Red Fuel’s Massey, NAPA’s Capps lead DSR nitro sweep in NHRA Gatornationals in celebration of Schumacher’s return
GAINESVILLE, FL – Don Schumacher’s return to the NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series after health challenges
the past three months couldn’t have gone much better Sunday during the 46th annual Gatornationals in Gainesville, Fla.
The owner of the biggest organization in drag racing attended his first national event of the year since having successful surgery for head and throat cancer and completing 31 rounds of radiation treatments.
In addition to a “Welcome Back Don” banner, two of his teams presented him with NHRA Wally trophies when Spencer Massey drove the Red Fuel Powered by Schumacher/Sandvik Coromant dragster a final round win over DSR teammate Tony Schumacher for the Top Fuel title moments after DSR teammate Ron Capps and the NAPA AUTO PARTS 2015 Dodge Charger R/T won the Funny Car title to become the second winningest driver in Funny Car history.
It marks the 43rd time DSR has won two professional titles at the same Mello Yello event and increased the organization’s NHRA-best event titles total to 245.
Through three events of the 2015 season, DSR has won all three Funny Car titles and two of three in Top Fuel.
“This is tremendously gratifying,” Schumacher said. “My teams and all the guys back at the shop have done a phenomenal job.
“I’m getting better every day. I’m going to continue on and do what I do. This really was the first weekend I’ve been out and about. It was very refreshing for me to get back involved.”
It certainly was a boost to see Capps, his veteran Funny Car driver, win in the category for the 43rd time that moves him to second on NHRA’s all-time list. And Capps blended the expertise of crew chief Rahn Tobler and his NAPA team with his starting line reactions that contributed greatly to two of his four round wins on Sunday.
Capps was first to leave the line in the first round against Courtney Force that allowed him to advance and eliminate No. 1 qualifier Cruz Pedregon in the quarterfinals. In the semifinals, Capps was again the first to leave and he beat Tim Wilkerson by a few inches at most. In the championship round, Capps ended rookie John Hale’s hopes of getting his first NHRA Wally trophy.
“Tobler has been working on making our NAPA Dodge better and in that process I’ve been feeling like I’ve been driving a car that was behind the other cars so I’ve felt like I’ve had to be really up on the wheel all the time and that’s helped me,” he said of his quick reactions.
Capps, who was runner-up at this year’s opener, moved to second in points and trails leader and DSR teammate Matt Hagan, who was upset in the first round, by 26 points.
In Top Fuel, Massey moved to third in points after using an outstanding reaction time of 0.20 seconds in the championship round that enabled his slower 3.882-second run to beat Schumacher’s 3.873.
“Running Tony Schumacher in the final round, that car has been running extremely strong,” said Massey, who set a track record with a speed of 329.02 that his dragster tuned by crew chiefs Todd Okuhara and Phil Shuler did twice over the weekend.
“We know how well that car can run and Tony can be deadly on the starting line. I had to do whatever I had to do. It worked out. It’s just crazy.
“Just to be able to race against legends and do this, I never want it to end.”
His name also became attached to a pair of legends when his 18th career Top Fuel title tied him with Darrell Gwynn and Shirley Muldowney on the all-time win list.
Six of DSR’s seven teams advanced past the first round. Surprisingly, the only one that didn’t was reigning Funny Car world champion Matt Hagan who had won the past three Mello Yello events including the first two this season.
It was the first time the Mopar/Rocky team lost in an opening round since at Epping, N.H., that is a span of 17 races.
The Mello Yello series resumes in two weeks with the NHRA Four-Wide Nationals at zMAX Dragway near Charlotte for the fourth of 24 races.
