After 26 years of trying – including finishing runner-up six times during that period – winning NHRA Top Fuel championships is starting to become a habit for Doug Kalitta.

A good habit, for sure.

The veteran driver will clinch his second championship in the last three seasons during this weekend’s season-ending and 60 annual In-N-Out Burger NHRA Finals at In-N-Out Burger Pomona Dragway in Pomona, California.

All the Ann Arbor, Michigan native needs to do is make one successful qualifying run – he gets two tries on Friday and two more on Saturday – and the Top Fuel title is his once again.

“It feels really good,” said Kalitta, who looks to bounce back from a seventh runner-up title last season after his first title victory in 2023. “I’m definitely proud of my guys for making it all happen for sure. We just have to qualify this weekend, so we can definitely manage that. It’s a huge relief. It means a lot to Connie (team owner Connie Kalitta), me, and everybody at Kalitta Motorsports, and we’re very grateful.

“It’s gratifying – I always hoped I’d be able to tie my cousin (the late Scott Kalitta) with the number of championships he has, and there’s plenty of people who have won this twice. To be one of the guys that’s won it twice with Alan (Johnson) as the crew chief is really special for sure – that’s pretty cool.”

In a sense, the 61-year-old Kalitta could literally roll down the 1,000-foot-long drag strip in neutral to capture the title. But he’s never been a guy who takes the easy way out: he wants to finish the season not only with the championship but also to cap things off with a win in Sunday’s final round.

That means he’ll be looking for his usual speeds of well over 330 mph each time he hits the staging lanes this weekend. And if he ultimately wins the event, it would be Kalitta’s fifth win in the 20-race NHRA schedule – and would be his 60 career win in the Finals’ 60 year.

It would also be the eighth time in his career that Kalitta has won at the legendary Pomona racing facility.

“That would be the icing on the cake, for sure,” he said.

Kalitta and teammate Shawn Langdon hope to finish the season — and the race — 1-2

Kalitta Motorsports teammate and fellow Top Fuel driver Shawn Langdon is hoping to make it a 1-2 season finish with Kalitta not only in Sunday’s final round, but also in the final standings. Langdon, who has won three races this season (plus three runner-up finishes), comes into this weekend right behind Kalitta in the points but has a slim 19-point edge over Justin Ashley and a 48-point margin over Brittany Force, who will be retiring after this season to start a family.

“Shawn’s car is plenty capable of outrunning those guys, and he’s obviously trying to secure second,” Kalitta said proudly of his running mate. “We’re hopeful he can pull it off, but we want to win this race, too.

“He’ll hopefully have to go through us to get the win and I love running at Pomona. I’ve had great success there, and the pressure will be off. The only other thing to do is go out there and win this thing.”

Here’s the weekend schedule:

Friday: Two Nitro qualifying rounds at 4:30 and 7 p.m. ET/01:30 and 4 p.m. PT.

Saturday: Two more Nitro qualifying rounds at 2:30 p.m. and 5 p.m. ET/11:30 a.m. and 2 p.m. PT.

Sunday: Four rounds of final eliminations for all four professional classes – Top Fuel, Funny Car, Pro Stock and Pro Stock Motorcycle – begin at 2 p.m. ET/11 a.m. PT. Final eliminations will be televised live at 5 p.m. ET/2 p.m. PT on FS1.