John Force
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| John Force | |
|---|---|
| Date of birth | May 4, 1949 |
| Place of birth | Bell Gardens, California, USA |
John Force (born May 4, 1949 in Bell Gardens, California) is an NHRA drag racer and 14-time Funny Car champion. He is one of the most dominant drag racers in the sport with 126 career victories. He graduated from Bell Gardens High School and briefly attended Cerritos Junior College to play football.
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[edit] Early career
Since mid-1998, Force has been a Ford driver and team owner.
Since 2000, Force has been sponsored by BP, which purchased his longtime sponsor Burmah Castrol, which had sponsored him since 1986. After winning his fourth Funny Car title in 1994, Force earned the nickname of "Brute Force" from drivers, and even announcers such as Steve Evans. This nickname hearkens back to his early days on the track, when he drove his own unsponsored car, named "Brute Force". Force had a cameo in a 2004 episode of King of the Hill ("Dale Be Not Proud").
[edit] 2005
In 2005 however, John Force was defeated by a margin of 32 points by Don Schumacher Racing's Gary Scelzi, who won the NHRA 2005 Funny Car World Championship. He also came in behind Schumacher Racing's Ron Capps by 24 points.
[edit] 2006
In 2006, John Force won his 14th NHRA World Funny Car Championship, defeating Ron Capps in the quarter-finals of the Automobile Club of Southern California NHRA Finals which mathematically eliminated Ron Capps and teammate Robert Hight from the championship. Force went on to win the event, his third of the season and 122nd of his career.
[edit] 2007
2007 was a very tough, tragic season for the Force team, beginning with the death of team driver Eric Medlen, and 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 first two races but, again, rebounded until his crash. Injuries he sustained were a broken ankle, abrasion of his right knee, a dislocated left wrist, and badly mangled fingers and toes.
Current drivers racing under him are son-in-law Robert Hight, daughter Ashley Force, and new member Mike Neff. 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 began racing for the team on October 26, 2007 at the AC Delco Las Vegas NHRA Nationals.
On September 23, 2007, Force was injured in a crash at the O'Reilly Auto Parts Fall Nationals in Ennis, Texas as he crossed the finish line against Kenny Bernstein. Bernstein's Funny Car drifted into Force's lane, clipping the final timing cone and a foam block which shot into Force's lane. Initially, it was thought that the block ruptured Force's left rear tire, causing it to come apart, violently shaking the chassis until it broke apart. However, it was determined by NHRA after thorough review, that the block went behind Force's tire and was not the cause of the wreck.[1] Phil Burkart Jr. was added as Force's replacement for the remainder of the 2007 season, starting too at Las Vegas.
[edit] 2008
2008 was not a very good season for Force, finishing out of the top five for the first time since early in his career. 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 Funny Car and Top Fuel driver Kenny Bernstein, and six-time Top Fuel champion Tony Schumacher, with backing from NHRA's Track Safety Committee, assisted in developing a sensor that monitors the engines of Top Fuel dragsters and Funny Cars. Should the engine backfire at any time during a race, the fuel pump is automatically shut down, and the parachutes are deployed. The idea was to either minimize or eliminate the circumstances that led to Kalitta's death. This safety device became mandatory, and was put into place at the start of the 2009 season. Also made an optional setting for the Funny Car division, was a brake handle that, instead of needing to be pulled back, toward the driver, was set up to be pushed away from the driver. This came about because when the 2008 season began, Force's right arm was still in a cast, due to broken fingers, and he needed a different way of using the brakes on the car, rather than the traditional handbrake that needed to be brought back toward the driver; also, in the 2007 accident in Texas, Force had lost some grip in his right hand, and had some problems putting enough pressure on the handbrake to unlock it from position to apply the brakes. This led to the development of the forward application handbrake, which has given several drivers in the Funny Car class quicker access to the brakes. Though Force only finished seventh in the points in 2008, he became a visionary within the NHRA for innovations in driver safety.
[edit] Career awards
Won As A Driver/Owner
Won As An Owner
1990 NHRA Funny Car Champion
1991 NHRA Funny Car Champion
1993 NHRA Funny Car Champion
1994 NHRA Funny Car Champion
1995 NHRA Funny Car Champion
1996 NHRA Funny Car Champion
1997 NHRA Funny Car Champion
1998 NHRA Funny Car Champion
1999 NHRA Funny Car Champion
2000 NHRA Funny Car Champion
2001 NHRA Funny Car Champion
2002 NHRA Funny Car Champion
2003 NHRA Champion Owner (Tony Pedregon, Funny Car)
2004 NHRA Funny Car Champion
2006 NHRA Funny Car Champion
2009 NHRA Champion Owner (Robert Hight, Funny Car)
On the NHRA Top 50 Drivers, 1951–2000, John Force was ranked No. 2, behind Don Garlits.
Force has 126 Wallys in 202 Final Rounds
John Force is a 14-time NHRA champion.
John Force's round wins reached 1,000 in his career and best in NHRA history at in first round of eliminations 2008 NHRA Midwest Nationals at Gateway Int'l Raceway in St. Louis, Missouri.
Force has won at least once on almost every track, with only one exception. John has yet to win a race at Summit Motorsports Park in Norwalk, Ohio.
[edit] Driving Force
John is featured on A&E's reality show Driving Force with three of his daughters (Ashley, Courtney, and Brittany).
[edit] Trivia
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Lists of miscellaneous information should be avoided. Please relocate any relevant information into appropriate sections or articles. (December 2007) |
- Force suffered from polio as a child, which resulted in one leg growing shorter than the other. Although he has this affliction, it is such that he does not need special shoes that make up for the difference.
- Force is the only driver to have won more than ten championships in his division, beating the record once held by retired NHRA Pro Stock Champion Bob Glidden.
- Of the 21 current NHRA Full Throttle [disambiguation needed] series venues, the only venue Force has not won is Summit Motorsports Park, which began holding events in 2007.
- John Force became the first Funny Car drag racer to win 1,000 qualifying races.
- John Force appeared in a cameo in the King of the Hill episode "Dale Be Not Proud", in which Dale Gribble donates a kidney to Force, after which it appears he does not need it.
- In his early years, Force raced in Cedar Falls, Iowa.
