Some sports look great to watch on television.

However, TV coverage, which has gotten much better in recent years with FOX coming onboard, still does the sights and sounds and smell of drag racing an injustice.

Tony Schumacher, an eight-time Top Fuel world champion, and one of the best drivers in the history of the sport wish people – especially non-drag racing fans – could understand how cool drag racing is in person.

“I've said it, even in the beginning, I wish it was 10 times bigger. 30 times bigger,” said Scumacher, who returned to fulltime driving in 2022. “I don't understand how we can have such a great sport. Anyone that's ever been there's like, this is the greatest sport ever. The people who actually come and sponsors that jump into this sport, they go, ‘holy.’ What have we been missing? Why aren’t there 300 cars showing? This is the greatest damn sport in the entire world.”

Matt Hagan, a three-time NHRA nitro Funny Car world champion, 2011, 2014 and 2020, would love more racers and people to get to experience what he does at the track. Hagan’s leading the season points standings and won the most recent event – the New England Nationals June 5, in Epping, N.H.

“I hate that we had a bye run (second round in Epping),” Hagan said. “As a driver and as a competitor you go up there and you are trying to get your adrenaline up and make a good hit, but when there’s nobody besides you, it’s like ‘I’m here to race.’ You want somebody beside you. I hate it because in our economy and stuff it takes a lot of money to run these cars and sponsors are hard to come by. I damn sure want somebody beside us running those rounds.

“I just hope some more people show up and show out and come out here and drag race because we have an incredible platform and an incredible place to race, and I just love doing what we do.”

Schumacher knows other forms of motorsports have an advantage in terms on popularity based on the format of their racing.

“I know that there's some things, like you're watching this Formula 1 (Drive to Survive) TV show. It's hard to do a show on a car that goes straight for three seconds. I get it,” Schumacher said. “You know? You can't talk about it. ‘What was the track like?’ Well, it's dead straight. There's only so many things you can say about it. But when you come live and you see it and you see the day, the family, the kids, the whole thing, it's just a better day. I've been to F1 races, and I've been to a NASCAR race. There ain't no better day than a day at the drag races.”