By just about any metric, Antron Brown is already an NHRA all-time great. With three Top Fuel championships, 50 career wins in the Top Fuel class (16 more in Pro Stock Motorcyle) and 703 elimination round wins (sixth all-time) spread over the two series, the 42-year-old Brown is in some pretty elite company. Last year, Brown became just the fourth racer in the Top Fuel Dragster class to reach 50 wins, when he won the Northwest Nationals at Pacific Raceways near Seattle in August. He joined Tony Schumacher (84), Larry Dixon (62) and Joe Amato (52) in that club. Oh yeah, and Brown's Top Fuel career didn't start until 2008, following a decade-long run (and 16 NHRA wins) in Pro Stock Motorcycle.
Brown, however, is eager to turn the page on a rather pedestrian — by his standards — 2018 season that included just that one win and a sixth-place finish in the final standings. "We all look for a championship," Brown said from this past week's four-day test session near Phoenix. "That’s what we’re focused on. Last year we learned a lot of stuff. It was a good thing that we were competitive all year and we raced at a high level. This year, we’re looking to improve upon that and go back to the way that we used to be. We are looking to give Torrence Racing a run for the championship. We want to be able to go out and compete for our fourth title. Our main focus is to be in a good position heading into the Countdown to give us a chance to bring it home." Brown was sixth quickest in class during the four-day test.
"Testing has gone all right," he said. "We came in looking to be aggressive and push it. We made a shutoff run on Thursday where we ran a 3.76 (ET), which would likely have been a 3.73 if we ran it all the way down. With that said, we’re right in the ballpark with that. We have a new chassis that we’re breaking in right. "You’re always trying to be better and we made the right changes for it to be better, but you don’t know until you get out and run it and see how the combination works. Time will tell." Brown, with three championships in the last five years, is out to break a five-way tie with three titles. He shares that line of the record book with Dixon, Don Garlits, Shirley Muldowney and Gary Scelzi. The only drivers with more titles in the Top Fuel class are Amato with five and Tony Schumacher with eight. "We’re always working at getting better at Don Schumacher Racing," Brown said. "These Matco Toyota boys have put the work in during the off-season, getting the car right. I’ve been working out hard and gotten myself physically right. I’m coming in with no aches or pains and in some of the best shape I’ve ever come into a season in. We’re poised and eager to go out there and compete."
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