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Ashley, you’re racing plenty fast this season, but it hasn’t translated into wins exactly. Did funny car just get that much better this year? What’s the difference for you compared to the past two seasons?

–Steve, Golden

Ashley Force Hood: It really has become very competitive. Running at 1,000 feet makes a big difference. At a quarter-mile, it was never as close as now. There are just a lot of really good cars right now. The drivers in our category have really stepped up. There’s really no room for error in funny car, that’s for sure.

The rounds that we’ve lost this season have been super close. You want it to work out where you get better in each round. It’s a tough balance to find. You want to push the car, but you don’t want to push too far.

We want to run a little more conservatively, but not too careful. We’ve been on the losing end of some very close races. We’d rather have a consistently fast car in every race, than have one burn out trying to go for a record. You can’t win if you don’t get down the track.

What’s it like racing at Bandimere, compared to other strips? I’ve only ever been to Bandimere and Las Vegas. Vegas was cool and all, but Bandimere is my favorite by far.

–Charlie, Littleton

AFH: Bandimere is definitely a different track. The biggest difference is how the tuners work the car at altitude. It’s not a bad thing, just an extra challenge.

It is difficult. And we like that. We’ll have to use the qualifying runs to figure it out, and use our info from last year to make calculations.

It’s a beautiful racetrack to run, on the side of a mountain and at nights. We don’t get to see night races that often anymore. And we don’t get to race on a mountain very often.

I’ve heard there are a lot of adjustments your team has to make when you come to Denver. Is it changes in fuel ratios and engine calibrations for the altitude? (I have no idea what I’m talking about when it comes to those engines.) Does the track actually run different? Is it all just science? Or do you have to feel it out as the week goes along? And do you actually have to drive different?

–Buster, Douglas County

AFH: As far as what I do as a driver, it’s no different than any other track. None of the drivers do anything different during a race. It’s really gonna be the crew guys who shine at Bandimere. It’s really gonna be about adjusting as quick as possible, and not wasting runs. Figuring out the car.

This race – and all races really, but especially this one – the crew and the engine tuners share just as much in winning or losing a race. It’s a tough one for the tuners. My crew chiefs, Ron and Guido, really have their work cut out. But they can handle it. Ours is a great crew.

You can get frustrated real quick, or you can adapt and make it fun. That’s what we try to do here. It was a lot like racing four-wide at Charlotte earlier this year. It’s really different and you have to make a bunch of adjustments. But the challenge is a lot of fun. Once you figure it out, you can really race.

At Bandimere, the first run will really be the critical one. You need to figure it out quick. Because if you’re not making runs, you don’t advance and you miss out on a lot of points.

When did you first want to be a race car driver? Drag racing is so specialized, especially the kind you do with funny car and the really unique rocket-type engines. How do you even start racing like that? I’ve heard you loved racing even in high school. But you were also a cheerleader, right? Were you really a race-car driving, gearhead cheerleader?

–Lynette, Loveland

AFH: I originally wanted to be a crew member, but I don’t have a great talent in mechanics. I grew up around racing. Our uncles were always on the teams, on the crews. They’d show us what they did on race days and teach us about engines and racing and cars.

When I was young, crew members were the coolest people in the world. They still are. How they can tear a car apart and put it back together, and do it fast.

I was taking auto shop and welding in high school. Then I got a chance to go to Frank Hawley’s race school in California. I was learning and racing super comp cars. Then a couple years after high school, during college, I got in with racing some more and it went from there. I moved up the ranks and right after college, that’s when I really got hooked. I had a ton of fun with my team, racing A-fuel dragsters.

My sisters run it now, with the same tuners. And they have a blast. I can go back and hang out with them, remember the less crazy days. Alcohol fuel dragsters is a really fun category. They drive real fast, 270-280 mph. It’s fun, yet it’s not quite all the headache that the big pro divisions are.

When I moved to funny car, it’s a very fun car to drive. It’s very challenging. I don’t know if I could ever go back now. It’s very different. And it’s difficult, moving to funny car from dragsters, or dragsters to funny car. In funny car, you really have to make quick adjustments. The dragster I drove was more about finesse.

In funny car, it seems like every run is a new adventure. I grew up in funny cars, watching my dad race. It’s always what I wanted to drive. I spent 25 years with it. I’ve had a lot of fun.

Do you think your sisters will ever race in funny car? Do you think they could be better than you in the long run? Is there room for four Forces in funny car? Do the other drivers ever get annoyed by all the Force?

