Momentum Is Top Priority as U.S. Army NHRA Top Fuel Trio Heads to Brainerd

BRAINERD, MN – Gaining momentum and maintaining it is the top priority this weekend for the U.S. Army Top Fuel driver trio of Tony “The Sarge” Schumacher, Antron Brown and Leah Pritchett as they head to Brainerd (Minn.) International Raceway for this weekend’s 37th annual NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series Nationals.

It’s the penultimate event of the regular season, which winds up Labor Day weekend with the series’ annual blockbuster event, the U.S. Nationals in Indianapolis, and Schumacher, Brown and Pritchett and their respective teams are down to their final two race weekends to put themselves in prime position when the six-event Countdown to the Championship playoffs begin.

Schumacher and his U.S. Army Dragster team for Don Schumacher Racing (DSR) enter the weekend at Brainerd second in the Top Fuel standings and look to continue the qualifying consistency they’ve maintained all season while hoping to translate it into a pair of much-needed event titles before the playoffs commence. He’s a distant 161 points behind leader Steve Torrence in the Top Fuel standings but has Clay Millican and Pritchett looming in third and fourth place, just six and seven points behind him, respectively. While the top spot in the final regular-season standings might be a longshot, locking down the No. 2 position would put Schumacher just 30 points behind Torrence when the Countdown begins and the points are reset. A three-time Brainerd event winner, three-time runner-up and six-time No. 1 qualifier, “The Sarge” and his U.S. Army team are confident they can hoist their first Wally trophy this weekend at the track located two hours north and west of Minneapolis.

Brown and his Matco Tools/U.S. Army Dragster for DSR are coming off their first win of the season two weeks ago at Pacific Raceways near Seattle. It was a milestone 50th career Top Fuel event title that ended a year-long victory drought and, most importantly, marked a hopeful turnaround to a season that has seen its share of uncharacteristic struggles for the three-time world champion and his team. Brown beat Pritchett in the Seattle final after eliminating Shawn Reed, Schumacher and Torrence in the first three rounds. He advanced to last year’s Brainerd final against Pritchett, but his bid for a second Top Fuel event title at the track to go with his four titles in the Pro Stock Motorcycle class came up just short, netting his third career runner-up finish there. He’s sixth in the standings entering this weekend.

While Brown closed this year’s three-event Western Swing with an event title at Seattle, Pritchett opened it by winning her second event title of the season at Denver’s Mile-High Nationals and closed it by advancing to the Seattle final. She and her Mopar/U.S. Army Dragster for DSR are certainly looking to maintain that recent momentum at Brainerd. A year ago this weekend, Pritchett was absolutely dominant as she set a record national elapsed time record of 3.640 seconds to secure her sixth No. 1 qualifying effort of the season, and she mowed through Sunday eliminations with four impressive runs against Rob Passey, Scott Palmer, Millican and Brown for her fourth event title of 2017.

Safe to say all three U.S. Army drivers and their respective teams have plenty of reasons for optimism heading into the always eventful weekend in Central Minnesota.

Qualifying for the 37th annual NHRA Nationals at Brainerd begins Friday with FS1 providing one hour of live coverage at 6 p.m. EDT. FS1’s one-hour qualifying highlight recap is set for noon Sunday, followed by its three hours of live coverage of elimination rounds beginning at 2 p.m.

TONY “THE SARGE” SCHUMACHER, driver of the U.S. Army Top Fuel Dragster for Don Schumacher Racing

You’re down to the final two regular-season events. What are your thoughts as you head to Brainerd to try and build some momentum for the Countdown?

“It’s Brainerd – the fans are going to see some outstanding racing. This U.S. Army team keeps plugging away, trying to be as machine-like as we can. We’re in a good spot in the standings. There’s not really a chance to catch the leader with just two races left in the regular season. But we need to work really hard to keep those folks behind us right where they are. We just have to do what we know how to do and try and head into the Countdown on a high note. The biggest reason our U.S. Army team is successful is because of its commitment to be the best and that starts with (crew chief) Mike (Neff) and (assistant crew chief) Phil (Shuler). Those guys are phenomenal, and the rest of the guys follow their lead. Every one of them is vital to us being successful. They all have their role and have to be great at their jobs. We compete against great drivers and teams and, if we aren’t at our best, then we will get beat. Experience plays a big factor. They’ve been through the battles. When it comes time for those quick turnarounds and making sure everything is perfect, that’s when their talents come out even more. It’s a privilege for me to get in that U.S. Army car and look out and see my nine guys. I know I’ve always got a great chance just because of the work those guys do.”

Brainerd is said to be very similar to Seattle in the area of horsepower potential. Are there certain nuances about the racetracks you visit that you especially look for throughout the season?

