NHRA

Memphis: Tony Schumacher final report

SCHUMACHER RETURNS TO WINNER'S CIRCLE MEMPHIS, Tenn., September 28 - After a brief time away, U.S. Army Top Fuel driver Tony "The Sarge" Schumacher returned to the winner's circle here Sunday in the O'Reilly Mid-South Nationals at Memphis ...

Edited: Sep 29, 2008, 8:09 AM

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SCHUMACHER RETURNS TO WINNER'S CIRCLE

MEMPHIS, Tenn., September 28 - After a brief time away, U.S. Army Top Fuel driver Tony "The Sarge" Schumacher returned to the winner's circle here Sunday in the O'Reilly Mid-South Nationals at Memphis Motorsports Park.

With a final round loss last weekend at the Texas Motorplex clearly positioned in the rear view mirror, Schumacher wiped out Doug Herbert in the finals at Memphis with a 3.880-second pass at 309.91 mph.

"Man, what a great day for the U.S. Army team and our Soldiers," said Schumacher, who claimed his 13th victory of the season and the 54th of his career. "I guess we're out of our slump."

With his Memphis performance, the Chicago-area resident has taken a commanding lead in the Top Fuel standings as he seeks his fifth consecutive POWERade world championship.

Schumacher leads his Don Schumacher Racing teammate, Cory McClenathan, by 166 points with just three races left in the season and the NHRA's Countdown to One. "From a points perspective this was definitely a solid day for us," he added. "We needed to come in here and take care of business and we did just that. Of course, we have to keep the pressure on going forward."

The NHRA tour will now move to Virginia Motorsports Park outside of Richmond in two weeks for the Virginia Nationals. The POWERade Drag Racing Series will then finish up in Las Vegas and Pomona, Calif., respectively.

"We've never won in Richmond, so we need to come out with guns blazing in qualifying," he said. "We're going to keep battling until the end. We don't know how to do anything different.

"I'm so proud of my team. With a couple of the guys leaving at the end of the season to go with Alan (Johnson) next year, they have managed to keep their eye on the ball. They're as hungry today to win a title as they were in 2004 when we won our first one. As I've stated before, we're going to keep riding this wave as long as it lasts."

-credit: dsr

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