The father was living up to his former reputation. The son was just trying to earn his own.

This tale of the generations centers around the Cannons, father Scotty and son Scott, both of Lyman, South Carolina and well known in doorslammer circles.

This past weekend, in Rockingham, NC, they pulled off a feat that no other professional father/son tandem in drag racing has ever managed to accomplish. They qualified tops in their respective professional categories. Scotty was the No. 1 qualifier in Top Fuel while Scott, who answers to Junior, also secured top honors in Pro Modified – a classification the elder Cannon once ruled with an iron fist.

Junior could only stand in awe on the Rockingham Dragway starting line Saturday evening as Scotty sealed the deal with a 4.603 elapsed time at 307 miles per hour. That was almost a carbon copy of when Scotty watched Junior lay down a 5.96 elapsed time to not only nail the pole position but also claim the bonus points associated with the Last Man Standing award.

Old School and Next Generation provide potent one-two punch

The father was living up to his former reputation. The son was just trying to earn his own.

This tale of the generations centers around the Cannons, father Scotty and son Scott, both of Lyman, South Carolina and well known in doorslammer circles.

This past weekend, in Rockingham, NC, they pulled off a feat that no other professional father/son tandem in drag racing has ever managed to accomplish. They qualified tops in their respective professional categories. Scotty was the No. 1 qualifier in Top Fuel while Scott, who answers to Junior, also secured top honors in Pro Modified – a classification the elder Cannon once ruled with an iron fist.

Junior could only stand in awe on the Rockingham Dragway starting line Saturday evening as Scotty sealed the deal with a 4.603 elapsed time at 307 miles per hour. That was almost a carbon copy of when Scotty watched Junior lay down a 5.96 elapsed time to not only nail the pole position but also claim the bonus points associated with the Last Man Standing award.

“I stood there thinking to myself that it just doesn’t get any better than this,” Junior said. “I don’t know that the moon and stars could have lined up better than that.”

“I’ve been around this sport long enough to know these kinds of things just don’t happen every day,” Scotty said. “I cannot begin to tell you how proud I was of our teams that night. If anyone deserved it, they did. Junior and I just got the headlines for it.”

That may have been a notation to the history books, but this feat is just one of the many the Cannons recorded over the 72 hour span.

Junior came into Rockingham’s IHRA World Finals with a first career world championship nearly locked up and while Scotty couldn’t win a Top Fuel world championship, he was gunning for a third Top Fuel win in his rookie season.

Scotty knew exactly how his son felt. He’d experienced that same gut-wrenching feeling of chasing a championship in 1991. Not only did he win that year, but also five other times to establish himself as the winningest driver in the Pro Modified class although he’s been absent full-time for nearly a decade.

Junior was only a teenager when his dad went through a battle with Al Billes for his initial crown.

“I remember the pressure he was under back then and what I went through was a carbon copy of what I experienced in the last few months,” Junior said. “You know, I never really expected to be in the position that I’m in now back then. If I had, I might have paid more attention with the way he dealt with things back then.”

“People will never really understand that I haven’t eaten in three days,” Cannon said. “That’s not counting the two bottles of Tagament that I’ve eaten just to settle my stomach. I haven’t slept in a month.”

Even though Junior had put a nearly insurmountable point difference between himself and second place Mike Janis, there was still a mathematical chance he could lose the deal because of parts attrition and the IHRA’s oildown policy. That reality almost pushed him to sit out Sunday’s first round of eliminations.

“We had thought about it,” Junior said. “I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. We just wanted to go out there and lay it on the line and get that first round out of the way. I knew if we won the first round there was no way that he could beat us for the championship.”

Junior went out and beat Tony Pontieri in the first round of Pro Modified eliminations. He said at that point, he could push aside the championship concerns and concentrate on winning the race. Junior wanted to win this one badly. Unfortunately his historic day came to an end in the next round opposite of Pat Stoken.

“Once I won the first round, we went after the win,” Cannon said. “We just misjudged the track, that’s all. We were going after it. The track just got too hot for what we wanted to do. Once I knew that I could oil down the track and not lose the championship for it, we went after it aggressively.”

Meanwhile, Scotty began to shine behind the wheel of Evan Knoll’s Top Fuel dragster. He won the first round over Bobby Lagana, Jr. and then took out Jeff O’Neill.

Reaching his third final round was quite the accomplishment for Scotty, but he said it paled compared to seeing Junior take his first championship.

“Winning all those races and championships were great and I am honored that we did that,” Scotty said. “But seeing him win his first championship meant more to me than anything I’ve ever accomplished. I’ll tell you. This is special. You can do a lot in your lifetime but when you see your kid pull off something like that – it’s special. It really touches your heart.”

Scotty eventually lost to Bruce Litton in the final round but that didn’t seem to bother him too much. He’s already won without turning on the win-light.

The weekend was that special for the Cannons. The moment was a rite of passage for a Cannon male.

Junior said that as special as his exchange with his father was, he can’t seem to shake the memory of his interaction with departing world champion Quain Stott, who once built race cars for Scotty in the 1980s.

“Quain took the No. 1 off of his window and signed it before he stuck it on my window,” Junior said. “That’s about as noble a gesture as anyone could give. It says a lot about the champion he is.”

Scotty then followed Stott by patting Junior on the back and gave him a hug and the “I’m proud of you” line before headed back to his pits.

As Scotty rode back to his pits, he said that he starting singing the famous Harry Chapin song The Cat’s in the Cradle.

He sang (and he said it may not have been pretty), “And as I hung up the phone it occurred to me. He’d grown up just like me. My boy was just like me.”