Antron Brown Wins the World Championship!

"Antron Brown became the first African-American to win a major U.S. auto racing title Sunday at the Auto Club NHRA Finals.

Brown, who lost in the opening round of eliminations, had to wait until the final round before he could grab the championship trophy, when Tony Schumacher lost in a photo finish to Brandon Bernstein.

Brown entered Sunday’s eliminations 67 points ahead of Tony Schumacher and for a while it appeared that Schumacher would put together another magical come-from-behind victory to take the title. Schumacher's U.S. Army dragster lost the final to Bernstein's ProtectTheHarvest.com dragster by eighth-thousandths of a second.

Antron Brown

When the win light went on in Bernstein’s lane, Matco Tools dragster driver Brown was mobbed by his teammates, family and friends in a huge celebration at the starting line.

“I feel so blessed to be in this moment right now and this is a big huge moment,” Brown said. “I am just glad we could bring it home for Don Schumacher Racing. To win the world championship the way the competition has been this year in Top Fuel and to run and compete how we’ve been doing all season long is just phenomenal. We all switched the lead back and forth a bunch of times. Is this really happening?”

Brown, who earned six victories in 11 final rounds and was top qualifier three times en route to his title, continues the great history of diversity in NHRA..

“If I can be an inspiration for any of the kids out there who have dreams, any Americans, that’s all I want,” said Brown, who became the 18th different driver to win a Top Fuel world championship title". ##
National Dragster.

And yes, he has been an inspiration for many across the nation. This was a grueling experience for the team, in that Antron lost in the first round due to a malfunction.

It was nearly a catastrophe. As I understand it, a fuel line was not tightened correctly and fuel was blowing into the cockpit.  The heat was so intense, Antron suffered minor burns on his hands and vision was severely impaired.  As I was told, "it was all I could do to maintain control and bring the race car to a stop".

Team effort?  Were it not the fact that he had a sixty-five point lead amassed throughout the year, there would have been no celebration.

As we bring the season to a close, we must conclude, if given the opportunity, and good team preparation with a vivid goal in sight, we can and will succeed.

More on Antron and the blurred road to the Championship in the next posting.