POMONA, Calif. — Clay Millican edged out Tony Stewart in an explosive Top Fuel final round on Sunday for Rick Ware Racing, winning for the first time at historic In-N-Out Burger Pomona Dragstrip at the 65th annual Lucas Oil NHRA Winternationals.
Jack Beckman (Funny Car) and Greg Anderson (Pro Stock) also won the third of 20 races during the 2025 NHRA Mission Foods Drag Racing Series season.
Millican went 4.273-seconds at 189.71 mph in his 11,000-horsepower Mighty Fire Breaker/Parts Plus dragster before a wild engine explosion at the finish line, as Stewart drove into tire smoke almost immediately in the finals. It is the eighth career victory for Millican, who defeated Shawn Reed, Jasmine Salinas and No. 1 qualifier Brittany Force to reach the final round, and first in 2025.
Millican was also dynamite on the starting line during eliminations, including a lethal .038 against Stewart, denying the racing legend his first career Top Fuel victory and moving to sixth in points.
“My crew chief (Jim Oberhofer) told me he had it loaded up and a couple things were going to happen. He said we’re going to win, we’re going to blow up and if we lose, we’re going to be a footnote in history,” Millican said. “Thank goodness we’re not a footnote in history. Tony Stewart is going to win one of these soon, but all I know is we won the Winternationals.
“But boy, that final round was forever. When you blow it up and – and we blew it up good – and you got a HANS [head restraint] device on, you’re stretching that HANS to its limits, trying to look over like, ‘Is he coming or not?’ I couldn’t get there quick enough. I promise I never let off the throttle, even though it wasn’t running no more. But I had that thing buried. I was stomping on the loud pedal harder than normal. What a day.
“Winning [the Winternationals] is one of the majors. It definitely is. We’ve won Indy and now we’ve won here, and that’s pretty dang cool. But to come out and win the way we did today, it was a total team effort. I pulled us out once, which rarely ever happens, and the team just stuck together.”
Stewart reached the final round for the third time in his career and first this season after defeating reigning world champion Antron Brown, Doug Kalitta and points leader Shawn Langdon.
Funny Car
In Funny Car, Beckman handed John Force Racing its 300th Funny Car win after he went 4.015 at 302.88 in his 11,000-horsepower PEAK Chevrolet Camaro SS to knock off Daniel Wilkerson in a historic championship round at the legendary facility – and the home track for JFR. It is the 38th career win for Beckman, who replaced Force after his crash last year and has won the last two races in Pomona.
Force also won last year’s Winternationals, making the car a remarkable 12-0 in the last three Pomona races. The weekend belonged to Beckman, who won the Mission #2Fast2Tasty Challenge for the first time with two standout runs and then made a series of passes in the 3.80s to reach Sunday’s final.
He defeated Jeff Diehl, Chad Green and Matt Hagan to reach the championship round. There wasn’t another 3.80s in the fold, but after Wilkerson had trouble at the starting line, Beckman recovered and rolled to his first victory of the season and 36th in his career. It’s also the first time he has led the points since 2020, as Beckman continues to perform at a high level since replacing Force following his crash in June.
“The car was amazing all weekend. We qualified fourth, but we got qualifying points every single round and ran 3.80s every round of eliminations until the final when the flawless part fell off a couple of hundred feet out and car shook the tires and knocked them loose,” Beckman said. “That’s where, as a driver, you’ve got to be ready to give one back to the team because they’d given me everything all weekend long.
“It felt good to be able to pedal the thing and take it down there and have the car not blow up. It’s pretty cool when they hand you a trophy, your car still intact, and get John Force Racing its 300th Funny car win.”
Wilkerson reached the final round for the second time in his career thanks to round wins against J.R. Todd, Paul Lee and Funny Car rookie Spencer Hyde.
Pro Stock
There appears to be no stopping Pro Stock’s Greg Anderson these days, especially at In-N-Out Burger Pomona Dragstrip, as the reigning world champion set the track record in the final round against KB Titan Racing teammate Dallas Glenn with a stellar run of 6.476 at 210.90 in his HendrickCars.com Chevrolet Camaro. That gives Anderson a remarkable 16 career wins in Pomona – the second-most in NHRA history – including the last two races.
He won the NHRA Finals last November against Glenn, a final-round matchup that has repeated itself the first three races of the 2025 campaign. Glenn won the first in Gainesville, but Anderson has taken the last two. While Phoenix was a wild and wacky final round, this one was much more conventional, as Anderson continued his torrid run this weekend. He was in the 6.40s throughout eliminations, including a 6.477 against Jeg Coughlin Jr. in the second round that initially broke the track record from 2014.
Anderson, the current points leader who also won the GESi Pro Stock No. 1 Qualifier Award for a second straight race, then broke it again in the championship round with a spectacular run, giving the six-time world champion his second victory this season and 108th in his marvelous career.
“We set a [track] record in the final and this is the way you want to do it,” Anderson said. “You want to go out and earn it every single run, and you want to save your best for the final round, and that’s what we did. These are proud days today, and just like three months ago here in the final round, you want to give your best shot in the final round against the toughest competition.
“I love this place. Nine times out of 10 when we come here, you get friendly conditions like this, and I was able to drive better than I normally drive as far as reaction time goes. The slight cloud cover, the cool temperatures just feel good for a driver and that just plays more into my hand. are the conditions I need. I wish we could race here every weekend.”
Glenn continued his impressive season as well, advancing to a third straight final round and 30th in his career after defeating Erica Enders, Matt Hartford and Deric Kramer.
The NHRA Mission Foods Drag Racing Series returns to action April 11-13 with the 25th annual NHRA 4-Wide Nationals at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
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