GAINESVILLE, Fla. (AP) — It’s an hour after Maddi Gordon lost in the semifinals of the NHRA season opener, and fans are packed five or six deep at her hauler. They’re holding T-shirts, promotional cards and scraps of paper. They have cellphones at the ready and don’t seem to care that dark clouds are rolling in.
Rain and lightning are on the way. So is Maddi Gordon, and she’s even more electric and seemingly worth the risk.
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NHRA driver Maddi Gordon waits in her dragster as her team gets her Top Fuel entry ready for before an elimination run at the Gatornationals, at Gainesville Raceway in Gainesville, Fla., Sunday, March 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Mark Long)
NHRA driver Maddi Gordon waits in her dragster before an elimination run at the Gatornationals, at Gainesville Raceway in Gainesville, Fla., Sunday, March 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Mark Long)
NHRA driver Maddi Gordon waits in the staging lanes before an elimination run at the Gatornationals, at Gainesville Raceway in Gainesville, Fla., Sunday, March 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Mark Long)
NHRA driver Maddi Gordon jokes with teammates in the staging lanes before an elimination run at the Gatornationals, at Gainesville Raceway in Gainesville, Fla., Sunday, March 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Mark Long)
The 21-year-old Top Fuel rookie delighted crowds and dazzled colleagues at the Gatornationals, becoming a fan favorite after just a few passes in the Florida sun. Her passion and excitement shined in the garage, in the cockpit and in interviews. And it was more than youthful exuberance.
It felt like hope.
Gordon could be the jolt the series needs as it tries to replace 16-time Funny Car champion John Force as the face of drag racing. Force formally retired in November, nearly 18 months after sustaining a traumatic brain injury in a terrifying crash in Richmond, Virginia. Force hasn’t raced since, and his youngest daughter also stepped away after last season to start a family.
The opener in Gainesville marked the first NHRA season without a Force on the entry list since 1976 — a nearly 50-year run in which Force, along with his racing daughters, rose to prominence and welcomed the spotlight.
Three-time NASCAR champion Tony Stewart and wife Leah Pruett are racing in the same class as Gordon and provide a season-long storyline. Stewart and Pruett are arguably the most popular drivers in the garage, but they also are seasoned vets focused on their own family and other ventures.
Gordon, meanwhile, is a third generation drag racer who has spent the better part of her life working on dragsters and trying to find ways to go faster.
And she seems poised to take center stage.
“It really is the opportunity of a lifetime,” Gordon told The Associated Press. “I say it changed my life, but it really, really did. Everything in my life is different — except for where I live and my family — and I’m just enjoying the heck out of it.”
Gordon’s high-octane, postrace interviews turned heads during qualifying. But what she did in eliminations really grabbed everyone’s attention.
She upset second-seeded and 2013 Top Fuel champion Shawn Langdon in the opening round and then stunned eight-time champ Tony Schumacher, the No. 7 seed, in the next.
Suddenly, the No. 15 qualifier was in the semifinals — and just about everyone was rooting for her. Pruett gave her a shoutout on TV, and Stewart and others stopped by her dragster for words of encouragement.
Gordon responded to all the adulation by taking a victory lap of sorts when she rode a golf cart past the grandstands after the first victory.
“I have never, ever, ever seen a crowd like that,” she said. “They were standing up, clapping, cheering, and I was just so amazed. It was more than I could ever have imagined. We were really, really happy with the results.”
She has a chance for an encore at the Arizona Nationals beginning Friday. No one would be surprised to see the Californian accomplish more.
Gordon won seven division championships driving a junior dragster. She earned her Top Alcohol Funny Car license at age 19 and spent the last two years driving her family’s entry in a Top Alcohol Funny Car.
Her father, Doug, is a three-time champion in the division. Her grandfather, Mike, raced for seven years. And her sister, Macie, competes in Super Comp and Top Dragster.
Car owner Ron Capps has known the Gordon family for decades but seeing the sisters doing most of the pit-crew work on Doug’s dragster in 2020 caught his eye.
“Doug went out and won the whole race, and these two girls were working on the car,” Capps recalled. “One on the engine, the other on the clutch. That was just so cool to watch. So I’ve kept my eye on Maddi ever since.”
And when Capps started making plans to add a second car at Ron Capps Motorsports, Maddi Gordon was the first — and only — choice. He asked Doug’s permission, and Maddi got the news while riding motorcycles with her family.
“You guys told me this while I’m riding a motorcycle?” she quipped. “I’m going to wreck this thing before I get to live this experience.”
