ASHLEY FORCE HOOD
New Name, New Focus for Second Generation Pro

Ashley Force Hood is determined this year to prove that it’s her game and not just her name that has placed her on the precipice of becoming the first woman ever to reign as NHRA Funny Car champion.

Married in the off-season to Daniel Hood, the 26-year-old daughter of drag racing icon John Force has high expectations for her third season at the controls of one of the world’s most powerful and challenging race cars, one capable of zero-to-100 mile per our acceleration in less than one second.

Coming off a 2008 season in which she was one of only four drivers to lead the Funny Car points, Ashley and her 300 mile-an-hour Castrol GTX Ford Mustang are expected to contend for the Full Throttle championship in a Funny Car division that just three years ago was considered too physically challenging for a woman.

Ashley demonstrated otherwise in her very first season.  After an apprenticeship in the sportsman division (where she won five times in veteran owner Jerry Darien’s Top Alcohol Dragster), she demonstrated in 2007, after moving up in classification, that she inherited much more from her famous father than just his broad smile.

After claiming the Automobile Club of Southern California’s 2007 Road to the Future Award (as the NHRA Rookie-of-the-Year), the graduate of Cal State-Fullerton substantially elevated her game last year.

Not only did she become the first woman to win an NHRA Funny Car race, she also became the first to lead the Funny Car points, the first to make the NHRA Funny Car playoffs and the first, not only to qualify for the U.S. Smokeless Funny Car bonus race, but the first to earn the No. 1 starting spot.

The upshot is that in less than three years, the former high school cheerleader
has transformed her considerable promise into bankable performance.

The first woman to reach a Funny Car final when she finished 10th in points as a
rookie, she was sixth last year ahead of both her dad and teammate Mike Neff, who became the third John Force Racing driver in four years to earn the Auto Club’s rookie award.  

While her season highlight was a final round win over her dad at the Summit Southern Nationals at Atlanta, Ga., she advanced to the money round on three other occasions, started three times from the No. 1 qualifying position and really turned heads with a 310.05 mile-an-hour charge to 1,000 feet last fall at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, fastest speed of the season.

  Furthermore, her Castrol GTX team, headed by third year crew chief Dean “Guido” Antonelli and veteran tuner Ron Douglas, underscored her rising star status by winning the 2008 Full Throttle Pit Crew Challenge, a season-long competition recognizing qualifying consistency.

Because of her success in such a competitive environment, last October she accepted the Female Athlete of the Year Award from the Jim Murray Memorial Foundation.

One of the stars of the A&E Network series Driving Force, which ended a two-year run in 2007, Ashley continued last year to pile up credits off the track as well as on it.  After appearing the previous year on NBC-TV’s The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and on ABC-TV’s Good Morning, America, she was featured last fall in an episode of Designing Spaces. 

While she continues to serve as a spokesperson for BrandSource, continues to star in regional television ads for the Auto Club (one with her father, another with brother-in-law Robert Hight) and continues to appear in Ford Motor Company’s brochure for the Mustang, Ashley’s likeness – and that of her Castrol GTX race car – also now appears on packaging for the 42, 46 and 52-inch high definition Sanyo televisions sold in Wal-mart stores.

 The second oldest of Force’s four daughters will venture into yet another medium this season with the launch of an interactive children’s book she authored which focuses on a day at the drag races.

That’s all pretty heady stuff for an admitted tomboy who once seriously
considered a career as a crew member, which was the basis for her decision to take elective courses in auto shop and welding while attending Esperanza High School (Yorba Linda, Calif.), where she also was a varsity cheerleader.

Ashley’s “need for speed” is all in the genes.  In addition to her father, the 14-time NHRA Funny Car Champion, her mother, Laurie, is licensed to driver a Super Comp dragster and her younger sisters, Brittany, 22, and Courtney, 21, both compete in the Top Alcohol Dragster division.  Another Force daughter, Adria, who is married to Hight, is the chief financial officer for John Force Racing, Inc.

Despite her success, Ashley never seriously considered a driving career until her father sent her to Frank Hawley’s Drag Racing School as a 16th birthday present. 

Even though she began racing out of high school, her mother insisted that before she embarked on a full-time career, she had to earn her college degree.  As a result, she spent her weekends racing and her weekdays in school, ultimately graduating from Cal State-Fullerton in 3½ years with a degree in communications.

Her father could not be more proud, nor more surprised, by her career choice.

“I’m a typical father who always wanted his son to grow up and drive his race car,” said the 14-time Auto Racing All-America selection, “but I don’t have any sons, so I always hoped one of my girls would have an interest – but I didn’t expect it.”

Although she has been thrust into the spotlight, Ashley admits that she is not like her father in one very important way.

“I’m basically a shy person,” she said.  “I’m not comfortable in front of big crowds like dad.  It doesn’t come natural for me.  In school, I was the only cheerleader who never led a cheer and the only person in choir (who never performed a solo).  The driving part was easy.  The other has been harder for me.”  

As for hobbies, Ashley admits she’s a movie fanatic, just like her dad.  However, she has taken her love for the cinema a step further.  She not only likes to watch movies with her husband, Daniel, she also has demonstrated a talent for producing them.  Each year at the company Christmas party, she has introduced a new film that spoofs events and individuals in the sport, herself included.

Now, though, she finds she spends a lot more time in front of the camera than behind it, a role that’s certain to expand the closer she gets to the championship. 

-www.johnforceracing.com-