{"id":43223,"date":"2020-09-22T22:00:27","date_gmt":"2020-09-23T02:00:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.dodgegarage.com\/news-api\/?p=43223"},"modified":"2024-03-25T11:22:16","modified_gmt":"2024-03-25T15:22:16","slug":"don-schumacher-racing-looks-to-extend-dodge-charger-funny-car-win-streak-at-nhra-gatornationals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/racing\/2020\/09\/don-schumacher-racing-looks-to-extend-dodge-charger-funny-car-win-streak-at-nhra-gatornationals.html","title":{"rendered":"Don Schumacher Racing Looks to Extend Dodge Charger Funny Car Win Streak at NHRA Gatornationals"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>After four National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) Mello Yello Drag Racing Series events were held consecutively in Indianapolis following the mid-July restart of the revamped 2020 season, the championship battle now moves to Florida this weekend for the 51st annual NHRA Amalie Oil Gatornationals. The Don Schumacher Racing (DSR) Mopar<sub>\u00ae<\/sub> Dodge SRT<sup>\u00ae<\/sup> race cars were headed to the staging lanes at Gainesville Raceway when the pandemic brought a sudden halt to competition, but even a six-month delay hasn\u2019t lessened the anticipation and excitement that comes with competing at the historic event.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Ron Capps has put his DSR Dodge Charger in the winner\u2019s circle at the Gatornationals three times, including back-to-back Wally trophies in 2006-2007 and a victory in 2015, Jack Beckman won in 2018, and Matt Hagan and Tommy Johnson Jr. are hoping to be first-time winners. Leah Pruett is also looking for her first Gatornats event win in either Top Fuel or Factory Stock Showdown competition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Also returning to the drag strip is the \u201cDemon-possessed\u201d Dodge\nCharger SRT Hellcat Redeye-themed DSR race cars of Hagan and Pruett. For a\nfifth straight event Hagan\u2019s Funny Car and Pruett\u2019s Top Fuel dragster will\nfeature the fierce-looking red, black and chrome paint scheme in tribute to the\nnew 797-horsepower Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat Redeye, the most powerful and fastest\nmass-produced sedan in the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Adding to the anticipation of competing at the Gatornats this\nweekend is the opportunity for the DSR quartet of Dodge Charger Funny Cars to\nextend a nine-event winning streak that dates back to the October 2019\nFallNationals at Texas Motorplex with Hagan\u2019s victory aboard the Dodge Charger\nSRT Hellcat Widebody. All four DSR Dodge entries have contributed to the\ncontinuous string of victories with Hagan leading the charge with four wins,\nBeckman adding three, while Johnson and Capps each providing a Wally trophy to\nthe count. Three of those occasions featured an all-DSR Dodge final round\nbattle for the win.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The only previous time in series history that a team swept 10\nconsecutive race wins in a single NHRA category was during the 2017 season when\nthe same lineup of DSR Funny Car drivers contributed to that streak. Capps\nposted six of those 10 wins, with Beckman adding two, while Hagan and Johnson\nhad one each.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The chance to claim a 10th consecutive win in the Funny Car\ncategory at the GatorNats comes after the team achieved an unprecedented\nmilestone of 350 NHRA national event victories at the U.S. Nationals with\nBeckman\u2019s winning drive behind the wheel of his Infinite Hero Dodge Charger SRT\nHellcat. It also comes with just five national events left to fight for the\n2020 NHRA Funny Car Championship title and all four DSR drivers in a fierce\nbattle atop the top five positions in the standings. Beckman leads with a pair\nof wins and has Hagan on his heels with a 35-point deficit and\ntwo&nbsp;victories of his own. Johnson stays close in third place just 22\npoints behind Hagan, while Capps rounds out the top five.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Battling for a championship title in the Top Fuel category is\nPruett, who has positioned her Mopar dragster in second place between\ncompetitors Doug Kalitta and Steve Torrance. She is challenging for the lead\nbased on her runner-up finish at the U.S. Nationals and while she hasn\u2019t yet\nhoisted a Wally trophy yet this season, she has won a round at every event this\nyear, something that points leader Kalitta can\u2019t say.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Pruett is pulling double duty again this weekend as she will\ncompete in the SAMTech.edu NHRA Factory Stock Showdown (FSS) class aboard her\nMopar Drag Pak alongside teammate Mark Pawuk, with qualifying scheduled to\nbegin on Friday. Pawuk comes into Gainesville Raceway second in points with\nfour events left after driving his Empaco Equipment Mopar Drag Pak to a No.2\nqualifying effort and runner-up finish at the U.S. Nationals.&nbsp;\n\n\n\nNHRA qualifying highlights\nwill be broadcast on FS1 on Saturday, September 26, at 5 p.m. ET, while\ntelevision coverage of the elimination rounds, including LIVE finals at Amalie\nMotor Oil NHRA Gatornationals, will air on Sunday, September 27, on FS1\nbeginning at 2 p.m. ET.\n\n\n\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>After four National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) Mello Yello Drag Racing Series events were held consecutively in Indianapolis following the mid-July restart of the revamped 2020 season, the championship battle now moves to Florida this weekend for the 51st annual NHRA Amalie Oil Gatornationals. The Don Schumacher Racing (DSR) Mopar\u00ae Dodge SRT\u00ae race cars were headed to the staging lanes at Gainesville Raceway when the pandemic brought a sudden halt to competition, but even a six-month delay hasn\u2019t lessened the anticipation and excitement that comes with competing at the historic [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":43249,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[575],"tags":[528,849,615],"class_list":["post-43223","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-racing","tag-drag-racing","tag-dsr","tag-nhra"],"acf":[],"custom_fields":{"post_thumbnail_image":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/pressreleasefeature.png","icon_selection":"article","external_link":"","featured_article":[],"upload_background_image":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43223"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/27"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43223"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43223\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":59060,"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43223\/revisions\/59060"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43249"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43223"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43223"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.api.dodgegarage.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43223"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}