ENGLISHTOWN, N.J. – Five-time POWERade Series world champion Tony Schumacher raced to his first win at Englishtown in 12 years of competition at the Lucas Oil NHRA SuperNationals.
The event was overshadowed by the loss of Funny Car driver Scott Kalitta, who died from multiple injuries suffered after his car went out of control in the fourth round of qualifying Saturday.
Tim Wilkerson and Greg Anderson also won in their respective categories in the 11th of 24 events on the POWERade Series schedule.
Schumacher drove his U.S. Army dragster to a 4.589-second run at 325.06 to defeat runner-up Brandon Bernstein by half a car length to pick up his 46th win and pull within six of Joe Amato (52) for most Top Fuel wins all-time.
“With the passing of Scott Kalitta yesterday, today’s race was extremely tough to get through from an emotional standpoint. But we managed to take care of business like Scott would have wanted us to,” said Schumacher, who won from the No. 9 qualifying position.
In Funny Car, Wilkerson drove his Levi Ray & Shoup Chevy Impala SS to a 4.877 at 319.29 to defeat Rookie of the Year favorite Mike Neff, who was seeking his first career win in his third career final round.
“You come to the race track and you think there is always a chance of something happening,” said Wilkerson. “Knowing Scott the way I knew Scott I think that he would’ve wanted us to come and race because he was just that kind of guy. With that in mind, we all came to the racetrack with the intention of winning.”
Greg Anderson drove his Summit Racing Pontiac GXP to his third win of the season, posting a time of 7.520 at 200.23, which proved strong enough to get past runner-up Dave Connolly. It is Anderson’s 54th career win, fourth in Englishtown and second consecutive at Raceway Park.
“It was a tough deal to come out and race today, without a doubt,” said Anderson. “I don’t really know how you really do it, how you really concentrate and we probably didn’t very well, to be honest with you. You think about (Scott) all the time and you think, ‘I know I’m going to wake up from this dream in a while.’”
