CONCORD, N.C. — Former two-time NHRA Nitro Funny Car World Champion Frank Hawley is ending an 18-year retirement and will drive a partial NHRA schedule with newly formed Gotham City Racing.
Hawley, who has operated Frank Hawley’s Drag Racing School in Gainesville, Fla., since 1985, will team with Melanie Troxel at Gotham City, which is co-owned by former Funny Car driver Mike Ashley. Ashley finished sixth in last year’s NHRA standings and won the U.S. Nationals at O’Reilly Raceway Park, but is stepping out of Funny Car competition this season.
“All the planets were lined up as soon as this came together as far as I’m concerned,” said Hawley, who had been an unofficial adviser to Ashley when the driver decided to form his own team last year. Since then, Ashley has partnered with Roger Burgess to form Gotham City Racing. Ashley and Burgess will run a Pro Mod schedule sponsored by Burgess’s Pro Care Rx, a health-care provider, Hawley said.
Hawley recently received a new NHRA license during testing with the team at The Strip @ Las Vegas Motor Speedway with back-to-back passes at over 300 miles per hour. He drove Ashley’s former car to a 4.875-second, 318.62 mph pass, and then fired Troxel’s car to a 4.901/325.61 mph pass moments later.
“It was kind of strange to do that in two different cars, but we were running out of time,” Hawley said.
Those two passes were Hawley’s first at more than 300 mph, a speed that was out of reach when he first retired, temporarily ending a career after winning national titles in both Top Fuel and Nitro Funny Cars.
But Hawley’s involvement in his Drag Racing School has kept him both behind the wheel and in tune with the sport’s rapidly growing technology.
“Clearly, I haven’t been completely removed from the sport,” he said. “A lot of what we teach in classes and study here at the racing school is visualization and focusing with the mind, and all of that helped a tremendous amount.
“Are the cars faster than when I left? Yeah, but I didn’t feel out of place when I got in the cars. More runs in the cars will allow me to be back on the track and improve.”
Hawley said he will run a partial schedule for 2008 as the Gotham City team seeks sponsorship. It was one of the teams hit by the decision of Torco Fuels to discontinue its sponsorship involvement in the NHRA.