- Four-time NHRA Funny Car world champion Matt Hagan continued his impressive consistency Sunday at the NHRA Midwest Nationals with a sixth straight semifinals finish and points lead
- Winner of four 2026 NHRA Mission national events in his potent Tony Stewart Racing (TSR) American Rebel Light Beer Dodge//SRT Hellcat, Hagan holds a 72-point lead with three races left
- Hagan, tied with legends Don Prudhomme and Kenny Bernstein with four Funny Car titles, put in solid runs in qualifying and eliminations before suffering a semifinals loss to Jordan Vandergriff
- After qualifying third at 3.882, Hagan posted victories over Terry Haddock at 3.935 and Spencer Hyde at 3.925, but the Virginia driver’s nitro machine smoked the tires against Vandergriff
- Despite the defeat, Hagan and his TSR crew led by Mike Knudsen, Phil Shuler and Alex Conaway, hold the top position in NHRA Mission Funny Car points headed to Dallas in two weeks
- Leah Pruett, Hagan’s TSR Dodge teammate, won the first round of Top Fuel eliminations with a “holeshot” win over Kyle Wurtzel before losing to event winner Shawn Langdon in the quarterfinals
- In a tough quarterfinals matchup, Pruett recorded a 3.778 to Langdon’s 3.714, but she remains fourth in the NHRA Top Fuel points standings in the 12,000-horsepower Dodge Top Fueler
- Pruett’s husband and TSR team owner, Tony Stewart, also drove his R+L Carries/Elite Motorsports Top Fueler to a quarterfinals finish Sunday at World Wide Technology Raceway
- Stewart, the former NASCAR, IndyCar and USAC champion, ranks third in the NHRA Mission Top Fuel standings, just ten points in front of his wife as they head to Dallas on Oct. 16–18
- In the Factory Stock Showdown final from the Dodge NHRA Great Lakes Nationals postponed two weeks ago, Lee Hartman took the win in his Dodge Challenger Drag Pak over David Janac
Hagan, the four-time NHRA Funny Car world titleholder from Christiansburg, Virginia, was coming off his fourth win of the 2026 national campaign at Rockingham, North Carolina, entering Sunday’s final eliminations at World Wide Technology Raceway north of St. Louis. Led by his TSR Dodge crew of Mike Knudsen (crew chief), Phil Shuler (co-crew chief) and Alex Conaway (car chief) as well as a stellar staff, Hagan continued his consistent performance by qualifying third at 3.882 and defeating Terry Haddock and Spencer Hyde in the first two rounds.
Fighting off the pressure as the Funny Car points leader, Hagan has advanced to the semifinals dating back to Brainerd in August with six straight solid showings, including wins at Brainerd and Rockingham to jump from fifth to first in his trek for a fifth world championship after being tied with drag racing legends Don “the Snake” Prudhomme and Kenny Bernstein with four titles each.
After six strong runs in qualifying and the first two rounds of eliminations at the Midwest Nationals, Hagan’s nitro-burning mount lost traction with the rear tires against Jordan Vandergriff in the semifinals, and Vandergriff moved to the final round on Sunday. Despite the defeat, Hagan holds a 72-point advantage over Vandergriff with three races remaining in the 20-race national tour.
The next event is the Texas NHRA FallNationals at the Texas Motorplex set for Oct. 16–18 when nitro qualifying gets underway on Friday, Oct. 16, with two rounds scheduled for 5:15 and 8 p.m. CDT.
“The pressure is huge out here,” said Hagan, the 2025 Midwest Nationals winner. “Fortunately, I’m kind of old and I’ve been through it. I’ve experienced a lot, won some championships along the way, so you always feel like you can rise to the occasion and try to give your guys the best you can. It’s intense, but that’s how we love it. I absolutely just dig in deep and try to work hard for these TSR Dodge guys, and they’re doing the same thing giving me a great car.
“We had a great weekend in this American Rebel Light Beer Dodge//SRT Hellcat, nothing to hang our heads about. We did well in qualifying, picking up points, the ‘Last Dog Standing’ low qualifier on Friday night. Mike Knudsen, Phil Shuler and Alex Conaway have this car dialed in. We had to make some changes before that semifinal. We did stick a new supercharger on there, and maybe it had a little bit more meat than we needed and it smoked the tires. But we’re still leaving here with the points lead. This is absolutely one of the toughest championship fights in a long time. It’s going to come down to the last race in Pomona, a dog fight to the end. We’re here for it.”
TSR Dodge Top Fuel racer Leah Pruett, Hagan’s teammate, was sharp on the starting line lights Sunday in the Midwest Nationals with her blue Pellera Dodge dragster by scoring a “holeshot” first-round victory over Kyle Wurtzel at a close 3.735 to Wurtzel’s 3.733. Pruett, fourth in the current NHRA Mission Top Fuel points, had the tough position to oppose current points leader Shawn Langdon, winner of three straight NHRA national events, in the quarterfinals.
But Pruett and her crew, led by Neal Strausbaugh and Mike Domagala, were up for the challenge as she battled Langdon right to the finish line before Langdon’s 3.714 topped Pruett’s 3.770. Langdon went on to capture his fourth consecutive win in the final round.
“On race day, we backed the tune-up off again for the first round,” said Pruett. “It was a good run, but it wasn’t clean. We were fighting new mechanical gremlins, definitely not what you want on race day. We had valvetrain issues in the warmup and, ultimately, we ended up backing the tune-up off too much. Both rounds, our competition came out swinging against us, which shows that our Pellera Dodge team is never to be taken lightly.
“In the second round, we were seeded against the best car on the property, the No. 1 qualifier, the points leader, and ultimately the race winner in that round. The opportunity was there, to take out the points leader in the same round that all of our close points company just got eliminated. But we were unable to seize it. Our power just wasn’t there. We are deep diving into these issues and have no other intentions besides swinging hard in Dallas.”
Stewart, the NASCAR Hall of Famer and former series champion also in IndyCar and USAC, drove his R+L Carriers/Elite Motorsports Top Fuel dragster to the quarterfinals after a competitive battle with veteran Josh Hart in the first round of eliminations. In that round, Stewart’s 3.762 wasn’t enough to defeat Will Smith’s 3.721 as Smith went to the Top Fuel final round.
Stewart remains third in the NHRA Mission Top Fuel standings, just ten points in front of his wife, who has yet to race her husband in the eliminations after 17 races. That matchup could still happen in Texas at the NHRA FallNationals on Oct. 16–18.
In the Factory Stock Showdown final round from the postponed Dodge NHRA Great Lakes Nationals two weeks ago, Lee Hartman took the win in his Dodge Challenger Drag Pak over David Janac with a strong 7.511 pass at 176.67 mph.
The popular Texas NHRA FallNationals will see Hagan, Pruett and Stewart back in action beginning on Friday, Oct. 16, with two rounds of qualifying at 5:15 and 8 p.m. CDT. Saturday’s qualifying rounds are scheduled for noon and 2:30 p.m. CDT. Final eliminations are set for Sunday, Oct. 18, at 12 p.m. CDT. The final eliminations will be televised Sunday on Fox Sports 1 at 4 p.m. EDT.
For more information on NHRA, visit NHRA.com.Dodge
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