BOBBY BODE TALKS BRISTOL WEEKEND, NORWALK

This certainly has been a positive season for nitro Funny Car driver Bobby Bode – especially in qualifying.

Bode, who runs a limited schedule for the team owned by his father and driver Bob Bode, claimed qualifying spots of 12th and ninth in Phoenix and Las Vegas, then was 10th in Chicago.

Unfortunately, the younger Bode couldn’t translate those qualifying positions into round wins.

That was until and adventurous Sunday at the Thunder Valley Nationals in Bristol, Tenn., last weekend.

Bode qualified No. 13 with a 4.094-second elapsed time and had to face Bob Tasca in round one. The same Tasca, who won the rained delayed New England Nationals, which were completed in Bristol on Saturday. Tasca also won the Mission #2FAST2TASTY race on Saturday by upending John Force

“I didn’t really think we had a chance against (Tasca),” said Bode, 21. “He won the day before and he has been really good lately. He was probably the hottest car out there and we took him down.”

Bode won a pedalfest, clocking a 4.603-second ET at 242.93 mph to edge Tasca’s 4.767-second lap at 209.33 mph.

“I just pedaled it, and my win light came on which was pretty cool,” Bode said.

That set the stage for Bode’s second-round match-up with Alexis DeJoria, which was a wild ride for Bode in the left lane.

“The car left good and then it dropped a cylinder on the left side,” Bode said. “When it did that, it started pulling me over there and then I brought it back. It started spinning the tire on the left side, which started pulling me more. I still didn’t see her in front of me, so I stayed with it. The finish line wasn’t that far out of sight, and I thought maybe I could get there, and it kept pulling me and I hit the wall.

“I felt the impact of the wall. At first, I didn’t really think it was that hard. Once the car slowed down, I felt like I just hit the wall and maybe it was harder than I thought. I got out of the car when it stopped and I saw the swipe on the side of it and I was like ‘Darn it, I got it pretty good.’”

DeJoria took the win with a 4.154-seconds time at 296.31 mph.

 

Bode said he did bruise his left shoulder in the accident, but nothing serious.

Although Bode was happy with the victory over Tasca, he acknowledged his team has been bitten by some uncommon malfunctions this season that have stopped him from winning more rounds.

“We have qualified pretty good at most places, and we should have way more round wins,” he said. “The two races before Bristol, not like super rare breakages, but stuff that never should break has broken on us. In Vegas, one of the ports in the head, the ball that lets fuel come on by was stuck so only one of the sides in the number four cylinder was only getting half the fuel it needed and it burned a piston right when I hit the gas. In (Chicago), we kicked the rods out on the burn out. That is just not supposed to happen. Those were two rough stretches, and we got the win in Bristol, which was nice.”

Bode believes his team is ready to turn the corner, starting when he competes at the Summit Racing Equipment NHRA nationals June 22-25 in Norwalk, Ohio.

“We have been doing pretty good all year long, it is just if we can minimize those mistakes, part breakages, and we can have some luck fall our way,” Bode said. “Things are pretty unpredictable so anything can happen in racing. I’m looking forward to the rest of the year and hopefully something exciting will happen.”

Bode, who is scheduled to graduate from Arizona State University in Tempe in the spring of 2024 with a degree in business marketing, is especially looking forward to Norwalk and not just racing.

“My favorite part is the ice cream,” Bode said. “I’m actually doing the ice cream eating contest for NHRA again. You have a minute to see how much you can eat of the pound of ice cream they give you. I won last year. I’m the reigning champ and I really wanted to do it again. You get to choose the ice cream you want to eat. Last year I did mint chocolate chip, but I might have to switch it up this year. I ate about a half a pound last year and I had to slow down because I was getting a brain freeze and my teeth were going numb.  Last year, I went up against Dallas Glenn, Angie Smith, and Mike Salinas. It was pretty cool to win. They had all these people watching and it was a neat deal. This year I might have to go to vanilla.”