Antron Brown currently is ranked fifth in the National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) Top Fuel standings. He is a four-time racing world champion and has over 80 career wins since 2008 after racing pro motorcycles from 1998 to 2007.
Brown last weekend competed at the NHRA Nationals August 15-17 at Brainard International Raceway. He spoke to the MSR last Thursday in between interviews with other media and before throwing out the first ball at the Minnesota Twins-Detroit baseball game.
“Brainard is one of the longest historical race tracks on the tour,” Brown pointed out. He has won six times there, four in Pro Stock Motorcycle and two in Top Fuel. He was twice a four-time runners-up and four-time No. 1 qualifier.
Brown is the first Black driver to win a major U.S. auto racing championship (2012, 2015, 2016 and 2024) and the first Black NHRA team owner.
Thanks to his father and his uncle, Brown got hooked on drag racing at an early age: “I was 10 years old in 1986” when he discovered that he one day could be a pro racer, continued Brown. “I never forget the day when I turned professional … and I started racing bikes.”
NHRA has four top classes: Top Fuel, Funny Car, Pro Stock and Pro Stock Motorcycle.
Top Fuel is considered the fastest — 11,000 horsepower dragsters that can cover the dragstrip in less than 3.7 seconds at 330 mph or more. Funny Cars can be just as fast in just the same amount of time.
Pro Stock runs at least 6.5 seconds at 210 mph or more. Pro Stock Motorcycles are clocked at 195 mph or more and can run under 6.8 seconds. “The biggest thrill for me is the excitement, the rate of acceleration,” explained Brown.
“I think the other biggest excitement, key factor for me besides the adrenaline rush, will be working as a team. You will see the teamwork and dynamic that we have.
“Our whole crew with me consists of 10 people, guys and girls, and everybody’s gotta pull the chain at the same time, and gotta pull their way, because if one person messes up, there’s no mulligans in our sport,” he pointed out.
Although he is the first, Brown noted that he is not the only Black racing in NHRA. Destiny Spurlock and Nieshael Henry are up-and-coming Black female motorcycle drag racers. Nellie Goins was the first Black female funny car racer during the late 1960s and early 1970s — her nickname was “Nitro Nellie.”
Admittedly the sport can use more Blacks: “There have been plenty of African Americans that were drag racing before I ever started,” the superstar Brown pointed out. “Drag racing has always been rich in diversity. It just not [so diverse] on the pro level because it takes a lot to get to the pro level.
“But on the weekend warrior level, my dad and all their friends from the inner city, they were drag racing back in the ‘70s and ‘60s and ‘50s,” said Brown.
It takes a whole lot of money to successfully race on the NHRA circuit. “It’s about a $5 million investment to do this per year,” estimated Brown, “to be in the sport at this level.
“The [winning] purse is pretty decent from race to race, but the purse is always a bonus. We don’t use the purse to race. You can’t count on these to run your business. It’s all from partnerships and how hard you work off the race track to make it go.”
Brown was a three-sport athlete in high school, and competed in junior college track and field. He was fast enough to earn an invitation to the 1998 U.S. Olympic trials and impressive enough to be offered a college scholarship from Long Island University.
Instead, after earning an associate degree in business administration, Brown opted for a different track to race on.
“One thing I do have for this sport, I have passion and always love the sport and what I do,” said Brown. “I truly love what I do… You have to love what you do to put in the amount of work that’s required to be at the level that we’re at.
“I’m a person who doesn’t want to be just out there just to be out there. I want to be out there to win championships. I want to be out there to be great. And to do that, you have to put in the work.”
Charles Hallman welcomes reader comments to challman@spokesman-recorder.com.