Putting the Capps on a Fine Season
Ron Capps reflects on season past
By Anne Proffit; Photos by Roger Richards

If you just can't get enough of Ron Capps, we have an in-depth interview that can be accessed at Ron Capps Chat Session

Who would have taken bets on Ron Capps to be part of an airtight, classic battle for the 2005 NHRA POWERade Funny Car championship?

After all, the Carlsbad, California veteran had just changed wagons after eight years working with Don “Snake” Prudhomme and was joining a burgeoning Don Schumacher Racing, which already had Gary Scelzi and Whit Bazemore along for the Funny Car ride.

Capps, who looked like the odd man out after not even making a single run in the damp season starter in Pomona, came on strong toward the middle and second half of the 23-race campaign, emerging just eight points shy of eventual champion Scelzi and vanquishing 13-time champ John Force by 24.

It was the 40-year-old's third stint as Funny Car runner-up, this time driving the Don Schumacher Racing Brut Dodge Stratus R/T. His fate was secured as Capps was eliminated in the second round at the Pomona closer. His two competitors, too, went out in round two[SW: Round 2] so the title chase had this order: Scelzi, Capps, Force.

Capps is still devastated to have missed the title, especially by such a small margin. “It was heartbreaking and I’m still not over it.” Capps said.

On the other hand, beating the king of Funny Car, the incomparable Force and coming oh, so close to Scelzi had to be fairly heady for the Californian.

After all, the smart money was on Force, as usual, but even with a late-season surge, drag racing’s dominant driver couldn’t best the 11-year professional drag racer.

“I think next year will be an even tougher fight with John, who lost some of his focus last year," Capps said.

Perhaps he spread himself too thin?

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“There was stuff going on that Force had to deal with but he put it all aside and got to work in the later races. He was very tough,” Capps continued.

When the 2005 campaign began, Ron Capps had a new team, new car and sponsor to learn and he had to do it fast and quick. The only familiar piece of the puzzle was tuner Ed “Ace” McCulloch, with whom Capps had worked at Snake’s from early 1999 to the Sonoma race in mid-2003.

That familiarity definitely lessened the pain of the switch, and Schumacher assigned Dan Olson as co-crew chief to give the duo insight into the DSR way of doing things. “Dan’s been a floater on all the teams but he seemed to spend a lot more time in our truck,” Capps reminisced on the season.

Even before the team’s formation was announced January 27th they were off and testing at Las Vegas, then moved to Phoenix for more runs. Capps admitted to butterflies in his stomach again. Had it been time for a change?

“I wouldn’t say I was getting stale but maybe. I look at guys who switch teams and it’s kind of like changing quarterbacks in the middle of a big game. The whole thing got to be personal with Snake. We weren’t on the same page anymore and we didn’t want to ruin our [long-time] friendship.”

Starting a new team, under the same roof as guys such as Tony Schumacher, Alan Johnson, Scelzi and his tuner Mike Neff, Bazemore with Lee Beard, bikes for the Double As, Antron and Angelle and the Pro Stock tandem brought Capps’ adrenaline level up a notch. “I hated them both!” he said of Scelzi and Bazemore, not laughing a bit.

Scelzi and Capps have been buddies for quite a while, sharing the love of racing midget and sprint cars, something they both intend to pursue in the coming year. The outspoken Bazemore took some getting used to for quiet Capps. “Whit speaks his mind and there’s times when I just ask myself, ‘What was he thinking?’ with some remarks. But the fact is, he’s good for the sport.”

Capps was ready for the season to start in February but “even I didn’t think we were going to have the results with a brand new team, new car, brand new sponsor in Brut, brand new everything. I figured top five would have been good and I’m sure everybody else was thinking that for our first year.”

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The Winternationals didn’t give Capps much hope after a split oil tank deprived him of a single pass at Pomona and his former teammate Tommy Johnson Jr. won the race. “It’s ironic how things turned out but it sure was a strange way to start the year,” Capps said

Capps’ next race turned out a bunch better, as he made the finals yet bowed to Force. A good seventh qualifying spot gave Capps and McCulloch lane advantage through much of eliminations. Was this new team for real, many wondered?