Capps, a three-time champion in the Funny Car class, used his longstanding ties with Napa to land Carlyle Tools as Gordon’s primary sponsor. Monster Energy has since jumped aboard, believing Gordon might be the next big thing in motorsports.
“I told everybody who would listen: ‘You’re going to find out what I already know pretty soon,’” Capps said. “She’s done everything right. I haven't had to say anything more than once as far as advice in the car. And she went out and was perfect.”
Not quite. Gordon lost to defending Top Fuel champion Doug Kalitta in the semifinals. She handled the loss gracefully — another display of her plus personality that drew comparisons to Force’s magnetism.
She eventually emerged from a lengthy debrief with her team to find dozens of fans waiting for her in the rain. Capps even brought over some of his diecast cars for Gordon to sign for the throng. Much like she did on the track, she didn’t disappoint.
From there, she went back to the starting line to watch the finals — where she expects to be soon.
“That’s my favorite place on Earth,” she said. “I just love the racetrack. I love working on cars. I love being around cars. I love being a fan. I just love the racetrack. I would seriously have to try to not be enthusiastic at the track.
“I watch people do interviews after they get out of the car, and they’re all chill and calm, and I’m like, 'Man, I don’t know how they do that.' I could never.”
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NHRA driver Maddi Gordon waits in her dragster as her team gets her Top Fuel entry ready for before an elimination run at the Gatornationals, at Gainesville Raceway in Gainesville, Fla., Sunday, March 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Mark Long)
NHRA driver Maddi Gordon waits in her dragster before an elimination run at the Gatornationals, at Gainesville Raceway in Gainesville, Fla., Sunday, March 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Mark Long)
NHRA driver Maddi Gordon waits in the staging lanes before an elimination run at the Gatornationals, at Gainesville Raceway in Gainesville, Fla., Sunday, March 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Mark Long)
NHRA driver Maddi Gordon jokes with teammates in the staging lanes before an elimination run at the Gatornationals, at Gainesville Raceway in Gainesville, Fla., Sunday, March 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Mark Long)
LOS LLANITOS, México (AP) — On a dirt field on Mexico’s Pacific coast, five cousins between the ages of 8 and 13 strip down and kick off their shoes. Nearby, adults help them fasten the pre-Hispanic-style “fajado,” securing loincloths and leather belts that wrap around their hips.
The Osuna children grab the rubber ball, all 3.2 kilograms of it — around 7 pounds or seven times heavier than a soccer ball — and begin playing. Only the hips may touch it, forcing players to leap through the air or dive low when it skims the ground.
As Mexico prepares to co-host the 2026 FIFA World Cup, the nation is looking back 3,400 years to one of the oldest team sports: the ancient ballgame known as ulama, a ritual practice nearly erased during the Spanish conquest that survived only in the remote pockets of northwestern Mexico before its late 20th-century rebirth. Today, authorities and its modern players are leveraging the momentum of international soccer to shine a spotlight on the ancient sport once again.
While players acknowledge that tourism fueled the sport’s revival, many worry that projecting an “exotic” image undermines a tradition central to their identity.
“We must rid the game of the notion that it is a living fossil,” said Emilie Carreón, a researcher at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, UNAM, and director of a project aimed at studying and practicing the sport.
That's exactly what the Osuna family is trying to do. After ulama player Aurelio Osuna died, his widow, María Herrera, 53, continued his legacy, teaching the ballgame to their grandchildren in their small village in Sinaloa, 1,000 kilometers (620 miles) northwest of Mexico City.
“This seed will bear fruit someday,” she said.
According to the Popol Vuh, the sacred Mayan book, the world was created from a ballgame, where light and darkness clashed to balance life and death and set the universe in motion.
Long before the Maya, the Olmecs — the earliest known Mesoamerican civilization — practiced the sport; the recreation of this clash of opposing forces was common in various pre-Hispanic cultures. The evidence is in millennial rubber balls unearthed in Mexico and in nearly 2,000 ball courts found from Nicaragua to Arizona.
The game, depicted in codices, stone carvings and sculptures, had many variations and meanings, from fertility or war ceremonies, to political acts and even sacrifices.
While some players were beheaded — possibly the losers — Guatemalan archaeologist and anthropologist Carlos Navarrete explained this occurred only during specific periods and in certain regions. The physically demanding game was primarily a big social event, drawing crowds for fun and betting.
Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés was impressed by the spectacle presented by the Aztec emperor Moctezuma but the Spanish ultimately banned ulama and ordered the destruction of its courts, likely viewing the tradition as a form of resistance to Christianity. For the Catholic Church “the ball was the living devil,” Carreón said.
The game — played by hitting the ball with the hip, the forearm or a mallet — survived only on the Mexican northern Pacific coast, where the colonial process led by Jesuit priests was less aggressive and ulama was accepted in Catholic festivities, said Manuel Aguilar Moreno, a professor of art history at California State University.
On the opening day of the 1968 Mexico City Olympics, spectators watched as burly men contorted their bodies in unexpected ways to keep the rubber ball moving for as long as possible. The exhibition sparked studies about the ballgame and how to preserve it in the following decades.
Luis Aurelio Osuna, 30, Herrera’s eldest son, began playing hip ulama after school, just as his father did decades ago in Los Llanitos, a ranch next to the port city of Mazatlán. Now his three children also play.
Osuna and his mother teach the children how to hit the ball and guide them through the complicated rules, which include a scoring system with points that are won and lost.
They do it out of passion, but also out of pragmatism in a state where organized crime is pervasive.
“We need to find a way to keep them entertained with good things,” said Osuna.
Hip ulama teams have up to six players and the Osuna family sometimes participates in tournaments or exhibitions.
Decades ago, matches were big events tied to religious feasts, sometimes stretching on for an entire week. But those days are gone, as interest waned and rubber balls became hard to get.
In the 1980s, filmmaker Roberto Rochín documented the work of perhaps the last rubber ball-maker in the mountains of Sinaloa. The artisan made them similar to the Olmecs, who discovered that mixing hot rubber sap with a plant created a strong, elastic and durable material. This civilization made some of the oldest balls of the world.
During the 1990s, staff from a resort in the Mexican Caribbean traveled across the country in search of Sinaloan families who could represent the ballgame as a tourist attraction in the Riviera Maya, where no one played it anymore.
“It’s pure spectacle: they paint their faces and put on feathered costumes,” Herrera said. Yet, she acknowledges the value. “That’s where the revival began.”
The ballgame began to spread and to be known outside Mexico. Osuna, with the family team his father had formed, ended up playing hip ulama in a Roman amphitheater in Italy. It attracted so much attention that they were hired for a deodorant commercial, he said.
As the World Cup approaches, authorities and corporations are launching exhibitions in Mexico City and Guadalajara, and featuring ulama players in ad campaigns highlighting Mexican heritage — a move that has sparked mixed feelings.
“We’re not circus monkeys,” says Ángel Ortega, a 21-year-old ulama player from Mexico City who recently participated in a TV commercial alongside football players.
Ilse Sil, a player and member of the UNAM project led by Carreón, believes that institutional support will help to preserve ulama but officials need to promote the game in communities and schools to recruit more young players, as it remains a marginal sport with approximately 1,000 players mainly in México and Guatemala.
In Los Llanitos, Herrera’s grandchildren love playing. They don't care where — in the dirt field, in a court or even in the house corridor — but always with the precious inheritance: a handmade decades-old rubber ball from the mountains of Sinaloa. They say it cushions the blows better.
Eight-year-old Kiki is the most enthusiastic. He says he is determined to keep practicing until he fulfills the dream of leading a team of his own.
Follow AP’s coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america
Juan Osuna plays ulama, a traditional Mesoamerican ballgame dating to pre-Hispanic times, in Los Llanitos on the outskirts of Mazatlan, Mexico, Saturday, April 25, 2026. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)
The Osuna family poses for a photo before a match of ulama, a traditional Mesoamerican ballgame dating to pre-Hispanic times, that they organized in Los Llanitos on the outskirts of Mazatlan, Mexico, Saturday, April 25, 2026. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)
Iker Salgueido plays ulama, a traditional Mesoamerican ballgame dating to pre-Hispanic times, in Los Llanitos on the outskirts of Mazatlan, Mexico, Saturday, April 25, 2026. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)
Iker Salgueiro stands still as an adult fastens a pre-Hispanic-style “fajado,” or leather belt, in preparation for ulama, a traditional Mesoamerican ballgame dating to pre-Hispanic times, in Los Llanitos on the outskirts of Mazatlan, Mexico, Saturday, April 25, 2026. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)
Youth play ulama, a traditional Mesoamerican ballgame dating to pre-Hispanic times, in Los Llanitos on the outskirts of Mazatlan, Mexico, Saturday, April 25, 2026. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)
