U.S. Army NHRA Racing 15th Annual NHRA Thunder Valley Nationals Final Qualifying Report
So far, so good for the U.S. Army driver duo of Tony “The Sarge” Schumacher and Antron Brown after qualifying first 
and sixth, respectively, for Sunday’s elimination rounds of the 15th annual NHRA Thunder Valley Nationals at Bristol (Tenn.) Dragway.
“The Sarge” and his U.S. Army Top Fuel Dragster for Don Schumacher Racing (DSR) held onto the top spot he finished with in track-record time Friday, but he had to do it the hard way to lock down his 79th career No. 1 qualifying position on a day that saw several rain delays push the final round of Top Fuel qualifying from its scheduled 3:30 p.m. start time to just after 7:30 p.m. and in near-perfect conditions.
The eight-time and defending Top Fuel world champion and five-time Bristol event titlist dropped a cylinder and clocked the 10th-fastest run of the Saturday’s first qualifying session and third of the weekend, crossing the finish line in 3.957 seconds at 309.34 mph. Schumacher then saw his No. 1 spot eclipsed twice in the final qualifying session – first by Shawn Langdon and then by Doug Kalitta – to knock him down to No. 3 before his final run of the day. But as he has on countless occasions during his illustrious career, Schumacher laid down a stellar run and lowered the track record to 3.745 seconds at 326.08 mph to reclaim the No. 1 spot for good.
“It was the best run that’s ever been seen here, which is great, except it was on a 91-degree racetrack and we won’t see that unless we’re racing tomorrow night,” said Schumacher, who scored his record 79th career event title from the No. 1 qualifying position last weekend at New England Dragway in Epping, New Hampshire on the Army’s 240th birthday. “That’s brilliant stuff if we’re racing tomorrow night, but it does earn points and it flexes muscle and it shows horsepower and all that stuff. Like I said last night, I think those runs last week in the heat are going to be just as much if not more important for us tomorrow. This morning, we tried some different stuff that didn’t work and we learned. When you go out and run fastest in your first and second runs, you can try stuff like that. On the other hand, I hate to give up a session like that that’s closest to what we’ll have when we’re racing tomorrow. The racing will be tight tomorrow. A lot of cars can go fast on any given day. We’ll get Troy Buff in the first round, and if we get past that, eight versus nine is J.R. Todd, another Kalitta car, and Brittany Force. I don’t think there’s anything easy in the world anymore. You win a trophy because you earn it. You’ve got to dig deep each and every round. We’ll be out here in the morning and it’s going to be smoking hot out, the air’s going to be heavy, the sun’s going to be pounding on the racetrack. It’s going to come down to the crew that can figure out a difficult racetrack, not just throwing horsepower at it like we just did.”
Brown, a three-time event titlist this season and three-time No. 1 qualifier, got off to a strong start Saturday with the second-fastest run of 3.796 seconds at 320.66 mph in the day’s opening session. But despite his best run of the weekend in the final session — 3.770 seconds at 318.39 mph, the closing flurry of track-record runs by Kalitta, Langdon and Spencer Massey left him in the No. 6 positions. He’ll face No. 10 qualifier Richie Crampton in Sunday’s first round.
“Today was a good day,” said the 2012 Top Fuel world champion who is seeking his first career Bristol win Sunday. “The thing about it is, we were pressing hard on that last run but we didn’t make it to the finish line. Of course, the car didn’t do what we wanted it to do. But were second-quick in the first run today. We ran a 77 (3.770) when we were trying for a 74 or 75, which it had in it, but it didn’t make it to the finish line. But that’ll be a great run for tomorrow. We’re in a good spot for race day. We’re happy about that. We’re still learning and growing every run. We had a couple of races where everything worked out right, we were running on all eight cylinders. We’ll just keep plugging away and we’ll get it to where we like it. We’ll keep marching tomorrow. We’re excited and we’ll put our heads down and just keep working.”
ESPN2’s three-hour qualifying show is set for 8 p.m. Saturday and will include a very special interview with Schumacher, Funny Car’s John Force, and Pro Stock’s Greg Anderson in a segment titled “Active Legends.” Elimination rounds begin at noon Sunday with ESPN providing three hours of live coverage beginning at 3 p.m.
