Giving back has long been a core value of the Don Schumacher Racing fabric, and with the launch of the Chandler family ‘Giving Car’ program in 2014, DSR significantly amplified its charitable efforts over the past seven years.

The program, which enables a non-profit to be recognized through a dedicated tribute livery at no cost to the organization, was started by philanthropist and longtime friend of DSR, Terry Chandler. Following Terry’s passing in July 2017, her husband Doug Chandler opted to keep the program going in her honor, extending its run for an additional three years by personally funding the 11,000-horsepower Funny Cars piloted by Tommy Johnson Jr. and Jack Beckman. As DSR celebrates its final stretch of the Chandler family partnership, which will conclude at the end of the 2020 NHRA season, drag racing’s winningest organization reflects on some of its proudest accomplishments.

Tony Schumacher, the winningest Top Fuel driver in NHRA history, will return to the seat of a Don Schumacher Racing (DSR) Top Fuel dragster to compete with DSR at six of the remaining 2020 NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series events.
 
Schumacher temporarily rejoined the DSR stable for the Indy 1 and 2 events last month after a year-and-a-half hiatus from racing. He will make his second comeback aboard the Okuma/Sandvik Coromant dragster starting with the NHRA U.S. Nationals in Indianapolis, September 4-6. Schumacher will then compete at the next five NHRA events that follow the prestigious Labor Day weekend race.
 
Calling the shots on Schumacher’s co-branded machine will be championship crew chief Mike Green. The Schumacher/Green duo dominated the dragstrip from 2009 through 2017, having won 27 races, and two Top Fuel world championships (2009, 2014) together.

Tommy Youmans of Georgia is a racer’s racer to the core. He’s a family man and foremost, home and hearth come first; but when it comes to his recreational activities, his love of drag racing good old American hot-rods certainly holds this 56-year-old man’s attention. If he’s not busy with his industrial steelwork, or with his beloved wife Wanda, he’s thinking of ways to go faster and quicker with his bad-ass, Pro 275 car “The Judge.”

That’s right a Pontiac GTO Judge, circa 1970. Tommy’s a Pontiac fan in the truest sense of the word, through and through, so he chose to build his latest creation based on his youthful remembrance of his first ride in a GTO and that fond memory still tugs his heartstrings to this very day. One of Tommy’s earliest jobs as a young man was at a gas station, a full-service station as you’d see one now, back when checking the oil and cleaning the windshield as he pumped gas, was a standard service every customer received. Back at the time, LBJ was in the White House, and Richard Nixon was just a Senator looking to stay in public service. If you remember S&H Green stamps and free Coke Glasses with a fill-up and oil change – those were the days.

A little more than five years ago, Kyle Riley was the owner of a trucking company who raced whenever he got a chance.

Fast-forward to 2020, and he’s still a trucker and drag racer at heart -- and one of the most successful promoters in the sport. 

Riley’s the founder and braintrust of SFG Promotions, which this summer paid $1.1 million to New Jersey’s Steve Sisko for winning a bracket race in Martin, Mich. For an encore, Sisko pocketed an $100,000 in the next day’s event with a different car.

Ryan Oehler was in a stiflingly hot attic when he received a phone call that changed his life.

He was working for his family’s AirTech Inc. heating and cooling company, dreaming about how he and his father, Brad, just had “to go to the big time,” meaning the NHRA’s Pro Stock Motorcycle class. As he repaired a blower motor on an air handler in the hood, he dreamed of racing glory.

He remembered thinking about his American Motorcycle Racing Association Pro Mod Harley comfort zone and wanting to break out of it: “We don't want to kill the guys in Pro Mod, because we already beat them all. They're all like, ‘Ugh – Ryan's here.’” After all, Oehler had scored back-to-back AMRA Pro Mod Harley championships (2015-16), and he still owns that class’ elapsed-time record (5.227 seconds) from Rockingham Dragway in 2016. “They just didn't like that I was young and being so successful. You can just see it in all these older guys’ faces: ‘He’s a good kid, but damn him, he's just too fast.’” That’s why he said he was thinking, “I got to make it. How are we going to do it?”

The Ignitor in Boise had a few tense moments in the first round of Top Sportsman when Daryl Coe of Ridgefield WA and Todd Fricke of Pasco, WA got together in the shutdown area. It appears Fricke had a rear brake lock up and jumped the car sideways. The Corvette crossed into Coe’s lane and the two cars got together and then collected the right-side guard rail. Both drivers emerged shaken otherwise uninjured.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, NHRA and Maple Grove Raceway have made the difficult decision to cancel the 2020 Mopar Express Lane NHRA Nationals presented by Pennzoil.
 
“We are extremely disappointed to announce the cancellation of the September national event, which has been a staple event for the past 35 years. Due to the pandemic, Pennsylvania governor Tom Wolf has severely limited attendance at events for the 2020 season,” said Maple Grove Raceway President, Kent Lewis.
 

Jack Beckman said it’s odd, this feeling of racing four consecutive times at Indianapolis.

“I kind of feel like a cross between Batman and Bill Murray in the movie Groundhog Day. It’s kind of like ‘Wow, I’ve seen this movie before.’ And the Batman part is I feel like because the season and schedule have changed so many times, I’ve got my bag packed, I’ve got my airline ticket, and as soon as we get that ‘go sign,’ it’s time to head to the airport and get back out there. I’m thankful that we’re racing. I’m looking forward to being able to have more fans in the stands, and I’m hopeful that not only can we bag our first Indy trophy of the year - because we’re also still in line for the final of the Indy 2 race - but that we prove that the things we’ve just sorted out with our Infinite Hero Dodge are exactly what we needed to be back at the top of the heap.”

Stevie "Fast" Jackson was five seconds away from being sent to the showers for the day. Kris Thorne was too.

Together, the two sat on the starting line idle nearly two minutes during the second round of Pro Modified eliminations at the Dodge NHRA Indy Nationals. There were three warnings from NHRA Chief Starter Brad Hardy to stage.

Thorne, who races a turbocharged entry, was ready for Jackson. It's a well known-fact in racing circles the disdain the defending series champion Jackson has for the turbocharged combination.

During the past three years, the future for the Pro Stock class looked rather grim. Many wondered if it would live to see the 50th birthday it’s celebrating this year.

But the kids have arrived, and the party’s on.