Coming off of his second win of the 2024 NHRA Mission Foods Drag Racing Series season, Antron Brown was excited to return to Pacific Raceways this weekend for the 35th annual NHRA Northwest Nationals, an event he’s won four times in the past. A fifth event win wasn’t in the cards for the talented Top Fuel pilot and team owner, however, as Brown made an uncharacteristic early exit in the first round of competition today at Pacific Raceways.
Brown’s qualifying efforts started off strong when the three-time world champion made an impressive pass of 3.843 seconds at 320.28 mph, the second-lowest elapsed time of the first session, to earn two bonus points. For the first time in Pacific Raceways history, fans got to experience a nighttime qualifying session at the iconic facility. Brown laid down a crowd-pleasing 3.746 at 329.42 to land his Matco Tools Toyota Top Fuel Dragster in the No. 7 position.
Brown faced No. 8 qualifier Josh Hart in the first round of eliminations on Sunday. Hart got the starting line advantage and although it was a tight drag race all the way to the stripe, Hart managed to hold on to the lead and defeat Brown by only 13-thousandths of a second.
“We learned a lot this weekend,” said Brown. “We had some good qualifying efforts and earned a few bonus points. The track was super good and we just need to work on things. We’ve got to get ourselves right before Sonoma. If I would have been better on the tree, we would have won that round. And if we were just a little better with the car, we would have won that round. When you look at us as a whole, we didn’t carry each other as a team. Next weekend, we are going to put our heads down and get after it. It’s time to step up and be more aggressive. This was a tough race and I tip my hat off to Hart. They’ve got that car turned around. I still feel good about the weekend. The good part is, we go straight to Sonoma next weekend and we are looking forward to it.”
The No. 5 ranked Matco Tools Toyota team will head directly to Sonoma, Calif. for the DENSO NHRA Sonoma Nationals at Sonoma Raceway, July 26-28, where Brown returns as a four-time event winner.
This story was originally published on July 22, 2024. 
