Jack Beckman has proved his talent as an NHRA nitro Funny Car driver.

The California native won the 2012 world championship.

Jack Beckman has proved his talent as an NHRA nitro Funny Car driver.

The California native won the 2012 world championship.

A year ago, he had another solid season finishing third, highlighted by his victory in the $100,000 Traxxas Nitro Shootout all-star event at Indianapolis.

This season, Beckman, who drives for Don Schumacher Racing, has failed to win a race and he missed the Countdown to the Championship as he was 11th in the regular season point standings.

“A lot of people in my position would say I can’t wait for this year to be over and move on, and I think we have two shots to try and win,” said Beckman, who has 15 career nitro Funny Car national event wins. “I feel really bad for the crew. I feel like they’ve given us effort all year long and really haven’t gotten anything back as a reward for it. The crews get a bonus the better the car does in eliminations, so to put it a different way, the cars that aren’t winning rounds those guys are making less than some of the people who work in the same building. I just want to win one of these races.”

Beckman is competing at the NHRA Toyota Nationals this weekend at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. The season concludes Nov. 13-16 at the Auto Club Finals in Pomona, Calif.

“I’ve spent more time at those two tracks probably than just about any others I’ve been at just because of my Sportsman racing days,” Beckman said. “There’s definitely a sense of familiarity, but that doesn’t necessarily carry over to the tune up of the race car. It has been an unbelievably frustrating year. If you would have told me at the beginning of this year that we had 14 round wins going into the second to last race of the year and not be a Countdown contender, I would have told you that you were crazy. The most frustrating thing is we haven’t come close to what we are capable of doing. At this point, I’m just scratching my head. I don’t know why we haven’t had the success we are capable of. That being said, I still feel like we have two races to show people hey we didn’t forget how to do this. We know how to win races.”

During the first round of qualifying Friday in Vegas, Beckman was fourth fastest at 4.143 seconds at 309.27 mph. In the nightcap Friday, Beckman recorded a 4.045-second elapsed time at 318.84 mph to put himself third in the qualifying ladder.

However, being a spoiler is the last thing on Beckman’s mind.

“That word is a clear reminder that you are a non-contender,” Beckman said. “I just want to win races. At this point, the only thing that matters is that trophy on Sunday.”

As for 2015, Beckman doesn’t have a definite answer for what’s in store for him.

“Valvoline is not coming back and the way I understand it we do have enough stuff to run the car next year, but a lot of things are a big question mark,” Beckman said.

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