Behind The Scenes As Jasmine Salinas Clocks First Top Fuel Runs

Building toward what has long been anticipated as her next move into the NHRA Camping World Drag Racing Series ranks, second-generation drag racer Jasmine Salinas has spent the early months of the season racking up laps in her father Mike’s championship-contending Scrappers Racing Top Fuel Dragster.

Jasmine, 31, who debuted in Top Alcohol Dragster in the spring of 2019 and earned her first national event win at Gainesville a season ago, made her first runs in a Top Fuel car following the NHRA Arizona Nationals at Wild Horse Pass Motorsports Park in late March, successfully completing her planned 330-foot shutoff runs.

“My initial reaction was, ‘I know I didn’t even make a full pull and the power of these cars is absolutely incredible.’ ” she told NHRA.com. “And at that moment, right there is where I realized I want to spend this entire year taking my time because it gave me even more respect for these cars and the power that they have. I want to respect it so much and take my time with it because the horsepower and how fast it was. I’ve 100-percent fallen in love with it, and I’m ruined, and I’ll be even more ruined when I make my first full pass.”

She then had a second outing at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway in mid-April, and wasted no time at all getting her first full run out of the way, carding a very impressive 3.793 at just 279.21 mph. Subsequent runs that day ended in tire-smoke both early and late in the run that challenged her driving skills (and frightened her mother), but solidified the reasons why transitioning into a Top Fuel car is a process, not a race.

While it is speculated that Jasmine could make her Top Fuel debut in 2024 — a point she alludes to in her videos — the team has not publicly set any plan in place.