Top Fuel driver Justin Ashley ready to go swinging on NHRA's 'Western Swing'

The annual three-race "swing" starts this weekend in Denver, followed by Sonoma and Seattle in the following two weeks

UPDATE: Ashley qualified No. 2  in Top Fuel for Sunday's final eliminations.

Justin Ashley may be competing in this weekend’s Dodge Power Brokers Mile-High Nationals at Bandimere Speedway in suburban Denver, Colorado, for the first time in his career, but he more than knows the significance of the event.

The so-called ‘Mile Highs” kick off the annual three-race “Western Swing,” where the NHRA visits Denver, Sonoma and Seattle in consecutive weeks. For drivers hoping to qualify well for the Countdown to the Championship playoffs and to potentially ride the momentum all the way to the Top Fuel title, it all kind of starts this weekend.

Ashley, a Long Island, New York native, came into this weekend’s race in fourth place in the Top Fuel standings, one point behind perennial champion Steve Torrence and 110 points behind class leader Mike Salinas.

Ashley has two wins thus far this season, as well as four final-round appearances. Some might say he’s been one of the more pleasant surprises in Top Fuel this season, but to hear Ashley say it, he’s right where he expected to be as the NHRA begins the second half of the season.

“I think we're exactly where I thought we'd be right now, competing for a championship,” Ashley said. “Our objective is to win every race and to be number one in the points. But at the same time, we have to be realistic, and we know how good the Top Fuel field is. So it's exactly where I thought we would be at, contending and competing for a world championship at this point in the year.”

Justin Ashley is one of the more pleasant surprises in NHRA Top Fuel this season. Photo courtesy NHRA. 

Although he’s part of just a one-car team, Ashley does have a technical alliance with veteran and three-time (2012, 2015 and 2016) NHRA Top Fuel champ Antron Brown. And while it has been a good year up to this point, Ashley admittedly has had a few struggles thus far in 2022, including recording three first-round losses in eliminations this season.

In a sense, first-round competition has been Ashley’s Kryptonite, so to speak. Had those early exits not happened, the Plainview, New York native likely would be closer to the top of the heap in Top Fuel, if not potentially be No. 1 right now, rather than Salinas.

That’s why the second half of the season is crucial. He knows he has to eliminate mistakes and be on top of his game every round.

“Yeah, it's been a great season for our team, but there's been some ups and downs,” he said. “But overall, when you look at it collectively from a broader view, we've had a lot of really positive things happen both on the track and off the racetrack.

“Something real positive that’s happened for our program is bringing on Phillips Connect to be our primary sponsor for the year. And that partnership has really allowed us to take a step forward on the racetrack and you see it in our performance.

“We really focused in the offseason on putting ourselves in a position to take that next step forward. And having two wins and four final rounds already less than halfway through the season, I think really speaks volumes of our performing so far. We really expect to go out there and be successful.”

Ashley would love to win all three races on the Western Swing, but he’s also realistic. If he can come out of the trio of races potentially with a win and another one or two final round showings, it would be a good lead-in towards the U.S. Nationals in Indianapolis and then right into the Countdown to the Championship.

“It’s critical,” Ashley said of the Western Swing. “The Western Swing has that allure, that history, that prestige to it. And having never had the chance to race the full swing before is something that's really exciting for me.

“But I think the important part comes because it's such a crucial point in the season. We're right before countdown time and we need to continue to stack on the wins to make sure that we clinch a spot and make sure we put ourselves in the best position to win a championship after the countdown is locked.

“These three races really is where you start to see teams that are successful toward the end of the year hit their stride. So this is when we need to put our foot to the floor and make sure that we perform at the highest level.”

Ashley has to not only keep those behind him in the standings at bay, but he also has to find a way to overtake the trio in front of him, namely Salinas, Brittany Force and Torrence.

“Absolutely, we can,” Ashley said of overtaking those three drivers ahead of him. “The competition is so good right now that really top to bottom, the depth of the Top Fuel field is the best it's been probably in two decades.

“I think anybody can really come out on top. Of course, we're one of those teams that can do that. I have the utmost confidence in our team. At the same time, we're focused on being the best version of ourselves that we can be, and wherever that puts us, it puts us. We worry about individual rounds, the individual races and being the best version of ourselves that we can be. And wherever we end up at the end of the day is because we put ourselves in that position.”

Ashley has also developed a reputation of being one of the biggest thorns in Torrence’s side. The Texas native has won the last four Top Fuel championships and has amassed 55 career event wins.

Yet even though Torrence is third in the standings, he’s having a very uncharacteristic season through the first 10 events, having yet to win even one race in 2022.

You’ve heard the phrase “giant killer”? Well, in a sense, Ashley is a Torrence killer, so to speak, having knocked him out of two races already.

“We’ve had a lot of success over Steve this year, and they have such a great team, they’re far and away one of the, if not the most, difficult teams to beat on any given race day,” Ashley said. “I think it took us as a unit maybe seven or eight times before we even beat him the first time.

“Then once that happened, we started to stack some wins. It’s not a matter of us doing anything differently when we’ve raced him. It’s just a matter of us really executing on what our plans have been. He's had a lot of really great runs and every time we’ve raced him, it's been really close, we've just been fortunate to come out on top, and this sport will humble you really quick. So you just don't know what's going to happen the next time and the time after that when we go up to race against Steve’s team.

“We would like to not have those first-round losses, those losses are killers for the points. You really want to establish more consistency, you really want to be able to get at least a few round wins each and every race for the points.

“So (first round losses are) not ideal, it's not at all what we envision. But at the same time, we know that it's a long season, and it's a marathon, it's not a sprint. We just need to do a little bit of a better job, myself included, of establishing that consistency and making sure that race in and race out, we at least stack a few round wins by the time the race is over.”

You’re either with us or against us! #MileHighNats #Squad@phillips_conn • @ToyotaRacing • @WyakinStrong • @VelocitiInc • @DavisMtrsprts • #VitaC • @KATOFastening pic.twitter.com/ZMux1AdFxF

— Justin Ashley (@TheJustinAshley) July 16, 2022

That’s why Ashley is a firm believer in the old drag racing adage of “taking it one round at a time.” But he also admits that given the success he’s had thus far this year – and with 12 races still remaining, including this weekend’s end result – he has thought about what it would be like to win the championship this year.

“I do think about it, what it would be like to win a world championship because that's always been the goal,” Ashley said. “Obviously, it would mean the world to me, like it would mean the world to all the drivers out there.

“I know that our team’s put in a lot of work to be able to accomplish that goal. That's something that we really think about away from the track. But once we're at the track, our focus is just on that specific race. We don't want to follow the points race in and race out, because you're going to end up riding that roller coaster because racing is so up and down over the course of a 22-race season.

“We want to focus on running our best during the first qualifying session, running our best during the first round of eliminations, until you get one qualifying session and one round at a time and trying to win the race and then worry about the championship later."