TOPEKA, Kan. — The ninth race of the NHRA Full Throttle Drag Race takes place this weekend at Heartland Park Topeka and Terry McMillen finds his Amalie Oil Top Fuel dragster winless so far on the NHRA tour.
“I don’t think you can ever underestimate the depth of talented teams here in the NHRA,” McMillen said. “There’s no such thing as an easy round. We’re going to have to win our first round the old fashion way and earn it.”
“These other teams have so much data at these tracks it’s amazing. If we didn’t have a GPS we couldn’t even figure out how to get to some of these tracks we haven’t raced at before much less have a notebook full of data.”
While losing eight rounds in a row can be challenging for a first year full-time team, McMillen finds motivation from fans.
“I think these NHRA fans are hungry to see us win our first round,” McMillen said. “Their support is motivating. I can’t tell you how many emails, Facebook and Twitter comments we get. Between that and just visiting with fans and the track and spending time with them, it’s like they’re all a part of our team. It’s really encouraging.”
Through the first eight races, McMillen has faced an opponent who has gone on to be a final round contestant four times.
“I guess that means we have a 50-50 chance of going to the final round if we win first round,” McMillen laughed in reference to the stat.
“We met with Amalie last week and talk to many of our marketing partners and each of them tell us how happy they are with our competitive qualifying performances,” said McMillen. “I just want to over-deliver for them and win some rounds.”
