It was a night for all of Canada as local favorite Tim Boychuk won his first Nitro Jam event at Castrol Raceway in front of thousands of fans who packed every inch of the Edmonton facility to witness the SMS/Komatsu “Night of Fire” at the River Cree Resort and Casino Rocky Mountain Nitro Jam Nationals presented by MOPAR and E3 Spark Plugs.

Boychuk claimed his first Nitro Jam win at his home track in the new Prostalgia Nitro Funny Car category, overshadowing the incredible victories by fan favorites Bobby Lagana (Top Fuel) and 21-year-old Ashley Bart (Pro Fuel) Saturday night at Castrol Raceway.

“What an incredible weekend. To win in front of these incredible fans and right here in my backyard is unbelievable. Hopefully we can go out and add another Ironman or two tomorrow,” Boychuk said.

Veteran drag racer Rickie Smith beat three-time NHRA Get Screened America Pro Mod Drag Racing Series winner and current points leader Von Smith in the first round of competition Saturday at the Summit Racing Equipment NHRA Nationals.

All of Friday’s qualifying leaders remained atop their respective categories as Larry Dixon, Ashley Force Hood, Jeg Coughlin and Steve Johnson will lead their divisions into Sunday’s 11 a.m. eliminations at the NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series event.

Dixon’s track record performance of 3.780 at 320.43 in his Al-Anabi Racing dragster gave him his fourth No. 1 position of the season and 44th of his career in Top Fuel. He will face Troy Buff in the first round.

Jeg Coughlin Jr. has been racing long enough to know Mother Nature is the biggest factor in drag racing. Sunday, the No. 1 Pro Stock qualifier at the NHRA Summit Nationals, figures she is going to have a hand in Sunday’s eliminations.

“Weather could really play a role in this race tomorrow,” Coughlin said. “We ran that 6.59 Friday night in what is usually the hero session, but this morning when we had that cloud cover we saw plenty of cars running good numbers. If we get that again tomorrow morning it could be really interesting.”

Ashley Force Hood learned on Saturday that you cannot change fate and for her this means a first round match against her 14-time Funny Car champion father John Force in Sunday’s final eliminations at the NHRA Summit Nationals.

Force Hood’s provisional pole survived a hot day of qualifying and two torrential downpours which brought an end to the incomplete final round.

“I was in my Mustang belted up and ready to go and then the rain just started pouring,” Force Hood explained. “It surprised all of us. I think the locals all knew because someone said the stands cleared out before it started raining really hard. We were going to try and make another really strong run. In the heat I don’t think we would have been trying to improve too much on our time.”

Force Hood’s Friday night time of 4.032 seconds held up as the top elapsed time.

The first time Steve Johnson qualified on the pole he could never have envisioned the scenario he would face the second time around fifteen years later.

Johnson, a three-time finalist thus far in 2010, fended off a flurry of challenges for his provisional pole spot to head into Sunday’s eliminations at the NHRA Summit Nationals as the No. 1 seed for the first time since the 1995 NHRA Southern Nationals in Commerce, Ga.

The difference between then and now is this time he didn’t even fire his bike outside of his pits on Saturday. For Johnson, his survival from week to week is dependent on being conservative during qualifying. In this case, it was better to sit in the pits then it was to put two more runs on his bike.

Sunday's final results from the Fifth annual Summit Racing Equipment NHRA Nationals at Summit Racing Equipment Motorsports Park. The race is the tenth of 22 in the NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series:

Final round-by-round results from the Fifth annual Summit Racing Equipment NHRA Nationals at Summit Racing Equipment Motorsports Park, the tenth of 22 events in the NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series:

Point standings (top 10) for NHRA professional categories following the Fifth annual Summit Racing Equipment NHRA Nationals at Summit Racing Equipment Motorsports Park, the tenth of 22 events in the NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series -