For Austin Prock, there is only one acceptable ending to the NHRA Funny Car season – winning the championship trophy.
“If they hadn’t reset the points, we’d have it pretty much secured by now,” Prock told RACER ahead of the NHRA Carolina Nationals at zMAX Dragway. “I think we would have had to do well, maybe one more weekend and it would be secured. We had a 348-point lead that was cut to 39 points; 348 points equals 18 rounds of competition, so yes, we want to win the championship.”
Prock raced through the Funny Car class in his John Force Racing Chevrolet Camaro. The 29-year-old quickly got used to the machine that Robert Hight had driven when he had to take a break this year for health reasons. In his debut in Gainesville, Prock made it to the final round, where he lost to JR Todd.
It took three races for Prock to get his first Wally, and since then he has had five more wins, 11 No. 1 qualifiers and a 38-9 win-loss record in 15 races.
“My dad said at the beginning of the year when they asked him about expectations, ‘I want to win the championship,'” Prock said. “I’ve never heard my dad talk like that. He’s quiet and humble and when he said that, I thought, ‘Wow, he means business.’ That definitely showed this year.”
The younger Prock is the driver, his father Jimmy Prock is the crew chief. Also on the team is Thomas Prock, Austin’s brother – the assistant crew chief. The family affair was not only one of the most talked about highlights of the drag racing season, but also means just as much to the Prock family. Being able to race together was a dream for Austin.
The dominance, however, surprised everyone. Prock had never competed in a Funny Car before this season. A win in the opening race of the Countdown at Maple Grove Raceway (September 15) increased his lead over the competition to 86 points.
“I’ve always said throughout my drag racing career, ‘It’s the same for everybody,'” Prock said of the points reset. “That’s how I’ve always viewed the countdown. I’ve always been on the outside looking in, and now that it’s happening, it’s not the same for everybody. Plain and simple, it’s just not. You lose an 18-lap lead to less than two laps.”
“We knew that everything would restart when we came in. You just have to have the same goal and the same mindset of taking it one round at a time and seeing how the cards fall.”
A championship would be Prock’s first in NHRA competition. In recent years, his focus has been on Top Fuel, but his career, while promising, has been anything but stable.
He won one race in his first season in 2019 and then raced just three between 2020 and 2021. He returned in 2022 with a two-win season and a career-best third place in the championship. Last year, Prock won his fourth career race in the Top Fuel class.
John Force Racing announced in mid-January that Prock would drive the Funny Car.
“It’s been an outstanding year,” Prock said. “I said last week that I’ve had more success in this one season than I’ve had in my entire career. This sport can be tough if you don’t do well. I like to say that drag racing is either a lot of fun or it’s not fun at all because there’s one winner and the rest are losers.”
“You just have to enjoy the moments when things are going well because then everything can change very suddenly. I’ve done a great job all season and stuck with it, and it’s been a lot of fun working with my family and everyone on the team.”
