Dodge NHRA Indy Nationals presented by Pennzoil
Event No. 5
Lucas Oil Raceway at Indianapolis
August 8-9, 2020
DSR Elimination Highlights:
- After 26 years, Ron Capps finally captured his elusive first Indy victory on Sunday during the Dodge NHRA Indy Nationals presented by Pennzoil. The accomplishment enabled him to reach a personal milestone of having claimed a win at every venue on the current NHRA tour.
- Capps’ victory was the 65th of his career (64 Funny Car/1 Top Fuel), first in 2020, and marked the seventh consecutive Funny Car triumph for DSR and 349th national event title for drag racing’s winningest organization
- Sunday also marked the ninth consecutive event where DSR campaigned a Funny Car in the final round
- By racing to the winner’s circle, Capps advanced to fourth in the Funny Car point rankings
- DSR maintained its sweep of the 1-2-3 spots in the Funny Car standings for the third event in a row, with Doug Chandler’s ‘giving cars’ holding strong in No. 1 (Tommy Johnson Jr.) and No. 2 (Jack Beckman); Matt Hagan rounds out the ‘top three,’ and with Capps moving into fourth, DSR’s quartet of Dodge Charger SRT Hellcats now occupy the first four spots on the leaderboard
- Leah Pruett advanced to her third semifinal appearance in 2020 and sits third in the Top Fuel point standings
(EXCERPT)
JACK BECKMAN
Driver of the Infinite Hero Foundation Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat
Qualified: No. 15 (4.621 E.T. at 179.90 MPH)
The Results:
E1: 4.293 E.T. at 219.01 MPH defeated by Matt Hagan 3.993 E.T. at 296.50 MPH
Race Recap:
Jack Beckman found himself in an unfamiliar position on Sunday morning, starting from the bottom half of the field for the first time in 2020. A three-time finalist in the first four events, Beckman has been dominant all season long but struggled to get his footing during Saturday’s two qualifying sessions at the Dodge NHRA Indy Nationals presented by Pennzoil. Beckman qualified 15th and drew No. 2 qualifier Matt Hagan, setting the stage for a matchup between two of the heaviest hitters in the Funny Car category. The world champion drivers were set to square off for the Indy 2 trophy at the previous event before it was rescheduled for the U.S. Nationals due to rain, making Sunday’s round one showdown all the more dramatic.
Against his teammate, Beckman was first on the gas, but his machine started to drift out of the groove and toward the wall, and he was forced to click it off while Hagan drove away with the win. The first-round loss caused Beckman to drop from atop of the point standings, a position he had enjoyed since the start of the season, to second.
Quotable:
“I’ve never been done on Sunday at 10:40 in the morning. It’s a surreal feeling with an early start to get beat first round. We’re not gonna ‘woulda, coulda, shoulda’ this. We pushed hard both qualifying runs and it was just a little too aggressive. It put us in the unenviable position of running a teammate who had qualified good and had better data than us. That’s drag racing. On a perfect day, you beat four people and they hand you a trophy and it’s damn near impossible. We will pick up the pieces for our next race. I’m not sure when and where that is. These are unprecedented times. We will be back to the form we were in late last year and early this year and we will make an absolute run at that championship.”
NHRA Mello Yello Countdown to the Championship Standings:
Top Fuel
1. Doug Kalitta – 436
2. Steve Torrence – 353
3. Leah Pruett – 347
4. Billy Torrence – 290
5. Justin Ashley – 283
6. Terry McMillen – 273
7. Antron Brown – 263
8. Clay Millican – 240
9. Shawn Langdon – 214
10. Brittany Force – 153
Funny Car
1. Tommy Johnson Jr. – 416
2. Jack Beckman – 403
3. Matt Hagan – 388
4. Ron Capps – 314
5. Bob Tasca III – 303
6. J.R. Todd – 292
7. Tim Wilkerson – 270
8. Alexis DeJoria – 217
9. Cruz Pedregon – 202
10. Paul Lee – 193
About Don Schumacher Racing:
Established in 1998 as a single-car Top Fuel team, Don Schumacher Racing (DSR) has grown to become the winningest organization in NHRA Drag Racing history. Including team owner Don Schumacher’s five NHRA Funny Car titles from the 1970s, DSR’s current win count stands at 349, and DSR is looking forward to reaching the ‘350 milestone’ early in the 2020 season. DSR owns 17 world championships in three different NHRA categories.
Headquartered in Brownsburg, Indiana, DSR currently fields seven professional teams competing in the NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series. In Top Fuel, the Matco Tools/Global Electronic Technology/Toyota dragster driven by three-time world champion Antron Brown, the Nordic Boats/Revchem Composites/Hawkeye Industries dragster driven by Cory McClenathan, and the Mopar/Pennzoil/Okuma dragster driven by Leah Pruett. In Funny Car, the NAPA AUTO PARTS Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat driven by 2016 world champion Ron Capps, the Mopar Express Lane/Pennzoil/Sandvik Coromant Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat piloted by two-time series title-holder Matt Hagan, and in Doug Chandler’s ‘giving cars,’ 2012 NHRA world champion Jack Beckman in the Infinite Hero Foundation Dodge, and Tommy Johnson Jr. behind the wheel of the MD Anderson Dodge.
DSR also campaigns two Factory Stock Showdown entries. The duo is piloted by Pruett, the 2018 Factory Stock Showdown Series champion, and former Pro Stock racer Mark Pawuk.
Follow Don Schumacher Racing at Shoeracing.com, on Twitter and Instagram at @shoeracing and Facebook.com/shoeracing.
