Funny Car driver DeJoria returns 'home' for NHRA New England Nationals
EPPING – Funny Car pilot Alexis DeJoria is hoping for a little home cooking as the Rhode Island native heads to New England Dragway this weekend to compete in the NHRA New England Nationals.
The track that DeJoria considers one of her home tracks (she also has family on the West Coast) has not always treated her well, but now is as good a time as any for her luck to change.
“We treasure this race,” said DeJoria, who spent the majority of her childhood in the Narragansett, R.I. area. “This is really our only East Coast race that is left on the schedule. It's usually the only race that my East Coast family can get to, so this one really means a lot to me.”
Professional qualifying for the New England Nationals will kick off Friday at 6 p.m., but the midway will open at 11:30 on Friday morning. Sportsman qualifying will start at 9:15 a.m. The three professional categories will have one round of qualifying on Friday night.
Teams will be back at it again on Saturday, with two rounds of qualifying for the professional categories, starting at 1 and 4 p.m., respectively. Sportsman racing will start Saturday at 9:15 a.m.
The big race day for the professional categories will be Sunday, with events kicking off at 9 a.m., and elimination rounds starting at 11.
DeJoria returns to Epping along with the rest of the professional drivers and crew members of the NHRA Camping World Drag Racing Series. DeJoria and her competitors in the Funny Car category will be joined by Top Fuel and Pro Stock professional categories, as well as hundreds of other competitors in sportsman categories throughout the weekend.
DeJoria has never advanced past the semifinals at New England Dragway, and although the 2022 season hasn’t started like she hoped for after a strong finish to last season, she sees this race as a golden opportunity to turn her luck around on both fronts.
“Of course we want to go rounds and win races, but the key is to be at our best at the end of the season when it matters most," DeJoria said. "To get there though, we have to start building on some successes, and hopefully this weekend we can start to turn things around.”
After taking a couple years off from the sport, DeJoria returned as owner of her own team in 2020. She reconnected with former crew chief and teammate Del Worsham, who has worked closely with DeJoria and Nicky Boninfante to build the new team and racing program. Their efforts were rewarded in 2021 with a career-high sixth-place finish in the Funny Car standings, which raised expectations for this season.
“I know we have a car that can win,” she said. “We’ve got a great team and a great car. It’s just a matter of the planets aligning.”
Should the planets align in Epping this weekend, DeJoria said it would be a huge moment, not just professionally, but personally, as her 95-year old grandmother will be at the race.
“That would be incredible,” she said. “I have never won there, and I have never won a race when my grandmother was at the track. I have won with my mother at the track, and with my father at the track, but never with my grandmother there.
“I tend to do better when I have family there," she continued. "Any time you have family with you to support you in something like this, it makes it that much better. It pushes me to do everything better. I don’t just want to win for me. I want to win for them too.”
This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: Funny Car driver Alexis DeJoria returns home for NHRA New England Nationals