–Greg, Albuquerque

AFH: My middle sister, Brittany – hold on, I’m getting passed by a car in our RV, if they only knew how fast we can really race. … Anyway, Brittany is racing A-fuel, but she has her mind on teaching. She’s getting a teaching degree. Our youngest sister, Courtney, she’s wanted to be a race car driver since she was four years old. She used to tell everybody she’d meet, ‘I’m gonna race cars!’ People think she’s following my footsteps, but really it was the other way around.

She won at Seattle last year, so she’s doing well. She definitely has that goal, to go pro. It takes some time. It took me a year and a half testing in funny car, and that was before the new restrictions. It’s a challenge teaching somebody new. It’s a bigger challenge now, because it’s hard to get car time.

When Bob Tasca switched over to pro, he made it smooth because he’d had so much time behind the wheel of a funny car. For Courtney, it’ll be different. She’s still finishing college.

I think my two sisters are a little more competitive with each other, because they race each other so often. I haven’t raced them.

These are very challenging cars to drive. Obviously, you have to be the kind of person to catch on. It takes a lot of practice, and failure. You have to learn from your mistakes. We’re from a team that’s very much about teaching. There are some teams that are very tough on their drivers. They’ll get really down on a driver if they don’t catch a light. But our team isn’t like that. If I catch a bad light, the crew is like, “We’ll get ’em next time!” It’s a lot better.

If my sisters ever moved up, they’d be with our camp. But it’s never clear sailing, there will always be struggle. That’s all a part of it. Most drivers know that.

It’s like, I’ll be watching the Stanley Cup, and I’ll yell at the TV because I think I know what I’m talking about. But then I’ll realize, I don’t know anything about what it’s like to skate in a Stanley Cup. It’s the same with racing. You never know what it’s like until you do it.

How has your mom put up with your dad all these years? And who does she root for? I’m half joking. I’m a big fan.

–Dave, Westminster

AFH: Now she’s on the road with us. It’s very different than when we grew up. It’s a lot of weekends, and travel. When we were little and in school, mom would stay home with us. Dad was always gone, out racing every weekend from Thursday to Monday.

Now that we’re older, mom can come on the road with us and hang out. She wants to be here with us. She likes that we’re all out here together as a family.

It depends on the situation, who she roots for. When I first started out, she rooted for me. Then dad was struggling for awhile, so she rooted for him. But really she just wants us all to get down the track safe.

Did you like being on a reality TV show? Did you watch it? Do you think it was accurate? Is your family really like what we saw on TV? It was a pretty good show. Although I’d rather just watch the races to be honest.

–Chucky, Wichita, Kan.

AFH: The show was pretty accurate, really. It’s never gonna be exact. But they were always with us filming, all the time. They really wanted to make it real. With our show, our producer always said, ‘Your life is plenty dramatic with the racing. We don’t need to create anything, we don’t need to drum up fake drama.’

Sometimes you didn’t want them filming because you were cranky or whatever. But we kept going along with it. But at one point, I stopped watching. I was mad about something dad made us do, something dumb, I can’t remember. It is weird watcing your own life on TV. But we had a fight and it was embarassing. I don’t want to watch that again as entertainment.

But it was fun doing it. There are some memories that were more fun than others. The best part of the show was it always kicked our butts into doing something we always wanted to do. Like, we all really wanted to go camping, but never did. So for the show, we made the effort and did it. Things like that. We made some fun memories.

Is it more fun beating your dad than other drivers? What’s it like having a dad who’s a hot rod legend? I think you’re a great racer on your own. But I bet it’s tough.

–Nikki, Denver

AFH: If it’s in a final, it’s fun running against him and beating him. It’s great. But if it’s in an early round, it’s never fun to have a teammate go out.

Like last weekend at Sonoma, Robert (Hight) edged me in the first round. It was tough, because we’re teammates. Last year at U.S. Nationals, it was me and Robert in the final, and it was great. You couldn’t have a better ending.

For dad, he’s been a very entertainingg person in my 27 years on earth. He’s exactly how he seems on TV. He’s always running around with his hair on fire, talking real fast, moving a mile a minute.

We’ve actually had interventions with him, to tell him he needs to slow down. And I don’t know if he actually listens. At times, it can drive you crazy. But now it’s a lot of fun to race against him – and with him.

Now 26, Force Hood is eighth in the funny car standings, trailing dad John who leads in first place. She will race upwards of 300 mph in Denver this weekend at the Mile-High Nationals at Bandimere Speedway.