The key to winning a championship in any sport is finding that little something extra in your team and hitting on all cylinders when it matters most.

And that is exactly what Antron Brown hopes to continue this weekend.

Riding a wave of momentum that includes three-straight final rounds, Brown added another mark to his impressive 2017 resume with his second No. 1 qualifier of the season and first since early June at the 30th annual NHRA Northwest Nationals at Pacific Raceways.

Brown edged Doug Kalitta in the Matco Tools Top Fuel machine to take the top spot Saturday evening with a 3.735-second pass at 329.10 mph amid unseasonably warm temperatures to earn his 49th career top qualifier award and second of the year.

“I feel really good right now going into tomorrow,” Brown said. “The thing is, we came up here to the Northwest Nats and these are some of the hottest temperatures we have ever seen up here and Brian (Corradi) and Mark (Oswald) and the gang have been working really, really hard to improve every lap.

“As we kept going, the track has for sure come around and those are the best elapsed times we have run with the track where it is with the sun out.

“Tomorrow is going to be the same day. In fact, it will probably be warmer tomorrow, so we probably won’t see those ETs, but I can tell you that it definitely sets us up for a great race day tomorrow.”

Brown topped the charts after gradually climbing the ladder through the first three qualifying sessions. He was sixth after round one, fourth after rounds two and three, and blasted to the top spot in the final pairing Saturday night.

Throughout it all, four different drivers took a turn atop the Top Fuel charts with Brittany Force, Steve Torrence and Leah Pritchett all sitting in first before Brown’s quick lap.

“All we can ever hope is to get into the top half of the field, but when you go in No. 1, that is definitely a confidence booster for the whole team,” Brown said. “Each and every one of my teammates, we have been working hard, adapting to all of these different situations and I will tell you, we try to be like an army soldier. We try to be tough like that to be able to come out here and do what we do. We are definitely peaking at the right time and we just have to keep pushing forward and working hard.”

Doug Kalitta qualified second in the Mac Tools machine with a 3.744 at 326.48 mph, while Pritchett slid to third with a 3.755 at 325.30 mph.

After an extremely competitive season thus far in Top Fuel, Kalitta’s pass was an example of just how quick any of these cars can be in a given session. After failing to make it down the track in his first three attempts, Kalitta hooked up with the track in session four and temporarily took over the top spot, before eventually settling for second.

“You can see by the competition everyone is running good right now. Look at Dougie, he had no runs all weekend, didn’t make it down the racetrack, then on his last run they went to the No. 1 spot. That is how deep and tough this class is,” Brown said. “When you see that, everyone stepping up, then you see that number come on the board, all of that work, all of those small things add up to what you see on the board. And when you see that, I feel blessed. The good lord knows we work hard and when you get those types of results it means a lot.”

Brown, in seeking his fourth win of the season and 65th of his career, will match up with Ron Smith in round one. But lurking out there are the usual hitters of Torrence, Pritchett and others, as the battle for playoff positioning in the Countdown to the Championship heats up.

“The Capco team has always been there, the Army team and their eight world championships, Leah, she has stepped up and she wants it bad - they are all running hard,” Brown said. “When you look at that, our Matco team has to stay steady, calm and consistent. We have been behind that radar, but people know we are there. We have got a few wins, we would like to have a lot more, but we just have to keep working hard and create that luck where we can do the same.”