Now that the calendar has changed to the month of September, one can clearly note a much bigger
bounce in the step of U.S. Army Top Fuel driver Tony "The Sarge" Schumacher.
With the most historic and prestigious race on the NHRA drag racing tour coming up this
weekend - the 55th annual Mac Tools U.S. Nationals at O'Reilly Raceway Park (ORP) in Indianapolis -
Schumacher is ready to once again patrol what's become a personal playground.
"I can't wait to get down to Indy," said the six-time world champion. "With the kind of
success we've had there over the years, we're quite anxious to get started."
The Chicago-area resident will head for ORP looking to tie the legendary Don Garlits
for the most Top Fuel U.S. Nationals victories - eight. A nine-time U.S. Nationals finalist, he has
captured the last three Indy events.
"Indy has truly been unbelievable for us," he added. "Of course, we want to keep adding
more wins. You can never get enough of those U.S. Nationals trophies."
While he's excited about competing in another U.S. Nationals, Schumacher is not losing
sight of the fact there's still a world title hunt in progress.
The regular season of the Full Throttle Countdown to the Championship concludes at the
U.S. Nationals. Following Monday's race, points for the top 10 in all of the four pro classes will
be reset in preparation for the playoff round known as the Countdown to 1.
"Winning in Indy would definitely allow us to go into the playoffs on a high note,"
said Schumacher. "We want to go to Charlotte in a couple of weeks firing on all cylinders. Our goal
is the same as it has been from day one - to win another world championship for our Army Strong
Soldiers. We'll settle for nothing less."
Presently, Schumacher holds third-place in the standings and is 54 points removed from
Larry Dixon in second. If he should get around Dixon in Indy, it would mean he'd start the playoffs
30 points behind the leader, Antron Brown, instead of 40 points behind.
"You might think 10 points does not make much of a difference, but it's the difference
between being two full rounds of racing behind instead of less than two rounds of racing behind,"
he said. "Plain and simple, we want to be as close to Antron as we can be when the game begins for
real."
