Struggling Al-Anabi / Toyota Top Fuel drivers Shawn Langdon and Khalid alBalooshi could take heart from Sunday’s NHRA Dollar General Summernationals winner Dave Grubnic.

The affable Australian finally got his third overall victory and a second at Heartland Park Topeka — winning with the slowest time in all previous rounds, yet outrunning sizzling-hot Spencer Massey in the final to win by about four feet. It was a finish that looked like Thoroughbred sensation I’ll Have Another blowing past Bodemeister again in Saturday’s Preakness.

And Grubnic slogged through 143 unsuccessful races, which one enterprising reporter (not this one) calculated to cover 2,254 days.

Reflectively, Grubnic said Sunday, “Sometimes you’ve got to go through these troughs to appreciate the peaks. To go that far without winning, it starts to affect you a little bit, but you still believe. You never stop believing. You still work at it and you do whatever you have to do to try and make those wins happen. And finally, eventually you break through.”

The Kalitta Motorsports driver didn’t say that to encourage his Al-Anabi / Toyota rivals or even seven-time Top Fuel champion Tony Schumacher, whose winless streak extended to 31 races. He wasn’t trying to cheer up current Funny Car champion Matt Hagan, who has five first-round defeats in eight races and finally Sunday said, “Man, I just don’t know what to say anymore.”

Grubnic simply was sharing his experience. The Al-Anabi / Toyota drivers probably will look back soon on this bleak stretch and feel like it was 100 years ago. But as Schumacher and Hagan know all too well, media scrutiny and fan feedback can get old.

But Langdon and alBalooshi have remained positive amid the scrutiny that the “Al-Anabi mystique” naturally invites. They know that when Johnson formed this team, he showcased two decorated veterans in two-time champion Larry Dixon and 22-time Funny Car winner Del Worsham. Both went on to Top Fuel championships and Worsham added three more Funny Car Wally statues to his collection at Al-Anabi Racing. But they were established, both as mechanics and as drivers with decades of second-generation experience.

So Langdon and alBalooshi might be testing their patience to the limits, but they nevertheless remain patient.

“I don’t think there’s any reason to hit the panic button, but we need to get things turned around before we fall too far back in points,” seventh-place Langdon said. “We can’t sit around too much longer, because a couple of the teams have things figured out and they’re running well. We can run with them, but we just need to do it consistently and do it on Sunday.”

He said he and his Brian Husen-led crew are “progressing and learning as a team. We’re going through some struggles for whatever reason right now, but when we get through it, I think the wins will come along. Once we get the first one, I think they’ll come often, and it’ll make it that much sweeter for all of us.”

Top Fuel rookie alBalooshi, the 2011 NHRA Get Screened America Pro Mod series champion with 158 career victories in various classes of competition here and in the Middle East, has made only 73 passes in his dragster. And the Dubai native who lives in Los Angeles, put it simply: “We are working very hard to be better and better.”

No one doubts his sincerity in wanting to please crew chief Jason McCulloch (who has won titles with Schumacher and Larry Dixon and shared in Del Worsham’s success last season), as well as team manager Alan Johnson and team owner Sheikh Khalid bin Hamad Al Thani, of Qatar.

“I am trying as hard as I can to be better and better in the car. I have started working out at the gym, because if I get in better shape, I think it will help me in the car,” alBalooshi said. “Jason and everyone on the team are doing a perfect job, and I want to do everything I can to help the team. I will keep working to get better until I am doing the kind of job Sheikh Khalid, Alan, and Jason expect for the Al-Anabi team.”

Johnson, who has 14 NHRA national championships on his resume, hasn’t had any knee-jerk reactions. He understands everyone needs time to adjust to new equipment and new teams.

And Langdon indicated he appreciates that, saying, “When Alan says we’ll be fine, I take his word for it.”

Consider the circumstances that Johnson surely is considering.

In the case of alBalooshi, having only 73 passes in the car (including test runs) pales in comparison to the numbers his predecessor put up. Reigning (and retired-from-driving) champion Worsham finished last season with 815 rounds of NHRA competition and competed in 456 NHRA national events as a driver. If Worsham had four rounds of qualifying at each of those events, he would have made 1,824 qualifying runs in a nitro car. Add his 815 eliminations rounds, and Worsham finished his driving career with approximately 2,639 runs. So alBalooshi has a lot of seat time to log just to catch up with those accomplishments.

Langdon arrived at the Al-Anabi / Toyota door after three promising seasons with Morgan Lucas Racing — and two Super Comp national titles and the 1997 Jr. Dragster national championship among his credits, along with the Super Comp crowns from the 2005 and ’06 JEGS Allstars races. So he knows how to win while competing with the best of the class.

He already had been to four Top Fuel final rounds, and he had qualified for the Countdown to the Championship in each of his three previous seasons. He brought three top-10 finishes in the final standings with him to Johnson’s acclaimed team.

This season, Langdon seemed on the verge early of scoring his first Top Fuel victory. He qualified No. 1 at Phoenix but since has compiled a 6-8 race-day mark. But the positives include no failures to qualify and two semifinal appearances. He has qualified in the top half of the order at seven of the eight Full Throttle Drag Racing Series events so far, including six times in the top five.

Following his exit at Topeka, Langdon said, “We qualified well but had a tough first-round opponent. With Morgan Lucas and alBalooshi going out first round and running so well, we knew the race track was there for some great runs, but we got in the later part of the session when the sun came out a little more and smoked the tires. The numbers from the early part of the run were great, so we’re getting close to the tune up we need to turn our season around. The Al-Anabi team is definitely making progress.”

Said alBalooshi as the tour heads to Englishtown, N.J. for the Toyota SuperNationals, “Everybody is doing a great job, and I mean everybody on the Al-Anabi Team. We ran the second-fastest run all week, but we lost to the fastest run. Sometimes these things happen, and they keep happening with us.

“We’ll keep working as hard as we can, and one day our luck will turn around. We are close. I appreciate all of the hard work everybody’s doing, and I appreciate everybody’s help with me since the beginning of the season. Our whole team is doing a great job. We’ll get there. I feel more comfortable in the car every week, and I think we will win some rounds soon.”

So if Langdon and alBalooshi can believe Alan Johnson when he says things will be all right, everybody will have to trust them.