3-time NASCAR champ earns NHRA Top Fuel win in Las Vegas: ‘It’s unreal’
Tony Stewart has won in practically all of the major auto racing series in the United States.
He’s a three-time NASCAR Cup Series champion. He has an Indy Car Series championship, two United States Auto Club championships and countless wins on go-kart tracks, short tracks and dirt tracks across the country.
Now, Stewart can say he is a winner in the highest form of drag racing.
Stewart, 53, claimed his first win in the top class of NHRA on Sunday at the NHRA 4-Wide Nationals at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, winning his Top Fuel final (3.870 seconds, 317.42 mph) over Antron Brown, Justin Ashley and Jasmine Salinas.
“It’s unreal,” Stewart said. “I haven’t been around NHRA that long, about five years and I realized it takes a lot. It takes a long time to win a race in this series. Everything in my career, I’ve never had to wait over a year to win a race. I always figured it out in my first year, but I’m just very appreciative.”
Austin Prock, the 2024 Funny Car world champion, won the Funny Car final over Paul Lee, Matt Hagan and Dave Richards with an elapsed time of 4.009 seconds at 316.01 mph. In Pro Stock, Dallas Glenn (6.649 seconds, 206.83 mph) defeated Greg Anderson, Matt Hartford and Matt Latino in the final.
‘We all needed this’
It was a perfect Sunday for Stewart, who co-owns the team he drives for, Tony Stewart Racing. He won his opening round and semifinal quadrant. His slowest run of the day came in the final, but he had just enough to hold off Brown.
Stewart has won at all the tracks on the LVMS property — the 1½-mile oval, the 3/8-mile short track, the 1/2-mile dirt track and the drag strip. Stewart won in the NHRA’s Top Alcohol class in Las Vegas in 2023.
“To sit here and do what we did two years ago and come back two years later and win in a Top Fuel car, that means a lot to me,” Stewart said. “Every car that I ever ran, it seems like the first place I won my first race at in each of those cars is my favorite track. When Vegas comes around on the schedule, I look forward to it.”
Stewart celebrated in victory lane with his wife, Leah Pruett, and son, Dominic James Stewart, who was born in November. Tony Stewart made the jump to Top Fuel in 2024 in Pruett’s car, as she decided to step out so they could start a family.
Stewart made just one final round last year, but his win Sunday put him in second place in the Top Fuel standings, 16 points behind leader Shawn Langdon.
“We all needed this,” Stewart said. “It’s been so stressful the whole year we had after Leah almost won the world championship (in 2023). People in the stands don’t realize it. They think I’m the reason the car sucks. It wasn’t that we had bad people tuning on the car. It was a different combination and there were different variables.”
Stewart got to experience another first Sunday. He celebrated his first win with both Pruett and their son present.
“When Leah brought (Dominic) on the stage when we were doing the interview, that’s an emotion that you can’t even think about or dream of,” Stewart said. “I saw her come up those steps with him and my heart stopped. As much as I love winning this race for my team and myself, seeing her bring him up there, that was a feeling I’ve never had before in my life.”
Other results
Prock’s win was his first of the year. The 29-year-old won eight times last season, his first full campaign in Funny Car, to win the title.
His most recent win before Sunday came in November at the NHRA Nationals at LVMS.
“You got to celebrate these things like you’re never going to win one again because you don’t know how long it’s going to take (to win again),” Prock said. “We battled a lot of adversity all year long and everyone just kept their heads down, stayed strong and kept picking at it.”
Glenn, 34, was already a winner in Las Vegas before Sunday. On Saturday he won the “2Fast2Tasty” NHRA challenge, a race that takes place during qualifying sessions between the previous race’s semifinalists, earning him $10,000 and three bonus points in the standings.
Maddi Gordon won the Top Alcohol Funny Car final. Gordon, 20, will drive a Top Fuel car in 2026 for Ron Capps Motorsports.
The win was Gordon’s second national series win in the Top Alcohol class. Her win last year at the NHRA Northwest Nationals in Kent, Washington, made her the 100th woman to win an NHRA event.
Contact Alex Wright at awright@reviewjournal.com. Follow @AlexWright1028 on X.
