YORBA LINDA — The fastest driver in the world still can’t outrun the fact of the matter: Women can have it all, but not all at once.
“People want to make it a fairy tale that you can do whatever you want,” said Ashley Force, one of three daughters, along with Brittany and Courtney, who took after their dad, the drag racing icon John Force. “But, well, life is life.”
Ashley and I were talking Thursday, during an event at the family’s whimsical, museum-like headquarters in Yorba Linda, about one of her younger sisters, Brittany Force.
She’s the most accomplished driver among them, becoming the winningest woman in the sport’s history earlier this month when she secured her 19th victory to surpass Shirley Muldowney.
Brittany is a two-time NHRA Top Fuel champion and “Queen of Speed,” the NHRA speed record holder – just this past September, Brittany reset her own mark by going 343.51 mph at the NHRA U.S. Nationals at Indianapolis Raceway.
Take gender out of it; Brittany is one of drag racing’s all-time top drivers. She’s also a short-timer on the track.
Following the In-N-Out Burger NHRA Finals at the In-N-Out Burger Pomona Dragstrip this weekend – or whenever weather permits – Brittany plans to get up out of the seat of her Monster Energy Top Fuel dragster for the last time in … well, who knows?
Married last year, Brittany, 39, has decided she’s going to turn her focus to starting a family with her husband, Bobby Lyons. It’s something that’s been in the back of her mind since she started seriously racing in 2013. She knew, she said: “If I ever decided to get married and start a family, have children, I’m going to have to step out of the seat and out of this career that I love so much.”
Often it’s the game that will pass athletes by. Or their aging bodies that will betray them. But, for many women in sports, it’s the fork in the road, knowing it will take closing one chapter to begin the next.
Tennis legend Serena Williams described how it felt to have her heart pull her in different directions when she announced her 2022 retirement via an essay in Vogue.
“Believe me, I never wanted to have to choose between tennis and a family,” wrote Williams, the 37-time Grand Slam champion. “I don’t think it’s fair. If I were a guy, I wouldn’t be writing this because I’d be out there playing and winning while my wife was doing the physical labor of expanding our family. Maybe I’d be more of a Tom Brady if I had that opportunity. Don’t get me wrong: I love being a woman, and I loved every second of being pregnant with Olympia … But I’m turning 41 this month, and something’s got to give.”
It was the job, in Serena’s case – and in Brittany’s too.
“We don’t have that luxury like men do in this sport,” said Brittany, the 5-foot-2, 118-pound woman who pulls 6 or 7 G’s in the first four seconds of every race.
“When we got engaged, we started talking about it. And being a female, it sucks. I have to get out of the seat; I have to leave this career behind. There may not be a place for me to come back to, I don’t know. It was a difficult decision. The best way I could describe it is it’s bittersweet.
“I’m excited about this next chapter, but stepping away from something I love so much, it’s really difficult.”
And it’s the right move, she’s sure. Just like she was sure that dedicating herself wholeheartedly to racing was the right decision after weighing whether she wanted to compete in the family business or follow through on her Cal State Fullerton degree and become a high school English teacher.
This woman with the lightning-quick reaction time at a light is, in fact, a deep and deliberate thinker – with a good gut.
And an opportunity to test a Top Fuel dragster for safety in 2012 was, initially, terrifying and, then, exhilarating – and finally the confirmation she needed. “I made my first full pass, and I got out of the car, and that was the moment I knew: ‘This is what I want to do. I’m gonna drive these race cars.’”
She needed only five seasons to go from NHRA Rookie of the Year to a Top Fuel world champion. As a bookend of sorts, this year she became the first Top Fuel driver to break the 340-mph barrier.
And at probably every race, she’s done for other little girls what Shirley Anderson Payne did for her as a 6- or 7-year-old in the stands, when Brittany picked the car with the pink stripe to win and learned, from Ashley, that it was driven by a woman: “It was this realization of, ‘Hold on. There’s a female driving that car?’” Brittany said. “So what dad does, girls could do that, too?”
Now fellow driver Jack Beckman, a John Force Racing teammate, witnesses other girls have similar epiphanies at every autograph session.
“Their eyes light up when they see her,” Beckman said. “They don’t light up for [Funny Car driver Austin Prock] and they don’t light up for me. And that’s fine! Because what happens in that instant [they see Brittany], is they’re like, ‘I can do whatever I want to do.’”
“That would be the biggest win right there,” Brittany said. “Leaving behind a legacy where maybe I inspired somebody to go chase down their own dream. It doesn’t really need to be drag racing. Just motivating somebody on their own path.”
But it sure could be drag racing! That’s one of the great things about the sport, it doesn’t discriminate between genders, or ages even – John Force also announced his retirement this week, at 76, opting to park his race car for good after a harrowing crash last year.
But, Ashley said, it’s hard to imagine splitting your time between racing those incredible machines and taking care of your young children.
“You don’t want to be [halfway] out there,” said Ashley, whose hiatus in 2011 when she was expecting her first child led to her retirement from Funny Car racing. “You have to be all in, because you know your team works so hard. You put your life on the line. You have sponsors that count on you, and fans that want to see you 100%. It’s not a job where you can kind of dip your toe in it.”
But, Ashley points out, Brittany isn’t going to disappear, and neither will John; the family will remain part of the drag racing community in full force.
“We’re not going anywhere, this is our family business.” Ashley said. “So it may change a little, and who knows what the future will bring? But she’ll still be out there.”
Brittany is still out there, for at least one more race at her home track in Pomona. Back at the nostalgic venue where she’ll try get one more victory. For her sponsors and her team. For her fans and, certainly, for her family.
