Photo courtesy NHRA/National Dragster
Funny Car ace Bob Tasca III pulled off an exceedingly rare feat Sunday afternoon by denying the entire final quadrant of competitors at the NHRA 4-Wide Nationals at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway on a holeshot.
In what was, separate of Tasca’s feat, one of the greatest Funny Car final rounds in history, the Cranston, Rhode Island native earned his first win of the 2024 season and the 16th of his career. Tasca led final round challengers Austin Prock, Ron Capps, and Matt Hagan — Funny Cars’ murderers row if there ever was one — off the starting line by two hundredths of a second (.034 to Prock’s second-to-leave .054) and sailed to a 3.915 at 329.75 for the win. His elapsed time was the slowest of the quad, as Capps clocked a 3.902, Prock a 3.904, and Hagan a 3.895.
It marked just the third time a driver has won a quadrant on a triple holeshot in the brief modern history of NHRA four-wide racing, and the first time in the Funny Car category. But making it all the more impressive — perhaps historically impressive — was the margin between the four drivers at the stripe: Prock and Capps were identical to the third digit, and Hagan, last across the finish line, was just .012 seconds behind Tasca.
“When I’m sitting here in lane one and looking at those grandstands full of people, it gives you butterflies because that’s why we do it,” Bob Tasca said. “I knew I hit it good. I didn’t know how good but it was a great light, great car, great setup, and it’s exactly what we needed to do this weekend.
“When you put together a final round where there’s one Ford, one Dodge, one Toyota, one Chevy, that why we do it. It’s the only reason we come out here to win for all our Ford fans all around the world. That’s going to go down as one of the best final rounds in Funny Car history. We’ve got a team that can compete for the championship and I promise you we will,” Tasca continued.
