News

Brown captures first victory of the season

April 03

Antron Brown, behind the wheel of his Aaron’s Dream Machine/Matco Tools dragster, swiped his first win of the year here Sunday in the 12th annual SummitRacing.com Nationals at The Strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

Brown, who was competing in his 220th professional race, disposed of Brandon Bernstein in the finals with a 3.887-second/318.84 mile-per-hour pass.

“Man, this is a great day for Aaron’s, Matco Tools and Don Schumacher Racing (DSR),” said the New Jersey native. “I’m ecstatic we were able to get Aaron’s its first NHRA national event win. Ken Butler (Aaron’s Chief Operating Officer) reminded me ‘nobody beats Aaron’s’ and I told him that’s a tough challenge. Fortunately, everything fell right for us today.”

Brown’s path to his match up with Bernstein was littered with land mines in the form of Morgan Lucas, DSR teammate Tony Schumacher and Doug Kalitta.

Against Schumacher, Brown laid down a blistering 3.845/320.58 run which was just enough to beat the seven-time world champion’s 3.895/315.49.

“When you run against Tony and the Army team, you can’t leave anything to chance and you have to roll the dice,” said the 35-year-old driver. “You better make sure every bolt is tight.”

He opened the day with a 3.910/316.30 first round run against Lucas, the lap against Tony and a 3.843/320.51 pass to top Kalitta.

“Our consistency this weekend was a major factor in us getting the victory,” said Brown. “Once Brian (Corradi) and Mark (Oswald), my co-crew chiefs, found the right combination we continued to use it. There are a million ways to lose in Top Fuel and one way to win. When you find that one way, you have to stay with it. We had it on this day.”

Brown, who will stay over an extra day in Las Vegas to test at The Strip with the rest of the DSR Top Fuel and Funny Car teams, moved into second-place in the standings and is now eight points behind leader Del Worsham.

He will have a weekend off before traveling to zMAX Dragway in Charlotte, N.C., April 14-17, for the VisitMyrtleBeach.com 4Wide NHRA Nationals.