The 2026 NHRA Mission Foods Drag Racing Series season comes to a close Nov. 13-15 at the In-N-Out Burger NHRA Finals, and John Force Racing arrives at In-N-Out Burger Pomona Dragstrip with plenty on the line. Jordan Vandergriff has a legitimate shot at the Funny Car championship, Jack Beckman is chasing a remarkable Pomona win streak, Alexis DeJoria wants her first Wally with the team, and Josh Hart is looking to bookend his season with a second victory.
One year ago, Jordan Vandergriff was holding a microphone and talking into a FOX Sports camera about the season finale at Pomona. This year, he’s one of the main storylines.
In his first season behind the wheel of John Force Racing’s Cornwell Tools Chevrolet SS Funny Car, Vandergriff enters the final race just 39 points behind four-time champion and points leader Matt Hagan. With each elimination round at Pomona worth 30 points instead of the usual 20, that gap is very much within reach. Vandergriff also holds a 65-point cushion over third-place J.R. Todd and a 102-point advantage over fourth-place Austin Prock.
He closed in dramatically at Las Vegas, winning the race while Hagan went out in the second round. For a driver who spent years waiting for this kind of opportunity, the moment isn’t lost on him.
“This this is what you dream of, right? I think any racer will tell you when they dream of getting a shot or the opportunity, they dream of winning championships. This is exactly what I thought of during all those years out of the seat. Now that I’m here, it’s like ’Wow, I guess this is what it actually feels like.’ So, to be here is truly a dream come true. The Cornwell Quality Tools team did exactly what we needed to do at Las Vegas. We got as close as we could to Hagan by winning the race and he went out in the second round. But the job is not finished. We have to close that gap and gain 10 or more points in qualifying to be within one round when eliminations start. That would make things much easier.”
Few drivers have owned Pomona in recent years quite like Jack Beckman. The 39-time NHRA Funny Car event winner and United States Air Force veteran has won at Pomona in each of the past four years in which he’s competed.
Beckman won the Finals in 2019 and the Winternationals in 2020. His career was then sidelined until midway through the 2024 season, when he took over the seat for the injured John Force. Since returning, he’s added wins at the 2024 Finals and the 2025 Winternationals.
His consecutive event-win streak at Pomona was interrupted when the 2025 Finals was cancelled by rain, and again when he was eliminated in the second round at the 2026 Winternationals earlier this year. But his yearly streak is still alive, and a win this weekend in the PEAK Chevrolet SS Funny Car would extend it.
Beckman believes his team’s performance numbers have been better than its results.
“I thought at this point we’d have won five races. I think the stats show the PEAK Chevy being the best car out there. With the number of low ET runs we’ve run. I don’t think anybody comes close to us in qualifying and elimination rounds. It’s just those things that bite us throughout the year. Sometimes my right foot needed to be a little quicker, or we drop a cylinder or smoke the tires and not really understanding why it happened. We just have to eliminate all that stuff and, when we do, we have weekends like we had an Indy where we were just dominant. We need one of those weekends in Pomona and, frankly, the points take care of themselves whether we’re going to finish fifth, fourth, or third. I just would like to close with a win at Pomona.”
Alexis DeJoria set one primary goal for her debut season with John Force Racing: get the Bandero Premium Tequila Chevrolet SS Funny Car into the winner’s circle. Pomona is her last chance to make it happen, and there may be no better place to do it.
The Los Angeles-area native fell in love with drag racing decades ago at the historic Pomona facility. Her Bandero Chevy will once again carry the silver and black livery that debuted two weeks ago at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
DeJoria sits seventh in the Funny Car standings, 94 points behind Ron Capps in sixth and 75 ahead of Daniel Wilkerson in eighth. One round win on Sunday would be her 20th of the season, tying the third-best total of her career.
“I would feel an incredible weight lifted off my shoulders. The Bandero team is the only John Force Racing team to have not won a Wally this year so it’s disappointing but we have the opportunity to change all that. A winner’s trophy from Pomona is one that’s never sat on my shelf before so I’d like to make that happen … not to mention it will be the last chance to win a 75th anniversary trophy.”
Josh Hart’s first season with John Force Racing started with a storybook win at Gainesville in March, and he’d love nothing more than to finish it the same way.
The Speedmaster Top Fuel team showed signs of a breakthrough two weeks ago in Las Vegas, producing multiple 3.68-second runs. Hart believes the team has turned the corner on performance heading into the finale.
He enters Pomona ninth in the Top Fuel standings, 24 points behind Justin Ashley in eighth and 39 behind Maddi Gordon and Will Smith, who are tied for sixth. With 30 points per round available, a sixth-place finish is realistic.
Winning at Pomona would check off a long-held goal for Hart.
“I have always loved Pomona and dreamed of winning that race. There is so much history there and I want to be a part of it.”
He also sees a top-six finish as a fitting reward for his crew.
“This has been a building year as a team and this Speedmaster crew deserves that sixth-place place position for all the effort they have put in and I will fight for it.”
And the progress made in Las Vegas has the team confident heading into the final race.
“The Speedmaster dragster’s performance seemed to turn around at Las Vegas and we are confident we can end on a high note.”
From a championship fight in Funny Car to a streak worth protecting, a first Wally with a new team, and a chance to bookend a season with victory, John Force Racing has no shortage of storylines heading into the In-N-Out Burger NHRA Finals. And with points-and-a-half in play and one last 75th anniversary trophy waiting at the end of Sunday, every round at Pomona will matter. For Vandergriff in particular, the driver who called last year’s finale from the broadcast booth could be the one everyone’s talking about when this year’s finale is over.
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