After an early exit at the NHRA Arizona Nationals one week prior, Top Fuel racer Shawn Reed was looking to the NHRA Winternationals to be a rebound race that would put his Reed Trucking & Excavating team solidly back into the top 10 on the NHRA Mission Foods Drag Racing Series leaderboard. Unfortunately, Reed saw his hopes for a second 2025 trophy go up in smoke during the first round of eliminations on Sunday morning at In-N-Out Burger Pomona Dragstrip.
Reed opened the weekend with a tire-smoking run but quickly bounced back during Friday’s second qualifying session, powering his 11,000-horsepower machine to the finish line in 3.698 seconds at 331.36 mph to move up from 13th to eighth in the qualifying order. Like many nitro teams struggling to adapt to the cold weather, Reed experienced a loss of traction during Q3 on Saturday, but his Rob Wendland-guided team closed out the weekend’s qualifying rounds with another solid pass, this time posting a 3.724 E.T. at 333.91 mph.
Starting from the No. 10 spot and with new partner ATRO Parts on board for the second event, Reed lined up opposite Clay Millican in the first round of eliminations on Sunday. His race day was short lived, however, as his machine lost traction as soon as Reed stood on the throttle while Millican posted a 3.874 to advance.
“It’s disappointing but we’re only three races in,” said Reed, who kicked off his 2025 campaign with a win at the PRO Superstar Shootout pre-season event last month. “There are a lot of races left. We’ve definitely got a gremlin going on in the clutch. It comes and goes. The crew is out there right now trying to figure it out and we won’t leave here until we do. Then it’s on to Vegas we go. We’ve got bigger and better things ahead of us. We have too good of a car to let this get us down.”
Shawn Reed Racing’s Reed Trucking & Excavating team competes next at the NHRA Four-Wide Nationals in Las Vegas, April 11 – 13, where Reed will look to close out the final leg of the early-season West Coast swing on a strong note.
This story was originally published on March 31, 2025. 
