JCM Racing Pre-Race Report: St. Louis

NHRA Midwest Nationals

Event 17 of 20

Countdown Event 3 of 6

World Wide Technology Raceway

Madison, Ill.

Sept. 27 – 29, 2024

Driver Information:

TONY SCHUMACHER

Driver of the Leatherwood Distillery/Waltrip Brewing Co. Top Fuel Dragster

Countdown to the Championship Ranking: 7th

NHRA Midwest Nationals Event Highlights:

• Two-time event champion (2006, 2010)

• Three-time runner-up (1999, 2008, 2016)

• 2020 No. 1 qualifier

• 2023 NHRA Midwest Nationals Event Recap:

• Qualified sixth; Semifinal finish (defeated Brittany Force in E1, Antron Brown in E2; defeated by Clay Millican in E3)

Last Event (Charlotte 2):

Qualified fifth; First round exit (defeated by Doug Foley in E1)

2024 Statistics:

16 races; one national event win, two runner-up finishes, one specialty race win

Career Statistics:

571 races; 87 wins, 88 No. 1 qualifiers

Quotable:

“St. Louis is cool, love racing there. For me, I wish we could have had a better showing in Charlotte. We’re now in that cutthroat time of the season. We went out early the first two races of the Countdown and now we’re in a position where those at the top of the rankings have a pretty good lead on us, so we’re going to have to do some serious damage starting in St. Louis. Gloves off, it’s game time. Hopefully the weather will hold out and it won’t be a total washout this weekend and we can have the opportunity to get all four rounds of qualifying in and make up some ground.”

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IDA ZETTERSTRÖM

Driver of the JCM/VP Racing Fuels/Edelbrock/COMP Cams/Dodge Top Fuel Dragster

Last Event (Charlotte 2):

Qualified 16th; First round exit (defeated by Brittany Force in E1)

Quotable:

“I’m very excited about St. Louis because I’m eager to get back out there and have another chance at more round wins. It’s looking like we’ll have a big field of cars, which is always great. This is another one of those tracks that I’ve never been to before so that’ll be fun for me to get to check out a new facility. It’s quite close to Indy so we’ll have a lot of friends and family members of our team coming out to support us. I’m just ready to get back into the car and continue to fine tune our combination. For us as a team, to get everything working together, we are trying to get the most out of all aspects – I’m trying to get better as a driver, and we’re trying to find great tuneups for every condition. We haven’t had a lot of opportunities to really push the car because it’s been mostly hot race weekends since we came into this. It’s looking like it could be a rainy weekend but maybe we’ll get lucky and get some good runs in. Of course if I had it my way, I would like some colder conditions and more opportunity for us to push the car a little quicker.”

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Can't make it to the track? Here are the times to catch it on tv!

Qualifying:

Friday 7:30-8:30p ET on FS1

Sunday 2-3p ET on FS1

Eliminations:

Sunday 3-6p ET on FS1