Top Alcohol Funny Cars are widely considered to be the most hateful of all drag racing machines to pilot. The drivers will tell you it’s not easy, doing it with the wick turned up to kill is even harder.  These carbon fiber body-wrapped, methanol-swigging supercharged beasts are capable of running in the mid five-second range at over 260 MPH in the quarter mile.  Just like their big angry brother, the nitro Funny Car, a Top Alcohol flopper can get a case of the tire shakes, and that makes any run difficult for the driver.

In this video from Nitro America we get to see seasoned veteran Jason Rupert demonstrate how you pedal out of one of these violent episodes of tire shake in a car that, even on a clean pass, is a handful.

Besides their healthy diet of methanol, Top Alcohol Funny Cars are different from nitro cars due to their smaller spoilers and air shifted three-speed transmissions. The driver has to shift the car via a button on the steering wheel that activates the Co2 powered air shifter. The shifts come quick, and if that shift is missed, you just scattered a motor at a high RPM; not a cheap or fun mistake to make.

Les Mayhew from NitroAmerica takes us on a journey in his video “The TAFC Experience”.  The star of this video is, of course, Rupert — a multi-time event winner and championship winning Funny Car pilot in both the NHRA and nostalgia ranks. During the video you get to see Rupert clean the car out, put it on the chip, and let her rip off the hit. As the car makes its way down the track you see via the in-car camera, and under-car shot on the rear end just how violent tire shake can be.  Being the true professional he is, Rupert pedals the shaking car quickly and still finishes the pass.