Relief.

That is the only way to describe the mindset of Funny Car veteran Matt Hagan following his win Sunday afternoon at the Summit Racing Equipment NHRA Nationals at Summit Motorsports Park. After a string of poor finishes that had plagued the team over the last four weeks, Hagan was thrilled to record his first win in the last 10 races and get his team back on the right track.

“It is good to see my guys smile a little bit,” said Hagan, who collected his second win of the season and first at the Norwalk, Ohio-based track. “It has been a grind these last four races and it was good to see them get out here and be able to celebrate a little bit. I am glad we were able to check this trophy off of the checklist.”

And he did so in thrilling fashion.

Hagan defeated this season’s most dominant driver in an exciting final as both Hagan and opponent Courtney Force, who was riding high off of the strength of her eighth No. 1 of the season while holding lane choice over each of her opponents on Sunday, smoked their tires coming across the line in a wild finish. Hagan got away first, but Force chased him down by mid-track before both cars ran into a bit of trouble and slowed at the top end.

But it was Hagan who got to the stripe first, driving the Mopar Express Lane Dodge Charger R/T Funny Car to a 4.094-second pass at 288.21 mph to record his second win of the season and 28th of his career, placing him ninth all-time in the class. Force, in reaching her fifth final of 2018, had a 4.220 at 227.54 mph in the runner-up effort.

“We hazed the tires and I was legging it out, but it is the final. I didn’t really care if I blew the body off of it or what - I just know I didn’t see her beside of me,” Hagan said. “Courtney, I can’t say enough about her. She is a great driver and a great individual. I have a lot of respect for her because of the way she drives and the way she has been bringing her lights. Before, you didn’t really worry about (her lights) and now I have to step my game up. She has got me a few times and made me get up and work hard. They have a great combo and Brian Corradi does a great job over there. I have a lot of respect for them and it should be a good battle down the stretch. I feel like we can throw down with these guys now.”

In picking up his first win since February, Hagan added wins over Tommy Johnson Jr., Jack Beckman and J.R. Todd in one of the toughest paths to a win all season after Hagan nailed down the third spot on the ladder in qualifying. And none of those wins came easy.

In round one, Hagan won by the narrowest of margins over teammate Johnson - a 3.994 to a 3.990 - followed by another close victory in round two over another DSR teammate in Beckman.

In the semifinals, Hagan again led start-to-finish in a close win over Todd, recording a 3.981 to Todd’s 4.031 to reach the 51st final round of his career.

Force, who collected her first runner-up of the season after four previous wins, had wins over John Smith, Shawn Langdon and John Force.

Following the win, Hagan was reflective of the struggles his team has faced adjusting to the new track prep dynamic presented by NHRA earlier this year, a change that Hagan and crew chief Dickie Venables had taken some time to grasp hold of.

“I am super proud of my guys. These cats are working so hard out here,” Hagan said. “In this class, you are not due anything and you have to earn it, but you almost feel like you are due a win when it has been a while since you turned on four win lights. But it is a nitro funny car and you never know what you are going to get.

“We obviously had a track prep change that we had to adapt to and we knew it would just take Dickie a few runs to get there. That is why I love him. That is why I am glad he is in my corner. He figured it out and we had a good, solid car all weekend.

“Our approach this weekend was go down the race track and don’t beat ourselves. We knew we had a good car that qualified No. 3, but you have to put that in perspective with the changes. I think a lot of the crew chiefs, their mindset is faster, faster, and the way things are prepped now they have to change their mindset to just go down the race track.

“We used to run 3.80s out here, but you have to take a step back and rethink how you are doing things. For us, our biggest thing is to get that first qualfiier down and get something to work off of and go from there.

“Today was just one of those things where your confidence grows every run the more laps we get. We have never seen these conditions because the tracks have changed because of the prep. It has taken these crew chiefs multiple runs to get data logged in. We are going back to runs from 2013 to look at stuff and that is just how it has progressed from then to now.”

With the win, Hagan closed the gap on second-place Beckman, actually moving into a tie with his DSR teammate. Now, after a well-deserved victory celebration, Hagan shifts his focus to continuing to master the new track setups and a brand new car as he prepares to debut a brand new Dodge body on Monday.

“As much as I want to celebrate, there is no time to rest as we are debuting a brand new body tomorrow,” Hagan said. “I am super excited about this Mopar body. It is really going to help level the playing field. With the aerodynamics that the Force team has right now with their Chevrolets, they are able to do some stuff with the headers that we are not. So we are excited about this new body and are looking forward to being able to be the first ones to do it.”