“We’ll never take anything for granted,” McMillen said. “We’ve got four round wins for a career and three of those over the last three weeks. There are teams out here that get that in a weekend. We’re just trying to keep that ‘any given Sunday’ mentality. If we stay consistent, maybe we can string a few round wins together and find ourselves in a final round before the year is over.”

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JOLIET, Ill.  — After earning his first round win of the season, Terry McMillen, driver of the Amalie Oil Top Fuel dragster hopes that momentum will carry him deeper into the race at his first hometown appearance in a Top Fuel dragster. The Route 66 Raceway is just minutes from the streets that McMillen roamed as a young man.

“Everything started for me around here,” McMillen said. “I worked two paper routes in this area just to be able to buy my first car and race at U.S. 30 Dragstrip. That 392 (cubic inch) Hemi with two four barrel carburators had to compete against some of the baddest hotrods around.”

While the drag racing competition in the Chicago area was tough in the early days, McMillen knows it’s just as tough today.

“There has always been a lot of top teams in this area and I think if you just look at the depth of the Nitro fields and the car counts, you began to realize that this is a special race for a lot of us. It’s like everyone is looking for a little bragging rights.”

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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.”

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ATLANTA – Can you be 0-7 on race day this season and still be confident? After losing seven straight elimination rounds, Terry McMillen, driver of the Amalie Oil Top Fuel dragster thinks so. “We might be the only 0-7 team out here, but we’re better than our record would indicate,” McMillen said.

While some would argue that McMillen might be full of confidence, it’s hard to argue with his team’s early season accomplishments. McMillen has qualified in the top half of the field in the last three races and set new personal best elapsed time and mile per hour records this season. Yet, winning a round on Sunday still eludes that Elkhart, Ind. based team.

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MADISON, Ill. – It has been a busy week around the Amalie Oil Top Fuel dragster race shop. Terry McMillen, owner and driver of the NHRA Full Throttle Top Fuel team hopes this week is even busier as the team rolls into the Gateway International Raceway for the AAA Insurance NHRA Midwest Nationals.

“Richard (Hartman, crew chief) has been going over everything with a fine-tooth comb,” McMillen said. “This car is so close to putting up some really impressive numbers – it’s what keeps us motivated. If you look at our incremental times from the 330 foot mark to the finish line, we’re a top five or six car. Yet our 60 foot numbers are at the bottom half of that same incremental sheet. The car really wants to run – if we can just figure out that piece of the puzzle (60 foot times) the car will go.”

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BAYTOWN, Texas – Terry McMillen will bring high hopes and his Amalie Oil Top Fuel Dragster to Houston Raceway Park this weekend for the O’Reilly Auto Parts NHRA Spring Nationals. It will be McMillen’s first appearance at the east Texas track.

McMillen hopes Houston marks the spot for his first round win of the season. “We’re just taking it one round at a time,” he said. “We’ve ran pretty good at times, we just need to find a way to win a round. If we can do that, we can kind of fight our way into the top 10. It’s a little bunched up and it would be pretty fun to make it a little messier.”

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CONCORD, N.C. – With three races already completed, Terry McMillen, driver of the Amalie Oil Top Fuel dragster, finds himself 12th in points, two spots outside of the Countdown to 10. He’s reached the 12th spot on the strength of his still untarnished NHRA qualifying efforts as team owner/driver, but he’s still searching for his first round win of the 2010 season. While some would suggest it’s time to worry, McMillen sees no reason to reach for the panic button.

“We’re an inspired team,” McMillen said from his Elkhart, Ind., race shop. “We lost first round in Gainesville with a 3.865 to Tony Schumacher and I was slapping high fives with my guys. That was our career best, the third best of that round, and if we had been racing four-wide in Charlotte we would have moved on to the next round.”

McMillen, who captured his first NHRA round win at Charlotte last season when he beat Antron Brown, thinks Charlotte could be the spot for his team to have a breakout race.

“I’m excited about being a part of drag racing history. Having a chance to be a part of the NHRA Four-Wide Nationals is going to be something to remember. Plus, if you look at how things unfolded for us last race, the four-wide deal could be helpful for a single-car team like ours.”

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Gainesville, Fla. — Terry McMillen will make his second career appearance in his Amalie Oil Top Fuel dragster at the Gainesville Raceway March 12-14 during the 41st annual Tire Kingdom NHRA Gatornationals. After successfully qualifying at Pomona and Phoenix, McMillen hopes to take his team to the next step.

“We missed at least one, if not two, great opportunities to win a round so far this season,” McMillen said. “Richard Hartman [crew chief] has our car really moving early – career best numbers for me. We’ve made some adjustments in the off week, hopefully enough to get us to the end of the track and in the top half of the field.”

The team made adjustments to the front wing and the balance of the car in an effort to get the car to settle back down with all four wheels on the track. “Basically we’re carrying the front wheels for one second – at a critical point in the race,” McMillen explained. “We put a lot of new stuff into this car over the winter and the balance was off enough that I just couldn’t steer it. With more front wing we should be able to keep the front tires on the ground and then we can start to go after the clutch a little harder in the middle part of the track. When we tried to get on the clutch a little harder in Phoenix it just planted the wheelie bar and tried to turn the car over.”

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POMONA, Calif. – When Terry McMillen rolls the Amalie Oil Top Fuel dragster into the staging beams at Auto Club Raceway, it won’t be the first time he’s inched forward to turn on the bulbs at a drag strip. However, it will be his first time at the NHRA Winternationals.

When the 50th running of the NHRA Winternationals takes place this weekend (Feb 11-14), it will not only mark McMillen’s first runs in Pomona, but also the beginning of his first full NHRA season.

“We’ve never been more prepared to start a season than we are right now,” McMillen said. “Yet in the back of my mind, I still have to wonder if it’s enough. There are a lot of strong teams out here. We know it won’t be easy to make the Countdown to the Championship, but I can guarantee we’re going to have fun trying.”

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