NHRA welcomes fans, TV audience to Lucas Oil Raceway
BROWNSBURG, Ind. (WISH) — Drag-racing drama returns this weekend at Lucas Oil Raceway.
When the NHRA Season relaunches, it will be the first major-league auto racing event in the state to allow fans since the start of the coronavirus pandemic.
It’s the sound everyone has been waiting for at Lucas Oil Raceway. The NHRA season starts in Indy with back-to-back weekends of the fastest racers in the world.
Adding to the excitement, the event will be in front of real live fans.
Antron Brown, a Brownsburg native and a member of Don Schumacher Racing, said, “It’s gonna be awesome. And to come out here, this is the way that we can give back for all the support they’ve been giving us through all these months that we haven’t been racing, and now it’s time for us to give it back and burn some rubber for ’em.”
Also from Don Schumacher Racing, Leah Pruett said, “My first hit of the throttle in testing today just reminded me every single bit of why I love it. The smell, the feelings.”
How did 138 days without racing feel? Like an eternity. Unlike most athletes, for drag racers there’s no practices or training camps. It’s all or nothing. It’s zero to 330 mph in 3 seconds.
“There’s really no way to practice. It’s about coming out here and doing it, and I think that’s why the crew chief said, ‘let’s make sure we get some Friday runs before we show up and just try to send it down the track,’” Schumacher said.
Pruett said, “Now if I were to tell you that I wasn’t nervous at all, because it’s the longest that we have all been without NHRA drag racing, would be a lie. I felt like a kid on the first day of school.”
That thrill is what NHRA racers are hoping will hook new fans when they finally get the big stage all to themselves this weekend.
“Being on prime-time television seeing eyes that have never seen the sport before, it’s gonna be pretty huge for us, because our sport’s always been there, and we’ve always been like second behind NASCAR, but now we’re gonna be able to show people what we’re really about, especially if they come out and see it in person,” Brown said. “It’s six Gs. Nothing else that does it. It’ll shake you. It’ll move you. You’ll feel it, smell it, bring a tear to your eye.”
Don’t blink. NHRA is back.