The NHRA Full Throttle Drag Racing Series may not have been in action during the biggest racing weekend of the season, but thanks to the one and only Bruton Smith, who is unquestionably one of drag racing’s greatest allies in terms of marketing and promotions, 
[1]the sport earned its way into the news in a big way.
Smith, the owner of four tracks on the NHRA national event calendar, including the quad-lane zMAX Dragway in Charlotte, invited the Don Schumacher Racing dragsters of Antron Brown and Tony Schumacher to join in the pre-race festivities at the traditional NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Coca-Cola 600 on Sunday evening to perform side-by-side burnouts down pit road for the throngs of rabid roundy-round fans in attendance.
In addition to the connection between NHRA drag racing and Full Throttle mothership brand Coca-Cola and Schumacher’s U.S. Army sponsorship on Memorial Day Weekend, Smith saw it as an opportunity to promote the ground-pounding machines of the drag racing world to the Cup fans for his upcoming O’Reilly Auto Parts Nationals in September and other events at his facilities.
NASCAR on FOX personality Jeff Hammond got the nod to start the pair of burnouts as he stood between the pair of 8,000 horsepower diggers and waved the green flag to kick off their lengthy burnouts down pit road in front of the main grandstand.