Matt Hagan left Lucas Oil Indianapolis Raceway Park without the U.S. Nationals trophy but with something more durable: the NHRA Funny Car regular season championship and the $150,000 that comes with it. The four-time world champion, driving Tony Stewart Racing’s Dodge//SRT Hellcat Funny Car, punched his ticket to the top of the Countdown to the Championship standings by defeating Ron Capps in the semifinals Monday at the 72nd annual Big Go.
Hagan and Capps entered the weekend separated by three points, which made their semifinal matchup the race within the race. Hagan posted a .040-second reaction time, Capps smoked the tires early, and the result was never in doubt. Hagan’s 4.020 run sent him to the final and secured the regular season crown on points regardless of what came next.
What came next was Jack Beckman. The John Force Racing driver had lane choice in the final, a meaningful advantage on a surface that, as Hagan acknowledged afterward, tends to punish right-lane runners late in the day. Beckman ran a 3.965 to Hagan’s 4.030 in a race that was close at the stripe but not close enough. Hagan had beaten Hunter Green and Paul Lee in the earlier rounds to reach that point, his third U.S. Nationals final-round appearance in a career that now stands at 58 wins, all of them with Dodge.
Hagan enters the six-race Countdown to the Championship as the No. 1 seed. The playoff opens September 18–20 at the inaugural Dodge NHRA Great Lakes Nationals presented by Mopar in Martin, Michigan, with final eliminations televised on Fox Sports 1 at 2 p.m. EDT Sunday.
TSR teammate Leah Pruett had the weekend’s most complete performance arc. She qualified fifth, ran a 3.713 to eliminate Gatornationals winner Josh Hart in the first round, then beat Maddi Gordon, the Summit Nationals champion and Rookie of the Year candidate, in the quarterfinals. Her semifinals draw was former world champion Shawn Langdon, who held lane choice. Pruett jumped first off the line but her dragster smoked the tires, and Langdon moved on to face Stewart in the final.
Before Monday’s eliminations, Pruett had already secured the weekend’s signature moment. On Saturday, she defeated reigning Top Fuel world champion Doug Kalitta in the Mission Foods #2Fast2Tasty qualifying race, running 3.873 at 319.98 mph against Kalitta’s 4.502. It was her first Mission win since the Bristol event in 2023. Pruett enters the Countdown third in Top Fuel points, the highest Countdown starting position of her career.
Team owner Tony Stewart drove his R+L Carriers/Elite Motorsports Top Fueler to a second consecutive U.S. Nationals Top Fuel final, beating T.J. Zizzo, Antron Brown, and Kalitta along the way. Langdon’s 3.804 was too quick for Stewart’s 3.904 in the final, but Stewart moves to fourth in Top Fuel points heading into the Countdown.
Sweden’s Ida Zetterström returned to Top Fuel competition in her Bandero Tequila/Dodge Europe dragster, qualifying seventh in the 16-car field before losing traction against Brown in the first round. Two-time defending Factory Stock Showdown champion Mark Pawuk advanced to the quarterfinals at Indianapolis in the 25-car field, the largest Factory Stock Showdown lineup of the 2026 national tour season.
Stephen Comella added a fifth Sox and Martin HEMI Challenge title in six years on Friday, winning when Jason Line fouled in the final. Comella’s previous titles came in 2021, 2022, 2023, and 2024, with no champion crowned in 2025.
Hagan goes into the Countdown as the favorite on paper. Whether Capps, who led the Funny Car points for most of the regular season before this weekend’s semifinal loss, can close the gap across six races is the question that will define the 2026 title. Hagan has closed gaps before. He just closed one at Indianapolis.
Source: Dodge. Images courtesy of Dodge.