It was apparent Ace and Capps hadn’t lost the good working relationship they’d had over four and a half seasons; McCulloch tuned Ron to his second runner-up slot to Force back in 2000 (the first was in 1998). “We jelled pretty quickly and went into our mode. Ed was a bit conservative on the qualifying setups at the start of the season. We had a round-table later in the year and decided we needed to step it up.”

Qualifying was the Brut Funny Car team’s Achilles heel for much of 2005 and the resultant lack of lane choice from being on the back half of the grid likely kept them from the No. 1 spot at the close of 23 races.

Despite his qualifying problems, after round 5 in Las Vegas, Capps was never out of the top 10 in points. It wasn’t until much later that the team put its collective heads together on the qualifying dilemma.

“We did a gut check on the variables of qualifying and realized we were a bit on the cautious side. It wasn’t until near the end of the year that we started looking at what [rookie] Robert Hight was doing. He was on fire in qualifying,” Capps said. “and kept piling up the points.

“We had a talk, Ace and I and decided we didn’t like qualifying midfield. Those results likely cost us the championship,” Capps said. The most gratifying part of the 2005 year, Capps said were his qualifying results in the second Las Vegas and Chicagoland races, where he held eighth (Joliet) place and second (Vegas), went to the final round in both races and came up with the victory in Las Vegas, setting up a three-way, last-race battle.

Capps said he started to believe he’d made the right choice in leaving Snake’s lair for the DSR camp as the meat of the season commenced.

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The first string of three straight contests that began in Commerce, GA, had everybody on the POWERade tour trying to keep it together. But for Capps’ squad, that dilemma became even more problematic in Englishtown, New Jersey, when Ed McCulloch's undisclosed illness caused him to miss several rounds.

Ace went into the hospital to combat cancer, leaving the Brut team missing its core. Todd Okuhara took over as crew chief in E-town, and at Gateway the next race, in Madison, Ill. Capps was the winner over Scelzi in the finals.

It was a relief to win his first race for Schumacher. It was a gift to his bedridden crew chief, who returned for the next round at Denver, with Ronnie Thompson backing up the veteran tuner.

“That was really the low point of our season, losing Ace for a couple of races and having him return weak but determined to get back to work.”

Another tough nut for Capps and his DSR squad came in Reading, where they were erroneously cited for oiling down the track and lost the night run, which could have placed them better than ninth in the gang of 16.

McCulloch should have his rounds of chemotherapy completed before the first test in January at Las Vegas and both he and Capps are steeling themselves for another new battle in 2006. “I think you’ll see a different look on his face in 2006,” Capps said.

This time the scenery at DSR won’t be terribly unfamiliar, as it was last year, but there’s always a new challenge. This time it's being patient with a new 2006 Dodge Charger.

“The new body is pretty cool. I’ve already had a chance to drive it and I think the fans will like it because it looks a lot like the Dodge Charger they see on the street. There’s a lot of loyal people out there and they like to see race cars that are recognizable to them.”

Other than that, Capps said he expects the status quo for 2006. “We built some good momentum to the end of last season and intend to carry that forward.” To prepare, he’s spending some quality time with wife Shelley and the kids, future racing stars Taylor, nine and Caden, four.

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Daughter Taylor has dabbled in Junior Dragsters and she might continue with it in 2006. Who can predict the actions of a nine-year-old girl? Caden loves watching old drag-racing movie clips from the 1960s and ‘70s when the professional sport was still in its technical infancy. Capps relishes sharing that special time with his son.

There’s a lot of working out to do, keeping Capps’ mind and body in shape for another long haul on the NHRA POWERade Funny Car trail and three Nostalgia drag racing events with the Good Guys on tap.

Capps is also hoping to get another crack at the International Race of Champions (IROC), but that is dependent on scheduling from IROC competition director Jay Signore. He also intends to work it out with midget and sprint cars on invitation from NASCAR champ Tony Stewart.

Capps seems to have it all together, having amassed three wins in seven final-round appearances, nabbed the No. 1 qualifier nod a single time, making it to the semis five times and taking a career-best 4.694-second E.T. in Dallas and top speed of 329.02 mph during the fall race at Joliet's Route 66 Raceway.

But all of those achievements still can’t beat an NHRA POWERade Funny Car title. That's the one item missing from Capps’ list of accomplishments. He won’t rest – and won’t quit – until he gets it.  

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