(Above) Ron Capps scored his first Pro win 14 years ago this week, in Top Fuel in Seattle. (Below) Last weekend's Denver Funny Car triumph was career win 30.

Ron Capps is in his 12th season driving a Funny Car, but he got his start and his first Professional victory in Top Fuel in 1995, when the relatively unknown and inexperienced Top Alcohol Dragster driver piloted Roger Primm’s Top Fueler to a surprising victory at the NHRA Northwest Nationals in Seattle. This weekend, 14 years after defeating Cory McClenathan in Tuesday’s rain-delayed final round, Capps returns to Pacific Raceways, where he will try to win his second race in as many weeks and sixth of the season.

“What stands out most about that first win is being there on Tuesday, but also the bumps,” said Capps, referring to the left lane, the lane in which he won. “The bumps back then were so gnarly that you had to hold the steering wheel as hard as you could when you went over them or they’d rip it right out of your hands. In the final, I remember leaving the starting line and not seeing Cory, then going over the bumps and hanging on for dear life. I couldn’t believe I’d won.”

Capps has done a lot of winning since. His recent victory in Denver, where he won for the first time after runner-ups in 1998 and 2007, was the 30th of his career in 60 final rounds, including two in Top Fuel (he was runner-up in Atlanta in 1995 in his first Professional final). His 29 Funny Car wins ranks fifth all-time, behind John Force (126), Tony Pedregon (42), Don Prudhomme (35), and Kenny Bernstein (30), and his 58 Funny Car final rounds ranks fourth.

Capps hit the big time in 1997 as driver of Prudhomme’s Funny Car. He won 13 races in eight seasons driving for Prudhomme, twice finishing second in points, in 1998 and 2000. After a disappointing 2004 season in which he failed to win a race and finished outside the top 10 for the first time in his Funny Car career, Capps joined Don Schumacher Racing and in four-plus seasons has won 16 times and posted three top-five finishes, including a second-place showing in 2005.

With his victory in Denver, Capps matched his career high for wins in a season with five, which he set in 1998 and 2006. This weekend in Seattle, the second stop on NHRA’s annual three-race Western Swing, Capps will be looking to eclipse that mark with his third win at Pacific Raceways, second there in Funny Car, and first there since 1998, when he defeated Force in the final round.

“That was a big weekend,” said Capps, who is winless in Seattle in three final-round appearances since, in 2001, 2006, and 2008. “I was driving the Copenhagen car with Roland [Leong tuning], and we actually took the points lead from Force, which was the first time in a long time somebody else led the points that early in the season.”

Capps has led the Funny Car points many times since but never at season’s end. He held the points lead through the first 10 races this season before dropping to third in Englishtown with a second straight first-round loss. Capps remained in third following a second-round finish in Norwalk before reclaiming a share of the lead with his win in Denver, where he won from the No. 1 qualifying position for the second time this season.

“We tested for three races after Topeka,” said Capps, who is tied for the points lead with Ashley Force Hood after beating her in the final in Denver. “Our points lead was up to 119, and there were some things that we needed to try, things that could take our whole team to the next level. You hate to test at a race, but we’ve already used two of our four allotted test days, so we decided to do it. We were also at the point where he needed to bring out a new chassis, so we did that in Norwalk. We’re going to test on a couple of qualifying runs in Seattle, some new supercharger technology that we’ve been working on all year, but as far as any major testing, like the out-of-the-box stuff we did at those few races, we probably won’t do that again.”

Take away those three races, and Capps is 25-5 in eliminations.

“Before Denver, ‘Ace’ [crew chief Ed McCulloch] talked about getting the points lead back, and he never talks like that,” said Capps. “He said we’re going to have a good Swing, and when he said that, I thought, ‘This is going to be fun.’ ”

Capps’ victory gives him a leg up on a potential Western Swing sweep, a feat that only six Professional drivers have accomplished in the swing’s 19-year history. Capps has never won more than one of the swing’s three races in the same season, but, with his win in Denver, he has won all three at least once and in 1998 was runner-up in Denver before winning in Seattle.

“It’s in the back of my mind,” said Capps. “Denver was a big win. You’ve got to be on your game there because that race is always a big if. We’ve always done well in Seattle and Sonoma, so it’s possible. But it’s not something we talk about. We’ll talk about it if we get to the final round in Sonoma and we’ve won the other two.”

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