LANGDON ADVANCES TO SEMIS AT TOYOTA NATIONALS IN LAS VEGAS
LAS VEGAS – Shawn Langdon advanced to the Top Fuel semi-finals to lead Toyota before a sell-out crowd at the 
NHRA Toyota Nationals at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
Langdon, who advanced to the final round in the previous event in Dallas, defeated championship contenders Antron Brown and Steve Torrence in the opening rounds before falling to eventual race winner Terry McMillen after dropping a cylinder in the semi-finals.
“To beat Antron Brown and Steve Torrence, it shows you the amount of talent we have on this Global Electronic Technology Toyota,” said Langdon, the 2013 Top Fuel world champion who will make the move to Funny Cars in 2018. “We just didn’t make a good run in the semi-finals and dropped a cylinder and lost to Terry McMillen. We have had a car that’s capable of winning the last two races, we’re just running out of time now. One more race before I start my Funny Car venture and we’ll try to make the best of it at Pomona.”
It was a disappointing day for the other Toyota Top Fuel drivers, though, as both Doug Kalitta and Brown saw their championship hopes diminish, while Richie Crampton lost in the first round.
After advancing to the second round with a win over Scott Palmer, Kalitta had an opportunity to make a major move in the points with a match-up against second-place Brittany Force. Unfortunately, a loose air line left Kalitta’s Mac Tools Toyota sitting at the light, while Force struggled down the track after smoking her tires and picked up the win.
Brown made a strong run in the opening round with a 3.742-second pass, only to fall just short of Langdon’s 3.739. The loss all but eliminates Brown from winning his third consecutive Top Fuel world championship.
“It was a heart-breaking day,” said Brown. “It didn’t go the way we wanted. Our plan actually came together in fruition, but we had to win that first round to take advantage of it. Sometimes you’re the bug and sometimes you’re the windshield. We’ve been the windshield for an awful long time. Our main focus now is just to go to Pomona and finish it out strong and to try to make it into the top three. So we will just go out there and race as hard as we can and see what we can do.”
In Funny Car, the first round saw a pair of all-Camry match-ups with Alexis DeJoria defeating Cruz Pedregon, while Del Worsham earned the victory over J.R. Todd, who had qualified fifth. DeJoria, who will make the final start of her career at Pomona, was eliminated in the second round by Courtney Force, while Worsham fell to eventual race winner Matt Hagan.
The NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series wraps up its 2017 campaign in two weeks with the Auto Club NHRA Finals at the Auto Club Raceway in Pomona, Calif., November 10-12.
