Top Fuel sensation Larry Dixon had conducted top-qualifier press conferences before -- seven times in 20 races this season alone and 47 times in his career.
 
But nothing could match the visit he had with reporters Saturday at the Texas Motorplex after he captured the No. 1 position for the O'Reilly Super Start Batteries Fall Nationals. He did so by breaking his own track-record elapsed time with a 3.793-second pass at 320.05 mph to top last-ditch efforts by No. 2 Tony Schumacher and No. 3 Cory McClenathan.
 
Into the room walked NHRA legend, pioneer, innovator "Big Daddy" Don Garlits, who told Dixon, "You never cease to amaze me." He wished Dixon good luck for Sunday's eliminations in which the Al-Anabi Dragster driver is seeking his fourth consecutive victory.

Top Fuel sensation Larry Dixon had conducted top-qualifier press conferences before -- seven times in 20 races this season alone and 47 times in his career.
 
But nothing could match the visit he had with reporters Saturday at the Texas Motorplex after he captured the No. 1 position for the O'Reilly Super Start Batteries Fall Nationals. He did so by breaking his own track-record elapsed time with a 3.793-second pass at 320.05 mph to top last-ditch efforts by No. 2 Tony Schumacher and No. 3 Cory McClenathan.
 
Into the room walked NHRA legend, pioneer, innovator "Big Daddy" Don Garlits, who told Dixon, "You never cease to amaze me." He wished Dixon good luck for Sunday's eliminations in which the Al-Anabi Dragster driver is seeking his fourth consecutive victory.
 
Garlits reminisced about seeing three-year-old Dixon tag along with his dad, Larry Dixon Sr., when he won the 1970 Winternationals, as a commentator with Keith Jackson on the ABC-TV broadcast of the Pomona, Calif., classic. Dixon, flattered by Garlits' approval and completely respectful in response, marveled at his fortune of "being in the same room with him" and said of the drag-racing icon, "That's my Michael Jordan, right there."
 
It simply added to memories Dixon has accumulated throughout the years.
 
Special to him, he said, is a winners circle picture taken when he was a crew member with Ed "The Ace" McCulloch's winning Funny Car team at this Dallas-area race in 1987. Jason McCulloch, Ace's son, is his crew chief today. Dixon also recalled that Texas is where longtime boss Don "The Snake" Prudhomme earned his last victories in both Top Fuel and Funny Car.
 
"So I've got a lot of great memories from this track. We're just trying to make our own now," Dixon said.
 
Holding onto Saturday's top spot has to rank among his best memories of this season, considering the late charges by Schumacher and McClenathan. Closing qualifying for this 25th anniversary of NHRA presence at the Texas Motorplex were the two Don Schumacher racing teammates.
 
Schumacher reset his own year-old track speed record with his 321.65-mph blast to improve to second place in the order with a 3.799-second E.T. McClenathan made his quickest pass of the weekend and wound up in the No. 3 slot.  
 
"I really thought the two Schumacher cars that ran behind us could run better than that,  and I'm sure they did, too," Dixon said. "We were just fortunate to run a little bit quicker.
 
McClenathan had been on top of the qualifying charts during a five-hour rain delay with his 3.834-second run at 316.08 mph in the third qualifying session. While the Funny Car class had to rely on just three qualifying sessions, the Top Fuel class got to run once the rain stopped and the track dried. And conditions gave the fans a real show.
 
DSR driver Antron Brown overtook McClenathan's spot with a 3.812/321.42, and Dixon followed.
 
"It's that time of year," McClenathan (who's second in the Countdown rankings) said. "Everybody is trying to win a championship. We're running good, Dixon is running good, and Tony and Antron are running good, It's cool to see that after all that time of waiting and waiting the fans got to see some good side-by-side runs. It just shows how good a job NHRA is doing taking care of tracks, getting them dried off, as we're all trying to put on an excellent show for the fans, and that's what we did."
 
Schumacher, who arrived in Texas 148 points behind Dixon in third place in the standings, said Saturday, "I had all the faith in the world we would do the job today. We had a couple of unlucky breaks yesterday, so it was just a matter of dusting ourselves off and taking care of business.
 
"We absolutely need to have a great Sunday," Schumacher said. "The time is now for the U.S. Army team. If we're going to remain in contention for another world title, we have to be hoisting the trophy tomorrow."
 
He said he's focused on taking elimination rounds away from Dixon in the next four races.
 
"There's no doubt about that," Schumacher, last year's event winner, added. "We need as many rounds as we can get. Of course, we'll also need some help from others relative to beating Larry early. You can be certain we're going to keep slugging it out right on through the season finale."
 
He'll be going for his fifth victory of the year and the 66th of his career, first against Mike Strasburg. Dixon will square off first against Scott Palmer and McClenathan against Morgan Lucas. Missing the field Saturday were Mike Bowers and Terry Haddock.

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