U.S. Army Racing Duo Opens Second Half of Playoffs at AAA Texas Fall Nationals

ENNIS, TX – The U.S. Army Top Fuel driver duo of Tony “The Sarge” Schumacher and Antron Brown kick off the second half of this year’s NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series Countdown to the Championship playoffs at the Texas Motorplex in Ennis this weekend looking to make the second half the better half.

Both Schumacher, the eight-time Top Fuel world champion and driver of the U.S. Army Dragster for Don Schumacher Racing, and Brown, the two-time-defending and three-time overall world champ in his Matco Tools/U.S. Army Dragster for DSR, hope this year’s AAA Texas NHRA Fall Nationals is again the pivotal event on their drive to the 2017 Top Fuel title like it has been in recent years.

During Schumacher’s 2014 championship run, the Texas round was a record-setting one as he left town with not one but two Wally trophies – becoming the first driver in history to score multiple event titles in a 24-hour period. The first came during Saturday qualifying at Texas, when he closed out the victory for the opening Countdown round which began the previous weekend at zMAX Dragway near Charlotte, North Carolina but was cut short by rain. The second was a successful run of the table of Sunday’s Texas elimination rounds, giving him a more than 100-point lead after two playoff events. “The Sarge” never looked back from there en route to his record eight Top Fuel world title.

Brown, meanwhile, scored his first career Texas title in Top Fuel during his first championship run in 2012 after having won there in the Pro Stock Motorcycle class in 2009. Last year, Brown duplicated the feat in Top Fuel, winning for the third time in last year’s opening four Countdown events and leaving town with a 150-point lead in the championship that he never relinquished with two events remaining.

This weekend, the U.S. Army duo arrives at the all-concrete dragstrip about an hour’s drive southwest of Dallas ready for a turnaround. Schumacher, who has dropped second-round elimination matchups at each of the first three Countdown events this year, finds himself sixth in the Top Fuel standings, 142 points behind leader Steve Torrence. Brown, who went down in the second round at Charlotte and in the semifinal round at Reading and St. Louis, is 94 points out of the lead in fourth place.

Schumacher and the U.S. Army team will be buoyed this weekend knowing they’ve executed some of the most prolific comebacks in drag racing history, as well as their record-setting six event titles at the Texas Motorplex. Brown, meanwhile, will be looking to get back to business as usual with his Matco Tools/U.S. Army team, which in recent years has shown they can be unstoppable in the Countdown.

Qualifying for the 32nd annual AAA Texas NHRA Fall Nationals begins with sessions at 4 and 7 p.m. EDT Friday. FS1 will provide a live, one-hour broadcast at 6 p.m. Friday. Qualifying concludes Saturday with sessions at 3 and 6 p.m. with FS1’s delayed qualifying wrap-up show set for 1 p.m. Sunday. Sunday’s elimination rounds will be broadcast live by FS1 beginning at 2 p.m.

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

Halfway through the Countdown, you’re faced with a 141-point mountain to climb to the top of the Top Fuel standings. What’s your strategy to try and make that happen beginning this weekend in Dallas?

“It goes without saying that it would be incredible to wipe out the entire deficit at Dallas and then hit Vegas and Pomona on equal ground. It’s not exactly mathematically possible, but we could certainly take a big chunk of it back. The way the U.S. Army team has shown its ability to perform in the most clutch situations, anything is possible. You never know what’s going to go down on any given weekend, so the way we approach it is to take care of what we can control, and that is to go out and try to be fastest in every qualifying session, then run the table on Sunday. That’s the best we can do. The rest is out of our control because you never know what’s going to happen with those guys and girls in the other lane and the other matchups on Sunday. It’s all about being in the right place at the right time and, if that happens, odds are we can at least take significant chunks out of the points deficit over these last three race weekends.”

The U.S. Army team has been a part of some of the most memorable comeback stories in NHRA history. What will it take to do it again this year?

“The U.S. Army team has an excellent history at all three of these remaining tracks, and we’ve obviously had the privilege of being a part of some really historic moments over the years. With that, I can honestly say that we’ve always been a team that has raced for wins, regardless of the points, whether we’ve got a huge lead, fighting to overcome a huge deficit, or anything in-between. Like we always say, we can only be the best at what we have control over. Points are something that we have absolutely no control over, other than eliminating that car in the other lane each and every time we pull up to the starting line.”

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

Your thoughts about heading to the Texas Motorplex to kick off the second half of the Countdown this weekend?

“Texas Motorplex has always been a special place for me because that was my first race win in Pro Stock Motorcycles back in 1999. That place always has a special place in my heart. We won there for the first time in Top Fuel and we were finally able to get another one last year. Dallas is one of those tracks where it can be really good, or it can be really hot. But if it’s really hot, it’s all concrete, so it’s always a great track surface to race on. It’s one of the great race events on our tour. The fans are always welcoming us out there. Billy Meyer and his group out there always do a great job for us, so I’m always pumped up to go to Dallas. When we won our first championship in 2012, it was our turning point. We went out there and that’s where we really started our pull toward the championship when we stuck a big win. We got that win and it really gave us the edge going into St. Louis. And St. Louis, we went out there and it was our race, and the same thing at Reading. Dallas is a great track and we’re looking forward to going out there and having a great time again this weekend.”

The points situation is quite different for you right now than it was the last two years at this point in the Countdown, but you had a bit of an eye-opener during the off weekend. Talk about that.

“We had a long weekend in St. Louis and we had a great time out there racing juniors (Junior Dragsters). My son (Anson) just literally shed some light on me. He showed me that anything is possible. He was 70 points down and this was the last race and my son pulled out the championship this year. So, if he can do it, why can’t we do it? Our Matco Tools/U.S. Army team, we never give up. We are going to go to Texas with our guns blazing and get into this Texas shootout for this championship. We’re working on it. We saw some places we could make improvements after race day in St. Louis (two weekends ago). We stayed and worked on it. We’re putting the work in. There’s a lot of racing left to do and we’re not going to give up easily.”