Team Al-Anabi Sets Sight on Toyota Summernationals
Shawn Langdon, Al-Anabi Racing Top Fuel Dragster (silver):
Reigning NHRA Mello Yello Top Fuel champion Shawn Langdon enters the Toyota NHRA Summer Nationals in fourth place in the NHRA Mello Yello Top Fuel point standings; it is his highest points position of the season. He trails third-place Spencer Massey by seven points and leads fifth-place Steve Torrence by 16 points. Langdon is now just 145 points behind class leader Doug Kalitta.
Langdon has two final rounds (Charlotte and Topeka) and a semifinal appearance (Houston) in the last four races. Langdon has not yet reached the winner’s circle this season, but recent performance suggests the team has returned to the form that propelled it to the 2013 NHRA Mello Yello Top Fuel World Championship.
Despite not having won a race this season, Langdon is surprisingly close to his points total at this time last year. One year ago, Langdon had won twice and amassed 631 points. This year, Langdon has two final-round appearances and one semifinal, but he has accrued 559 points. He trails his points total from this time last year by just 32 points.
Langdon prior to Englishtown:
“Having such a great car last weekend in Topeka, the Al-Anabi team has definitely turned it around. We’ve definitely improved our tune-up, and that’s something we’ve been working really hard on for the last couple of races. To be able to have our race car back on Sunday is definitely a good feeling. It gives us that confidence heading into Englishtown this weekend.
“It would be nice to get our first win of the season this weekend for a lot of reasons. Englishtown has always been a great track; we’ve always enjoyed going there, and there’s a lot of NHRA history there. Winning the Toyota Summer Nationals last year, coming back as the defending champion this year and coming off a great race at Topeka, we are definitely feeling good vibes heading into Englishtown this weekend. We had the all Al-Anabi, all Toyota final round there last year so our goal this weekend is to do that again.
“As a driver you enjoy these long stretches with a lot of races in a short amount of time. (10 races in 12 weeks) But it’s pretty tough on the crew guys that are working so hard every week and driving all these miles between races. So as the driver, you want to do a good job and reward the crew guys with good results on the track. They work on the cars and provide a good, safe car. You want to stay sharp and stay ready for anything so that way, if you can get those round wins, and hopefully the event win, it makes it that much more rewarding for the crew guys and gives them that little push as they are heading to the next couple of races.”
Khalid alBalooshi, Al-Anabi Racing Top Fuel Dragster (gold):
Third-year Top Fuel driver Khalid alBalooshi enters the Toyota NHRA Summer Nationals in sixth place in the NHRA Mello Yello Top Fuel point standings. He trails fifth-place Steve Torrence by 77 points and leads seventh-place Tony Schumacher by 24 points.
AlBalooshi prior to Englishtown:
“Our Al-Anabi team made some very good runs last week in Topeka. We were very good until the second round when we missed the setup and smoked the tires. But in qualifying and the first round, our Al-Anabi car was very good. It is nice that we are doing a good job, and I thank Jason (crew chief Jason McCulloch) and everyone else on the team for their hard work.
“We are excited to go back to Englishtown this week; we had a good race there last year. It is a Toyota race so we want to win it. Last year, we lost to Shawn in the final. This year we hope the same two cars are in the final, but this time the gold team wins. That would be perfect, but both Al-Anabi cars are making good runs so I think we can have a very good weekend in Englishtown.”
