(JM Photos) • Clay Millican, winning for the first time at historic In-N-Out Burger Pomona Dragstrip at the 65th annual NHRA Winternationals edged out Tony Stewart in an explosive Top Fuel final round..
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 ran an off-pace 4.273-seconds at 189.71 mph in his 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.
“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.”
Tony Stewart, in his Rinnai Top Fuel Dragster, 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.
In Funny Car, Beckman handed John Force Racing its 300th Funny Car win after he went 4.015 at 302.88 in his PEAK Chevrolet Camaro SS to knock off Daniel Wilkerson (above) at In-N-Out Burger Pomona Dragstrip, the home track for JFR. It is Beckman’s 38th career win, who replaced Force after his crash last year. John 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.
Fast Jack 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.
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.
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. Anderson, the current points leader who also won the 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.
In Extreme Steel Legends Funny Car 8-car field, Hawaiian Derrick Moreira defeated Shane Westerfield on a 0.014 holeshot. Moreira ran a 4.774 to Westerfield’s 4.700 in the Legends Funny Car final
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.
***
POMONA, Calif. — Final finish order (1-16) at the 65th annual Lucas Oil NHRA Winternationals at In-N-Out Pomona Dragstrip. The race is the third of 20 events in the NHRA Mission Foods Drag Racing Series.
TOP FUEL:
1. Clay Millican; 2. Tony Stewart; 3. Brittany Force; 4. Shawn Langdon; 5. Jasmine Salinas; 6. Doug Kalitta; 7. Josh Hart; 8. Ida Zetterstrom; 9. Scott Palmer; 10. Steven Chrisman; 11. Justin Ashley; 12. Shawn Reed; 13. Antron Brown; 14. Steve Torrence.
FUNNY CAR:
1. Jack Beckman; 2. Daniel Wilkerson; 3. Matt Hagan; 4. Spencer Hyde; 5. Chad Green; 6. Blake Alexander; 7. Cruz Pedregon; 8. Paul Lee; 9. Bobby Bode; 10. Jeff Diehl; 11. Austin Prock; 12. J.R. Todd; 13. Ron Capps; 14. Dave Richards; 15. Alexis DeJoria; 16. Steven Densham.
PRO STOCK:
1. Greg Anderson; 2. Dallas Glenn; 3. Cory Reed; 4. Deric Kramer; 5. Matt Hartford; 6. Jeg Coughlin; 7. Matt Latino; 8. Brandon Foster; 9. Eric Latino; 10. Greg Stanfield; 11. Troy Coughlin Jr.; 12. Stephen Bell; 13. Erica Enders; 14. Aaron Stanfield; 15. Mason McGaha; 16. Cody Coughlin.
Check out our First Gallery from the 65th Winternationals at In-N-Out Burger Pomona Dragstrip