Rob Atchison - Spring Nationals

By Dennis Smith

London,ON. “Back to Back” IHRA Funny Car Champion Rob Atchison takes the Erickson Manufacturing Pontiac south to Rockingham, NC and the IHRA Spring Nationals after a record setting performance and victory at the season opening Texas Nationals.

“Last year we qualified # 1 at the Spring Nationals on Friday and then I became extremely ill on Saturday with food poisoning” stated Rob Atchison. I was so sick the IHRA Medical Team had to give me IV’s to hydrate me. I never got another lap in the car to gain any data until Sunday when I was a little better but I lost in the first round to Chris Sipple after the car went into violent tire shake on launch. Mark Thomas won the race he widened his points lead to the point where we had to play “catch up” all year. I expect there to again be a huge car count in all classes at “The Rock” because Rockingham is a great facility. With the new track surface they have I can see Funny Car qualifying extremely tight for the new eight car field format.

We had a lot of help from a lot of Funny Car teams including runner-up Terry McMillen and his crew at Texas just so we could make the final. In the heat of the moment I might not been able to individually to thank them all but they all know that I appreciated their help and support. In some types of racing this support would be unheard of, but not in the IHRA Funny Car class. We are a very close knit bunch who race and battle hard on the track but we have a lot of fun in the pits and are always there to support each other when the need arises.