42nd annual Lucas Oil NHRA Nationals - Brainered, MN

This week the NHRA travelling acceleration show moves to the north central part of the country, to Brainerd International Raceway for the penultimate event of the 2024 Mission Foods NHRA Drag Racing Series "regular" season. It will be a full show in almost every NHRA national event category, with three of the four PRO classes running, both Top Alcohol classes, nine sportsman categories, and the Mountain Motor Pro Stock class. In the professional categories the fight to gain a berth in the Countdown to the Championship is getting down to the wire, with just the Toyota NHRA U.S. Nationals remaining on the schedule before the six-race countdown, or "playoff" season commences.

In the Lucas Oil Drag Racing Series, the battle for national championships in the Top Alcohol categories are growing intense, clearly evidenced by the number of contenders entered for the Brainerd event. Eight of the Top Ten in Funny Car, and seven of the Top Ten in Alcohol Dragster will be fighting it out for the points lead. With six national, and seven regional events remaining on the schedule after Brainerd, the chances to make up ground on the leaders will become fewer as each week passes until the season ending In-N-Out Burger NHRA Finals wraps it all up in mid-November.

The 35th annual NHRA Northwest Nationals

We're still working on our much-delayed coverage of the Northwest Nationals, but we've made a little bit of progress today by posting some Top Sportsman action from Saturday. You can check it out at NHRA Northwest Nationals. Tomorrow we will continue working on the Seattle report, and fill in more of the details from last week's Funny Car Chaos event at Albuquerque.