Shawn Langdon was the No. 3 qualifier at the Super Grip NHRA Thunder Valley Nationals. His best qualifying effort came in the opening round Friday afternoon when the Kalitta Air Careers dragster reached the finish line in 3.800 seconds at 328.54 mph.
Langdon defeated Cody Krohn and Josh Hart before facing Justin Ashley in the semifinals. Lane choice was pivotal at Thunder Valley today, and Langdon did not have it in the semifinals. Ashley took advantage of the better lane and ended Langdon’s day after the Kalitta Air Careers dragster smoked the tires early in the run.
When Langdon advanced to the semifinals, he earned a spot in the Mission #2Fast2Tasty NHRA Challenge later this month at Virginia Motorsports Park. During Saturday’s qualifying sessions, the drivers who reached the semifinals at Thunder Valley will re-run the semifinals and final earning additional purse and championship bonus points.
Langdon leaves Bristol in second place in the NHRA Top Fuel point standings. He trails points leader Tony Stewart by 76 points and leads third-place Antron Brown by 66 points.
“We had some really tricky track conditions this weekend, and lane choice was really important,” Langdon said. “We got Kalitta Air, PJH and SealMaster to the semifinals so that was a good showing for us for kind of where we are on everything right now. We’ll just go to the next race in a couple weeks and keep on working at it at Richmond.”
J.R. Todd was the No. 6 qualifier at the Super Grip NHRA Thunder Valley Nationals. His best qualifying attempt came during the first qualifying session Saturday afternoon, which was also the first round of the Mission Foods #2Fast2Tasty NHRA Challenge. Todd’s 3987-second pass at 327.03 mph made him the No. 6 qualifier and put him in the Mission Foods Challenge final round where he defeated Jack Beckman to win his first Mission Foods Challenge of the season.
Todd defeated Spencer Hyde in the first round. The pair before Todd and Ron Capps’ second round matchup had problems leading to a delay of more than 30 minutes. When the track was clear, Capps got the win 4.111 to Todd’s losing 4.324-second effort. It was an extremely close race until Todd’s DHL GR Supra began spinning the tires when approaching the finish line.
Todd leaves Bristol in sixth place in the NHRA Funny Car point standings. He trails fifth-place Matt Hagan by 66 points and leads seventh-place Dan Wilkerson by 27 points.
“The DHL GR Supra is going down the track which is good, but the way things were lined up today, it could have been another good points day for sure,” Todd said. “It was just really tricky track conditions here all weekend and especially on race day. You definitely hate sitting around that long and waiting (for track cleanup), especially when you’re all worked up and ready to go, but the other guy’s in the same boat. You’re ready to run, and your brain is set; then you have to sit. We definitely had some positives for DHL, PJH, SealMaster and Revchem this weekend, but we know we still have work to do.”
Doug Kalitta was the No. 9 qualifier at the Super Grip NHRA Thunder Valley Nationals. Kalitta’s best qualifying attempt happened Friday afternoon in the opening round of qualifying when Kalitta made a 3.900-second pass at 289.01 mph.
Kalitta raced Josh Hart in the first round of eliminations. Unfortunately, the Aflac Top Fuel dragster smoked the tires at the same point as most Top Fuel cars running in the right lane, and Kalitta was eliminated.
Kalitta leaves Bristol in fifth place in the NHRA Top Fuel point standings. He trails fourth-place Justin Ashley by five points and leads sixth-place Brittany Force by 43 points.
“It was one of those deals; that right lane’s been tough, but even in qualifying and the Mission Foods Challenge, our Aflac Toyota team ended up in that right lane pretty much through qualifying,” Kalitta said. “We just never got a good, solid run in, unfortunately. We were second pair out today; it was a struggle, and unfortunately, we smoked the tires. I kind of pedaled the thing and got close, but we were a few car lengths behind. It’s unfortunate with all the guys from Aflac, Alpine Benefits group and Mac Tools here this weekend; we really wanted to get them a win. All my guys worked their tails off this week like they always do; they make it hard to have a bad day out here.”
Team Kalitta will be back in action June 21-22, 2025, at the American Rebel Light Virginia NHRA Nationals near Richmond, VA. For additional information, please visit www.nhra.com. For additional information on Kalitta Motorsports, please visit www.teamkalitta.com.
This story was originally published on June 9, 2025. 
