Tony Schumacher started the weekend fifth in the Top Fuel standings, 141 points behind Brown with three events to go. “The Sarge” and the U.S. Army team left the outskirts of Dallas 209 points back after getting beaten across the finish line on a holeshot by DSR teammate Shawn Langdon in the second round. Schumacher clocked in at 3.751 seconds at 322.73 mph with a reaction time of .134 of a second. Langdon’s reaction time of .055 of a second enabled him to illuminate the win light despite a slightly slower elapsed time of 3.756 seconds at 322.65 mph.

“That one’s definitely on me and I wish I had it to do over again because I decided to try something different in the way I stage the car,” said Schumacher, who rallied Saturday to qualify third and beat No. 14 qualifier Kebin Kinsley in the opening round with a run of 3.720 seconds at 327.11 mph.

“Changing how I stage the car is something I tend to do every now and then. In this case, Shawn has always been an excellent leaver and he knows I like to go in quick (between the staging beams), so he’s been going in quick to keep me from doing that rather than letting me go in and sit there. I decided to let him go in this time and I waited, and then I started to go in, and I was expecting to leave but the light wasn’t on, yet. I was just amped up, the light wasn’t on, so I stopped. Then the light came on and I left and it just wasn’t quick enough.

“Part of me is just frustrated for letting that happen because this U.S. Army team, as it always does, gave me a bad-to-the-bone racecar again this weekend. We really needed to win this one and we needed for the Countdown (to the Championship) contenders ahead us in the standings to have problems. It wasn’t shaping up that way, to begin with. Antron and his team have been lights out all year, and they’re peaking here in the Countdown. They deserve to be on the verge of clinching the championship and, if we can’t be the ones to win the championship, we’re always rooting to keep it in the U.S. Army and DSR family.