“If a track has nuances, they don’t tell me about them. I don’t want to know. Unless there’s a groove I have to drive around, I don’t want to know about any of that stuff. The crew does its job and I do mine. I always say the mind can hold seven things in it. That’s why phone numbers have seven digits. There’s a reason for that. The more you tell a driver to watch for and do, the more he’s going to make mistakes. I like to say I’m a machine. I want to get in the car and be exact and do the same thing every time. Throw another thing in there and say, ‘Watch for this,’ and the potential to make mistakes increases. I think my guys are really good about knowing that. Likewise, I don’t have to get out of the car and tell them what it did. I don’t have to. We have computers for that. I drive the car and do my best to keep it in the groove and go straight, leave on time, and do the same thing every time so they don’t have to worry about the driver. We’ve been doing it this way for a long, long time and it’s a proven approach that works.”

ANTRON BROWN, driver of the Matco Tools/U.S. Army Top Fuel Dragster for Don Schumacher Racing

You scored a much-needed win to close out the Western Swing two weekends ago in Seattle. How important was it to make that happen for you and the team?

“Usually, by the time we get to the end of the Western Swing, we’re in a groove and our team starts hitting its stride. It’s no secret we struggled at the beginning of the year. You have to remember we lost Brian Corradi (former crew chief). When we lost him, we had other guys move up into new spots and they had to gel in new spots and new positions. And we had other Top Fuel issues, and we changed engine combinations, switching over to the U.S. Army combination, so Mike Neff and Phil Shuler and those guys gave us a great deal of help. And then Mark Oswald and Brad Mason (co-crew chiefs), and with the help of Mike Green, who came over to give us an extra set of eyes, just started our whole team to get going. We got everything in a groove and we’ve been doing it one run at a time and our main focus was always to get better every race and learn this new combination and make it work. All the media, all the fans, they’ve kept telling us all year that it was going to be OK. I knew it was going to be OK, this is just drag racing. You just have to stay with it and it will get better and I was so happy we finally got a win at the Northwest Nationals in Seattle.”

Seattle was your 50th career Top Fuel win, and your 66th overall when combined with your Pro Stock Motorcycle class wins. That puts you within three wins of Kenny Bernstein for sixth place all-time on the NHRA career wins list. How special is that?

“One thing I can say, he’s one of my true heroes. I saw him in Denver, came up and hugged me, him and his wife Sheryl. What makes him so special is a lot of people always recognize him for what he did and how great he was, but what people don’t realize is the work ethic that man has and that’s what I always try to emulate. He outworked people. He was talented, but when you put talent with his work ethic, that’s what made Kenny Bernstein what he was, and by surrounding yourself with the right people. When I saw him in Denver, he looked like he could jump in the car right now. Lean, mean, trim, muscles popping out all over, he’s still in shape. You know why? He wants to live life every day to its fullest. And that’s what I try to emulate out here in my life and on the racetrack with my team guys and try to help them and mold them to have that same mindset.”

LEAH PRITCHETT, driver of the Mopar/U.S. Army Top Fuel Dragster for Don Schumacher Racing

You return to the scene of one of your most dominating race weekends of the 2017 season. Your thoughts as you head back to Brainerd this weekend?

“Last year was a perfect scenario of conditions, of rising to the occasion on every level from the tuners to the crew, to making sure everything was perfect. We were able to make that all come together and execute it. That’s what is so exciting. It was a sense of satisfaction, gratitude and justification when everything came together. We know what that feels like. We know what it takes to do that. You practice that every single race, trying to have that perfect execution, and we were able to do that. That feeling and momentum are still with us and I feel it will be with us when we go into Brainerd because it will be those conditions you look forward to. Our focus is moving up in the points. On one hand, it’s extremely key to get momentum coming out of Brainerd, but then, on the other hand, you look at it as just another race. It is important. I’d like to think of this race as a practice crunch time for hopefully what will be at the end of the season. The importance is there. Seven points is less than a round. We could all be tied up before we even get to race day on Sunday based on how we qualify.”

You broke your own national elapsed time record in second-round qualifying at Brainerd last year. What was that like for you?

“Last year was pretty amazing and I think it was because we were able to execute so well what our strategy was. That was a solid run on Q1 (first qualifying run). Preparing for Q2 is almost as nerve-wracking, important, as eliminations because Q2 is most likely what is going to set your qualifying position. Last year, we were extremely excited about the conditions because they were record-breaking conditions and we already held that record and we improved upon it. Later that weekend, it was threatened twice by Clay Millican, who but we didn’t let that hinder us. Actually, what that did was it amped us up. So, already having phenomenal qualifying rounds and winning round one and two, seeing Clay go as fast as he did on Sunday, it excited us. We felt like, for the final rounds, let’s lay everything out on the line and that’s what gets our blood pumping.”