Erica Enders-Stevens had a point.

And the new, history-making NHRA Pro Stock champion is correct.

"There’s no way to write 'how' on the scorecard. We got it done. That’s all that mattered," the Royal Purple / Elite Motorsports Camaro driver said after winning her dual battle with Jason Line at the Auto Club Raceway at Pomona, Calif., and becoming the first female Pro Stock series champion.

Enders-Stevens plowed through an obstacle course in the final day of the season, playing tug-o-war with Jason Line for the points lead during eliminations. She began race day with a 19-point advantage over Line and had to regain it three times before their high-strung showdown in the final round. Both red-lighted. But two-time champion Line did it first, lurching over the starting line .011 of a second too early. Enders-Stevens followed, .002 of second before she should have.

Erica Enders-Stevens had a point.

And the new, history-making NHRA Pro Stock champion is correct.

"There’s no way to write 'how' on the scorecard. We got it done. That’s all that mattered," the Royal Purple / Elite Motorsports Camaro driver said after winning her dual battle with Jason Line at the Auto Club Raceway at Pomona, Calif., and becoming the first female Pro Stock series champion.

Enders-Stevens plowed through an obstacle course in the final day of the season, playing tug-o-war with Jason Line for the points lead during eliminations. She began race day with a 19-point advantage over Line and had to regain it three times before their high-strung showdown in the final round. Both red-lighted. But two-time champion Line did it first, lurching over the starting line .011 of a second too early. Enders-Stevens followed, .002 of second before she should have.

Thanks to the NHRA's so called "first-is-worse" rule, Enders-Stevens received the $250,000 check at the awards ceremony on behalf of team owner Richard Freeman, crew chiefs Rick and Rickie Jones, the racetrack crew, and the wizards in the shop south of Norman, Okla.

She said when she saw the race-day bracket, she told herself, “The story’s already written. It’s going to be him and me in the finals.” When her prediction came true, she said she “said a prayer before I got in there and just focused.” She said she pretended the final run wasn’t a six-second shot at a race triumph and the championship. Instead, she said she told herself, “This is Friday night qualifying.”

And that was her pep talk to herself with her life's grandest prize at stake. Then after 10 years of slogging through competition with spotty sponsorship and ill-fitting alliances, her biggest triumph in racing – bigger than the Disney movie "Right On Track" about her and her sister Courtney's Jr. Dragster experience, bigger than any of her dozen event victories – came down to less than one second.

It came down to nine-thousandths of a second difference between her and Line, not at the finish line but rather at the starting line. Jason Line's last shot that day, that year, was shot before it began.

That's less time than it takes for a bullet to travel 900 meters and pierce its target. It's less time than a 90-mph fastball needs to leave a pitcher's hand and zip to home plate. In a full second, a bumblebee flaps its wings 200 times and 40 lightning strikes occur on Earth and the Earth itself "speeds" 18 and one-half miles in its orbit around the sun – that's in a full second. So in that flash of time, Enders-Stevens claimed the $250,000 Pro Stock championship and Line had to settle for the $50,000 runner-up finish. She also received $25,000 for winning the season finale.

“It’s crazy. It’s hard to put into words," she said just after sealing the deal. "It all boiled down to the last run at the last race against one of the baddest guys in the class. I was a ball of nerves. My entire team were. But we pulled together. We focused. We performed well under pressure.

"I give God all the glory, but it’s teamwork. Teamwork makes the dream work. I was a little kid with a big dream. I feel blessed,” Enders-Stevens said.

She's the only one of the six women who have raced in the Pro Stock class to claim a championship. She follows her friends and heroes, three-time Top Fuel champion Shirley Muldowney and three-time Pro Stock Motorcycle champion Angelle Sampey, a fellow New Orleans-area resident.

"They are heroes of mine," Enders-Stevens said. "I'm so thankful for their help and support in this venture. It means a lot to me to have my name on a list with Shirley Muldowney and Angelle Sampey. They're incredible racers and incredible women."

Line knew he was up against one incredible woman, too.

"Of course we're disappointed," he said after the finale. "The Summit Racing team worked very hard, and we almost had what would have been the seventh championship for KB Racing. But wow, what a way to end the day. To race for the championship in the last round of the last race of the year was really something big that brought a lot of attention to Pro Stock. I would say I'm proud to be part of that, for sure. We battled some adversity and gave up more points in the Countdown than we should have, but we still battled back and salvaged a pretty good season.

"All in all, it was a super cool day for Pro Stock and anyone that's a fan of good racing. Congratulations to the whole Elite team and Erica – they had a great car all year long," Line said. "Of course, I would have liked to win, but it'll just make us work harder over the winter. I don't want to feel this way at this time next year, but it's all good. That's what keeps you going. It's part of competition."

Not only did Enders-Stevens become a Pro Stock champion in an unconventional way at Pomona, but she and her team achieved by knowing when to be aggressive and when to back off.

The Elite team chose to sit out two west-coast races (Sonoma and Seattle during the Western Swing) this summer, while the crew worked overtime in the Oklahoma shop to prepare for the end-of-the-year assault.

"I definitely grew a lot," Enders-Stevens said. "I learned a lot. I became better, and so did our team. I have them to thank for that. It was a long, hard year. I had to sit out two races, and we were still able to accomplish this dream, and it says a lot of what we're capable of."

One of her competitors recognized that.

“I'm real proud of Richard Freeman, Erica, and that entire team. They traversed through quite a season, by taking a couple races off and having very limited testing. They just showed us a different way to do it, I guess, and I'm real happy for them," outgoing Pro Stock champion Jeg Coughlin said.

So Enders-Stevens might have carved for herself the reputation of accomplishing her goals in non-traditional ways. But she's accomplishing them just the same.

Even before the final event of the Mello Yello Drag Racing Series schedule, she told WFO Radio's Joe Castello, "The sky's the limit for our team. I'm very optimistic about our future together at Elite Motorsports with Chevrolet, Rick Jones, and Rickie Jones. It's going to be a great deal for us for the next few years and hopefully a lot of years to come."

Her run for the championship, she said, was "perfect proof that with the right group of people anything is possible and that's all through God. I've got the right group, a group that stands behind me, and we have a blast together. That's what it's all about. Win, lose, or draw, we love each other and that's all that matters."
She told Castello just after a productive visit to the SEMA Show – which followed her Countdown victory at Las Vegas – that she might have enough funding in 2015 to compete fulltime.

"Our plan is the same for 2015 as it was for this year. We're going to start off committing to 15 races and piece the rest together," Enders-Stevens said. "But judging by some meetings we had last week, we probably will be able to run a full schedule. It's going to depend on sponsorship. Hopefully our on-track success will spike a little more interest and we can piece together some associates and get 'er done again."

Just after sharing with the fans at Auto Club Raceway her first few minutes as 2014 Pro Stock champion, she said, "I love what I do. I love leaving with a clutch, with the weight on my shoulders. And it’s a fun car to drive. It is right on the edge of out-of-control. It's a challenge, and that's what I like about it."

She did say she told herself after that final round at Pomona, "Thank God he was worse. That would have been a heavy load to carry though the winter if I lost the championship on a red light."

Maybe her next championship won’t come in such an "edge of out-of-control" manner. Then again, if the result is the same, she probably wouldn't mind.

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