Winning has its price.
Funny Car driver Al  Hofmann found that out, if not before then certainly at the 1997 Gatornationals. He beat Mark Oswald, but as he crossed the finish line, his engine blew, flipping the car like a flaming turnover and flinging it over a retaining wall.
The skin peeled off Hofmann's right hand, and third-degree burns blistered his broken right arm that required six pins to repair. When nemesis John Force peeked in on him at the hospital, Force said Hofmann bolted upright in his bed and spat out a reminder that he had lasted longer in eliminations and had whittled a chunk off Force’s point lead that day.
Force instructed bus driver Bob Fisher to remain at Gainesville, Florida, fetch Hofmann from the hospital, and transport him to his home at nearby Umatilla, Hofmann accepted the ride, but called it a publicity stunt.
By then, Force had hired Tony Pedregon to drive what he called a research-and-development car. And that had made Hofmann just about apoplectic. Two cars! The very idea! It wasn’t one that went over well with Hofmann, who understood and respected the John Force who scavenged for money to make it from race to race in the beginning, but despised the emergence of a John Force who multiplied his magic.

If Johnny Cash was the balladeer in black, Hofmann was the bombardier in black. Many said that when Hofmann was driving, the car had two cranks. And he never wasted a chance to needle (John) Force.

Fumed Hofmann, “It’s like somebody eight feet tall picking on a kid three feet tall. He’s got cubic money out there, and it’s hard to ace against that. For the money he's thrown at it, he should just be racing in NASCAR.” He said he doubted he and Force could reconcile, “not as long as he’s being an idiot with all that nonsense he has to race with… the show he’s got with 27 cars and eight crew chiefs.”
Jealous of Force? Hofmann bristled at the idea. “I could have it all, too, but that ain’t the way you race. If you need to bring a damn tank to a gunfight, you’re not playing fair.”   
 If Johnny Cash was the balladeer in black, Hofmann was the bombardier in black. Many said that when Hofmann was driving, the car had two cranks. And he never wasted a chance to needle Force.
“Do you know,” Force asked, “that I had to take my pants down at Phoenix after a race because he said I had some kind of device that made the car do something magic?”
Hofmann called Force “just a truck driver with too much money.” That was OK by Force. Elvis Presley was a truck driver before he sang his way to stardom, and Force loves Elvis — loves him tender, loves him true. But Hofmann had to step on the blue suede shoes: when he eliminated Force in the second round of the 1998 Memphis race and went on to win, he said, “Maybe Force  will believe me now — Elvis is dead.”
Oh, the antics went on. One fall, somehow the two antagonists decided they were going to swap fire suits, dress up as each other for Halloween at the October race at Houston. Ultimately, the idea made Hofmann’s flesh crawl.
“Look how dirty your fire suit is,” Hofmann admonished.
“Yeah?” Force shot back. “Well, at least mine ain’t  haunted!”
One year at the Texas Motorplex near Dallas, Hofmann offered Force lane choice. For a nanosecond, Force said he thought maybe the ice was melting. “You love me, Al!” he said with a heartfelt smile. Replied Hofmann, “No, I actually hate ya.”
Hofmann thought the feeling was mutual. At Seattle in the mid-1990s, he said, “John hates me more than anything walking the Earth, believe me. He just won’t say it.”  
Said Force, wagging his head, “Poor Al. I can’t figure him out. I’ve just got to love him. I don’t hate him. I can’t — I tried. But I just can’t.” However, he did guess years ago that “when he dies, he’s going to have on his tombstone: Al Hofmann. Rest In Peace. Force Was Cheatin’.”
If Hofmann could respond today, he might be aggravated that Force got the last word. Force, though, surely would take no glee in that. The one thing Force respected was Hofmann’s mutual love of the sport and the fact that Hofmann wasn’t phony. For better or worse, Hofmann didn’t play games in expressing himself.
Years ago, fellow Funny Car driver Ron Capps, who appreciates the colorful and combative but  has worked hard to cultivate his own clean image, indicated he enjoyed the  verbal jousting. They were like the exchanges between George Steinbrenner and Billy Martin or those of John and Blanche Bickerson of the old radio days.
“NHRA needs an Al Hofmann, but it  isn’t going to be me,” Capps said.
Capps was right. The NHRA did need an Al Hofmann. Force might just as soon have done away with the quarreling. The fact, though, is that NHRA drag racing had that attraction of acrimony, that titillation of tension with those two. They were an act, however, unintentional, however, regrettable. It was because of the friction from their personalities, their story lines, their contrasting methods to the drag-racing madness. They sold tickets — and for all the positive  reasons that each hoped to generate, as well.
Was Hofmann a Grinch among Whos? Not really. He was a purist. He had an idea of how drag racing should operate — and when improved technology surfaced and the sport’s popularity begat increased sponsorship and increased opportunity for the opportunistic, Hofmann didn’t budge from his ideal.
Maybe it didn’t help that he often dressed in black. He was flinty, to be sure, a tough man who made tough decisions and took a tough approach to racing. Drag racing was war. It was about principle. And his principles didn’t leave much room for newfangled hooey.
We’ll picture Hofmann, his hands thrust into his pockets in a rare idle moment. And we’ll remember those moments, often when you least expected them, that he’d look up from hammering on his hot rod and flash a wry grin and ask, “What are you up to? What’s goin’ on?”
What was going on with him was always something intense. That’s what winning races was all about. And he won 15 of them, as many as Dick La Haie and more than some of the sport's greatest names —- more than Gary Ormsby, Raymond Beadle, Eddie Hill, Chuck Etchells,  Bill Jenkins, Billy Meyer, Connie Kalitta, Jeb Allen, Frank Hawley and Ronnie Sox.
Al Hofmann died at age 60 last week of a heart attack. And his was a heart that was beat to a drag racing rhythm. They made only one, and the shop is closed forever. Godspeed, Al Hofmann. We’ll miss you.