| John Force | |
|---|---|
| Date of birth | May 4, 1949 |
| Place of birth | Bell Gardens, California, USA |
John Force (born May 4, 1949 in Bell Gardens, California) is an NHRA drag racer and 14-time Funny Car champion, and a 16-time championship car owner. He is one of the most dominant drag racers in the sport with 127 career victories. He graduated from Bell Gardens High School and briefly attended Cerritos Junior College to play football.
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Since 1997, Force has been a Ford driver and team owner. In his early career, he drove a corvette then in the 1980s drove an Oldsmobile Cutlass until the end of the 1993 season. He drove a Chevrolet for a brief time in 1994, quickly changed to a Pontiac in 1995 and 1996.
Since 2000, Force has been sponsored by BP, which purchased his longtime sponsor Burmah Castrol, which had sponsored him since 1986. After winning his fourth Funny Car title in 1994, Force earned the nickname of "Brute Force" from drivers, and even announcers such as Steve Evans. This nickname hearkens back to his early days on the track, when he drove his own unsponsored car, named "Brute Force". Force had a cameo in a 2004 episode of King of the Hill ("Dale Be Not Proud").
In 2005 however, John Force was defeated by a margin of 32 points by Don Schumacher Racing's Gary Scelzi, who won the NHRA 2005 Funny Car World Championship. He also came in behind Schumacher Racing's Ron Capps by 24 points.
In 2006, John Force won his 14th NHRA World Funny Car Championship, defeating Ron Capps in the quarter-finals of the Automobile Club of Southern California NHRA Finals which mathematically eliminated Ron Capps and teammate Robert Hight from the championship. Force went on to win the event, his third of the season and 122nd of his career.
2007 was a very tough, tragic season for the Force team, beginning with the death of team driver Eric Medlen, and Force's own crash in Ennis, Texas at the 2007 O'Reilly NHRA Fall Nationals. Force started the year poorly, suffering a DNQ ending a 20+ year consecutive qualifying streak. He rebounded, winning the O'Reilly NHRA Thunder Valley Nationals in Bristol, Tennessee, then proceeded on to three more final rounds, winning another race in Sonoma, California, putting him fourth in points and allowing him to make the first cut in NHRA's new point system, the Countdown to the Championship aka the "Countdown to Eight". He stumbled again in the first two races but, again, rebounded until his crash. Injuries he sustained were a broken ankle, abrasion of his right knee, a dislocated left wrist, and badly mangled fingers and toes.
Current drivers racing under him are son-in-law Robert Hight, daughter Ashley Force, and new member Mike Neff. Neff, who was the crew chief for rival driver Gary Scelzi for the 2005 season, earned his NHRA Funny Car license in October 2007 and began racing for the team on October 26, 2007 at the AC Delco Las Vegas NHRA Nationals.
On September 23, 2007, Force was injured in a crash at the O'Reilly Auto Parts Fall Nationals in Ennis, Texas as he crossed the finish line against Kenny Bernstein. Bernstein's Funny Car drifted into Force's lane, clipping the final timing cone and a foam block which shot into Force's lane. Initially, it was thought that the block ruptured Force's left rear tire, causing it to come apart, violently shaking the chassis until it broke apart. However, it was determined by NHRA after thorough review, that the block went behind Force's tire and was not the cause of the wreck.[1] Phil Burkart Jr. was added as Force's replacement for the remainder of the 2007 season, starting too at Las Vegas.
2008 was not a very good season for Force, finishing out of the top five for the first time since early in his career. However, after the death of driver Scott Kalitta, he was instrumental in the development of some of the safety precautions that were implemented throughout the rest of the season, and also, along with retired Funny Car and Top Fuel driver Kenny Bernstein, and six-time Top Fuel champion Tony Schumacher, with backing from NHRA's Track Safety Committee, assisted in developing a sensor that monitors the engines of Top Fuel dragsters and Funny Cars. Should the engine backfire at any time during a race, the fuel pump is automatically shut down, and the parachutes are deployed. The idea was to either minimize or eliminate the circumstances that led to Kalitta's death. This safety device became mandatory, and was put into place at the start of the 2009 season. Also made an optional setting for the Funny Car division, was a brake handle that, instead of needing to be pulled back, toward the driver, was set up to be pushed away from the driver. This came about because when the 2008 season began, Force's right arm was still in a cast, due to broken fingers, and he needed a different way of using the brakes on the car, rather than the traditional handbrake that needed to be brought back toward the driver; also, in the 2007 accident in Texas, Force had lost some grip in his right hand, and had some problems putting enough pressure on the handbrake to unlock it from position to apply the brakes. This led to the development of the forward application handbrake, which has given several drivers in the Funny Car class quicker access to the brakes. Though Force only finished seventh in the points in 2008, he became a visionary within the NHRA for innovations in driver safety.
2009 once again saw Force finish outside of the top five, finishing ninth overall, however, he would win his 16th overall championship as a car owner, with teammate Robert Hight's championship, placing Force as the winningest car owner in NHRA history. Unlike the previous seasons, however, all four of the Force owned cars would finish in the top 10. The NHRA Funny Car Championship would be won by teammate Robert Hight, bringing Force's total Championships to 16, making him the winningest car owner in NHRA history.
The start of the 2010 season will see Force celebrate 25 years with the same sponsor, as well as 34 years in the NHRA. On February 14th, Force won the season open at Auto Club Raceway at Pomona in the 50th Winternationals in Caliornia defeating Ron Capps. He also made the final round of the NHRA Arizona Nationals.
Won As A Driver/Owner
Won As An Owner
1990 NHRA Funny Car Champion
1991 NHRA Funny Car Champion
1993 NHRA Funny Car Champion
1994 NHRA Funny Car Champion
1995 NHRA Funny Car Champion
1996 NHRA Funny Car Champion
1997 NHRA Funny Car Champion
1998 NHRA Funny Car Champion
1999 NHRA Funny Car Champion
2000 NHRA Funny Car Champion
2001 NHRA Funny Car Champion
2002 NHRA Funny Car Champion
2003 NHRA Champion Owner (Tony Pedregon, Funny Car)
2004 NHRA Funny Car Champion
2006 NHRA Funny Car Champion
2009 NHRA Champion Owner (Robert Hight, Funny Car)
On the NHRA Top 50 Drivers, 1951–2000, John Force was ranked No. 2, behind Don Garlits.
Force has 127 Wallys in 204 Final Rounds
John Force is a 14-time NHRA champion driver, and a 16-time championship owner (championships in 2004 with Tony Pedregon, and 2009 with Robert Hight).
John Force's round wins reached 1,000 in his career and best in NHRA history at in first round of eliminations 2008 NHRA Midwest Nationals at Gateway Int'l Raceway in St. Louis, Missouri.
Force has won at least once on almost every track, with only one exception. John has yet to win a race at Summit Motorsports Park in Norwalk, Ohio.
Force made history in 2007, when he, and daughter Ashley became the first father/daughter team to compete against each other, during the first round of the NHRA Southern Nationals in Atlanta.
John is featured on A&E's reality show Driving Force with three of his daughters (Ashley, Courtney, and Brittany). And his wife.
   | Interview with John Force - John Force / Ashley Force Interviews |
| | Driving Force - Driving Force - Drag Racing TV Show |
| | John Force on IMDb - John Force (I) |
| | John Force Crash Video: Force Hospitalized After Stunning Accident - The Post Chronicle |
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