Ashley Force Hood Blog
Week of May 18

This past week we raced in Bristol, TN which is one of the most beautiful tracks on the NHRA Full Throttle circuit. The track is tucked away in a valley surrounded by beautiful trees out in the country and it’s amazing how the sound of the race cars echo through the hills. Even our warm ups sound different! The forecast for the weeks leading up to the event was calling for rain however we were very fortunate all 3 days and had no rain problems or delays.

Our Castrol GTX Mustang qualified at the top of the pack in the #1 spot so we were very excited going into race day because we knew we had a competitive car in both the hot weather and cooler temperatures. Though it was hot both Friday and Saturday, on Sunday morning it was very cloudy and cool and great conditions for racing. The track was very tricky all weekend long with the lanes taking turns as far as which one was better. We had a great weekend, going all the way to the semi finals. We lost in a very close side by side race against Tony Pedregon in the 3rd round. We were able to gain some points with our qualifying and with going rounds Sunday, so we left Bristol still #4 in the points. If we can keep this up through the handful of races we have coming up we’ll be looking good once the Countdown starts up at the end of the summer. The greatest advantage we have is that my crew chiefs Guido and Ron have been able to tune this car in both hot and cool conditions. Summer is just around the corner with many hot and humid races like Englishtown and Chicago but also a chance of cooler ones as well like Topeka, Denver and Seattle later on.

As we all know, you can’t control the weather so we will just have to be prepared for both. My team and I will continue to try to stay focused and consistent. And of course continue to have a whole lot of fun in the process!