, a 5.42 and back-to-back 5.38s.

"The car's been working really well all year and it's not hurting itself at all," said Perry, who was runner-up at the North Central regional opener three weeks ago in Indianapolis. "I changed just about everything in the engine, and it's happy right now. This should be our second win; we should have won Indy, too." Jared Dreher beat Perry in the Indy final but lost the rematch in the first round of this event, 5.42 to 5.56.

Thacker, who left on everybody he raced by at least half a tenth, had the early lead in the final but fell short by 25-thousandths of a second - about half a car length. "We knew we had more car and should win, and I didn't want to get stupid and red-light because I've already had one this year," Perry said. "You shouldn't have to worry about another blown-alcohol car driving around you, but I drove it out the back door just to be sure."

In qualifying, which was run in front of a turn-away crowd, five-time Top Alcohol Dragster world champ Bill Reichert was the quickest in each of the first two sessions and left with low e.t., 5.28. He smoked the tires in a first-round loss to Jerry Powell.

Foster was as consistent in Top Alcohol Funny Car as Perry was in Top Alcohol Dragster, establishing low e.t. of all three rounds of eliminations and the last two rounds of qualifying. Fred Hagen Jr., who dominated the Norwalk national event last year, ruled the early going with a 5.53, which was low e.t. by almost a full tenth.

Hagen broke on the burnout in the semifinals against John Anderika and Foster won a close one over Brian Harvanek in the other semifinal matchup, 5.72 to 5.76, to clinch his spot on the Jegs Allstars team. "Making the Allstars team is like winning another division championship," he said. "We always ran a few races in Division 4 and Division 5 and never enough in Division 3 to do it until now."

Foster's crew chief, Will Hanna, was carted off to the hospital before the first qualifying session when a Dzus button run over by an A/Fuel Dragster on a burnout became embedded in his leg. He was taken away in an ambulance but returned for what turned out to be Foster's seventh career Lucas Oil Series win, including three in both 2009 and 2011, the years they won Division 3 titles.

In the final, in the best race of the day, Foster slipped past Anderika to win by less than a foot, 5.74 to 5.75. Anderika moved first by a hundredth of a second, and the cars were never seperated by more than six-thousandths at any point on the track. It was Anderika's fifth runner-up - one a year every year since 2008: Cecil County in 2008, Richmond in 2009, Atco in 2010, and Cecil County again in 2011.

"I never saw him, but it must have been tight down there," said Foster, who scored at Norwalk for the second year in a row. "I was over against the wall just about the whole way down the track. It kind of walked out of the groove, and I was worried that if I yanked it back over, he'd get past me. It was just a great weekend overall. Saturday, they had to close the gates and start turning people away, and it was wall-to-wall people in the pits and in the stands. We need somebody like Baders running all of these events."

Former TAD Crewman Mans Behind the Wheel Now

Courtesy of the Pro Sportsman Association/Todd Veney
Photo courtesy of David Smith

Brian Mans liked working on Alcohol Dragsters so much that he had to have one of his own.

The highlight of his career came late last year when he won the rain-delayed Columbus divisional race, which was run in conjunction with the Bowling Green divisional. From the No. 7 spot, he reeled off consistent 5.50s, including a 5.57 in the final to upset five-time world champion Bill Reichert, who went up in smoke.

"I never saw him and was pretty sure the win-light was on in my lane, but I didn't want to get too excited - just in case," Mans says. "Then everybody came down to get me, and the way they piled out of the truck, I knew. But we still had to get the car serviced and ready to race the Bowling Green event the following morning, and we had motors apart and parts all over the place. We might not have made it for first round if Reichert hadn't sent over some guys to help."

It was the biggest win to date in a career that began with a nitrous-assisted '67 Chevelle. Mans raced Super Comp before he ran Top Alcohol Dragster, and, believe it or not, while he was racing Top Alcohol Dragster. "When I was crewing for Marty Thacker, I wanted something else to do, so I started bringing my Super Comp car to the track with me," he says. "I'd work on his car and drive mine. Then when I got my alcohol car, I started running both of them at the same race. It actually wasn't that big of a distraction, but there wasn't enough time to get everything done on the alcohol car, so I quit bringing it. I still have the car. I could probably run it this weekend if I wanted to."

The only problem was that once he'd gone 260 mph, 160 wasn't fun anymore. "All I had to do between rounds with the Super Comp car was fuel that puppy up and it was ready to go, but driving it just wasn't that exciting," says Mans, 46, a manager for Matrix, a company that builds and repairs oil refineries. "The first time I ran the Super Comp car after I started racing in Alcohol Dragster, it felt like I could wave to the crowd and order a burger on the way down the track."

As a Super Comp racer, Mans didn't exactly go with a traditional setup. Instead of running a mega-inch big-block, throttle stop, and full-blown electronics package like everyone else, he went with a 427-cubic-inch small-block. To make the car faster, he'd remove ballast. Making it a tiny bit faster meant taking a grinder to lead weights. "I always hated that shut-off/turn-back-on crap," he says. "I want to just step on the gas and that's it."

Now he can. "I love driving this alcohol car," says Mans, who lives about a half-hour north of St. Louis in Godfrey, Ill. "Driving is an adrenaline rush. It's the reason I do it. Stepping up to this thing was a major shock - I figured that out in one run. I went from 1.02 60-foot-times in the Super Comp car to .920s in this. It leaves a lot harder, and it keeps right on pulling through the middle of the track."

Of course, with the increased performances comes more equipment, more expense, and a whole lot more maintenance. "Driving a car is a lot better than working on one," says Mans, whose crew is led by Mike Randazzo, who used to work with Division 3 Top Alcohol Dragster champ Russ Lindert. "I still it, but it's a ton of work."

Mans, who was the second driver in the country to join the Pro Sportsman Association, an organization dedicated to promoting Top Alcohol Dragster and Top Alcohol Funny Car racing, made the best run of his career last summer at the Lucas Oil Series event in Chicago. It couldn't have come at a better time: His 5.37 at 265 mph took out his old teammate, two-time U.S. Nationals winner Marty Thacker, in the first round.

"I really get jacked up for Marty," Mans says. "It's great to be able to beat somebody like him after working on these things for so long," Had he been able to parlay that round-win into another event title, he'd have been within striking distance of a spot on the Jegs Allstars team. "That would have been the ultimate. Getting into the Allstars is one of my goals this year and every year."