SONOMA, CA – July 29, 2024 – (Motor Sports NewsWire) – Top Fuel’s Antron Brown defeated first-time finalist Tony Stewart in the final round of the 36th annual Denso NHRA Sonoma Nationals, picking up his third win of the 2024 season on Sunday at Sonoma Raceway.
Bob Tasca III (Funny Car), Aaron Stanfield (Pro Stock) and Matt Smith (Pro Stock Motorcycle) also won the 12th of 20 races during the 2024 NHRA Mission Foods Drag Racing Series season.
Stewart left first with a slight advantage on the starting line, but Brown quickly tracked him down, going 3.746-seconds at 329.67 mph in his 11,000-horsepower Matco Tools/Toyota dragster to earn his 77th career victory. Brown defeated Shawn Reed, Steve Torrence and Brittany Force to reach the final round, leaning on consistency time after time this weekend in Sonoma.
It paid off in a major way, as Brown, who qualified seventh, powered to his fifth Top Fuel victory at Sonoma, which ties him with Doug Kalitta for the most in class history at the facility.
“Sonoma has a special meaning to me. It’s like a piece of heaven out here and just being here puts me in the zone,” Brown said. “Me and Tony know each other well. When I started as a team owner he was putting together TSR, we talked a lot about budgets and spread sheets and all that.
“He was also a hero of mine when he ran NASCAR and IndyCar. I know how good of a driver he is. He understands the science so as soon as he showed up I knew what he could do. I did tell him to come on over but there are a lot of sharks in the water here. His time is coming and it won’t be one win. It will be a lot of them, but this is a good win for us. My team stays poised and they were incredible all weekend. I’m super-pumped for all of them. We went down the track every single lap and that was an awesome, awesome job to get a win like this.”
Stewart’s first final in Top Fuel came after defeating Shawn Langdon, Justin Ashley and Ron August Jr., who upset points leader, No. 1 qualifier and reigning world champion Doug Kalitta in the first round.
In Funny Car, nobody could track down Bob Tasca III all weekend and that continued in the final round, racing to his second Sonoma win in three years by taking down Ron Capps in the final round with a 4.088 at 277.15 in his 11,000-horsepower Motorcraft/Quick Lane Ford Mustang. It’s also the third win of the year for Tasca, who remained second points, and he did it in incredible fashion.
Tasca qualified No. 1…
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