Prudhomme retires, will sell team

[Schwartz Fan]

NHRA car owner Prudhomme retires, will sell racing team

By Gary Graves, USA TODAY


Don "The Snake" Prudhomme, whose 47-year drag racing career included 112 NHRA event victories and six championships as a driver and team owner, retired from the sport on Thursday and will sell his racing operation based in Brownsburg, Ind.

The 68-year-old, whose 49 driving victories in Top Fuel and Funny Car rank eighth all-time, cited economics in closing the team despite last year's emergence of dragster driver Spencer Massey, who won twice in 2009 en route to being named the NHRA's top rookie. Snake Racing lost U.S. Smokeless Tobacco as a primary sponsor after last season and couldn't find a replacement.

"It was tough because I had done it for so long," said Prudhomme, who laid off 15 workers but said he will honor Massey's contract. "Drag racing's a tough sell. I didn't want to go out and not run at the level I had run at before, and I didn't want to run and not have the equipment. I had some opportunities, but it wasn't enough funding to make it work."

The news stunned 14-time Funny Car champion and team owner John Force, who said Prudhomme motivated him to enter the sport. At the same time Force, who owns a four-car Ford team and last season earned a Full Throttle Drag Racing Series title as an owner with Robert Hight, understood Prudhomme's decision and said he's mulling options for one of his Ford Mustangs because of sponsorship issues.

But he said there are alternatives to shutting down and vowed to call Prudhomme and persuade him to change his mind about leaving the sport he helped bring into the modern era.

"I am shocked," said Force, whose shop is located near Prudhomme. "He was my hero, the guy I chased and the reason I wanted to be in Funny Car. I know he doesn't want to quit, but you have to have financial backing. I'm going to try to talk him out of it. We can't afford to lose him; we can't afford to lose the name. If he goes, where I am going to go?"

Prudhomme won four driving titles from 1962 to 1994 before becoming a team owner and winning Top Fuel titles in 2002-03 with driver Larry Dixon.

In 1970 Prudhomme and fellow Funny Car driver Tom "Mongoose" McEwen introduced drag racing to the mainstream as the objects of Mattel's Hot Wheels die cast cars marketing campaign, which marks its 40th anniversary this year.

NHRA car owner Prudhomme retires, will sell racing team - USATODAY.com