Capps faces finale at Pomona leading Funny Car world championship

BROWNSBURG, Ind. - Heading into the 2012 season, Ron Capps addressed being labeled a "bridesmaid" for finishing runner-up three times for the coveted NHRA Funny Car world championship.

He has been the runner-up to the NHRA championship in 1998, 2000 and 2005. Seven years ago, he was so close to winning the championship he could taste it.

"There are a lot of guys who never come that close," he said.

Ron Capps

Photo by: NHRA

Capps has been close - very close - before, and no Funny Car driver ever has been as close. In 2005, he was battling former DSR teammate, Gary Scelzi, for the championship in the Pomona finale but came up eight points short in what remains the closest Funny Car battle in NHRA history.

At that edition of the NHRA Finals, Scelzi lost in first round but Capps lost in the second round to give Scelzi the championship.

"I've been through this before," Capps said. "Somebody told me, look, how many times you have had a shot at a championship. This one feels different for some reason, and that's a good thing."

Capps acknowledged that getting close isn't good enough anymore after winning the most recent Funny Car event title on Oct. 28 at Las Vegas where he beat Beckman in the final round.

"I wake up in the morning thinking about it and go to bed thinking about it," Capps said of the elusive crown. "We're close. I want to be a champion and be able to represent our sport as the champion."

Since Rahn Tobler took over Capps' NAPA AUTO PARTS Dodge Charger R/T team after it failed to qualify for the April 1 Full Throttle event at Las Vegas, the duo has dominated the category.

After starting with a 4-3 eliminations record, Tobler and Capps have gone 40-13 since for a series-best 44-16. The team also has won a series-best five event titles in the past 16 races.

Tobler regrouped after a disappointing No. 8-qualifying spot at Las Vegas two weeks ago at the most recent event to improve in each of four elimination rounds with times of 4.105 seconds, 4.095 and 4.086 before recording its best effort of the weekend to beat Beckman in the championship round with a 4.070.

That earned the NAPA AUTO PARTS team the NHRA Full Throttle Hard-Working Crew Award for overcoming subpar qualifying on the heels of a bad outing at the Oct. 8 race near Reading, Pa., where the team lost in the second round to Beckman, who left the event with the points lead after winning the event title and setting an NHRA elapsed-time record.

"I'm in a weird frame of mind right now," Capps said. "Going into Vegas, I knew what we had to do, and to come out with a win like we did was great. But I found myself with a really strange calming effect on (that) Sunday.

I think it had a lot to do with Rahn Tobler and my team because we found our car again and were back to what we did earlier in the season, all those final rounds and just the confidence that was built. That helped me as a driver.

"I really found myself in a good place on Sunday driving the car.

It was kind of strange because I'm always talking about how a lot of drivers kind of hide the nervousness that we get, and I've been pretty vocal and not afraid to say, look, I was throwing up this morning before first round or whatever it took, and I've always done my job in the cars even though I either had anxiety or was nervous."

Now it's on to Pomona. "It's basically coming down to (qualifying) Thursday, Friday and Saturday trying to gain more bonus points than Jack; four more, at least, so that we can go into Sunday (eliminations) either tied or ahead of him.

You have to do that because if we happen to go out the same round, that's going to mean the world championship.

That's going to be crucial. "Qualifying is going to be as big as the race (at Pomona) probably."

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