Residents Come Out for Annual NHRA Drag Races

Twice a year at the Pomona NHRA Drag Races, Schumacher Racing sponsor the U.S. Army furnishes area students with free race tickets for Educator Day. Since the start of the U.S. Army Youth Educator Service (YES) Day, they have hosted more than 1.5 million students to their races. During a mandatory orientation, students spend about 30 minutes prior to the races being challenged to stay clean, stay in school and master their subjects by U.S Army war heroes, world champion race drivers and CEOs of industry companies. San Bernardino Valley College automotive department instructor, Pete Petersen, meets his automotive students at the races with their online-acquired race tickets. Last year when he was earning his championship, 2013 World Drag Race Champion Antron Brown’s 8,000 plus horse power engine blew up, throwing his dragster into the wall at 306 miles per hour and breaking it in half. It finally came to a stop on fire in the sand trap, a safety stop at the end of the 1,000-foot drag strip. Schumacher Racing, Brown’s dragster owner, protects their drivers with a three-quarter-inch Plexiglas cockpit that protected Brown from the fire and gavel in the sand pit, allowing him to walk away saying, “God is good all the time.”