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"It's what we do."

It is a phrase that has been uttered innumerably during this past week by racers and race teams who are moving on to Norwalk, Ohio, for the next NHRA POWERade national event. Drag racing is their passion -- and their livelihood -- and as the sport continues to mourn and reflect following Saturday's qualifying accident that took the life of popular Funny Car star Scott Kalitta, there is now a stark reality that despite the pain, the men and women in the four POWERade professional categories must do their jobs.

The touring pros will begin qualifying for the second Summit Racing Equipment Nationals at Summit Motorsports Park on Friday, one day after a memorial service for Kalitta at the nearby Ernsthausen Performing Arts Center. As at least one NHRA veteran commented, "Scott would want all of us to put our game faces back on and get back to work."

Here's a preview of this weekend's event in Top Fuel, Funny Car, Pro Stock and Pro Stock Motorcycle:

Top Fuel
Tony Schumacher is running away from the pack.

This is not an unfamiliar pattern for the five-time and reigning POWERade champion. After last week's win in Englishtown, N.J., Schumacher's U.S. Army team has bolted to a spacious 244-point lead over second-place Antron Brown. In fact, Schumacher's decisive victory came at the expense of at least three of the toughest customers in the category: Brown in Round 2, Cory McClenathan in the semifinals and Brandon Bernstein (on a holeshot) in the final.

Schumacher's win was total, but unlike the pre-Countdown days, it's more about advancing to the Countdown to One than about building an insurmountable points lead. Unless the rest of the Top Fuel class can begin running as quickly and consistently as Schumacher, who now has five wins in seven final rounds -- and is the defending event champion in Norwalk -- Tony will be an "Army of One" heading into the late-season playoffs.

Expect an outpouring of emotion and appreciation from the assembled fans when any of the three Kalitta Racing entries pulls to the line. Doug Kalitta (Scott's cousin), David Grubnic and Hillary Will all will be racing this weekend after withdrawing from Englishtown following Kalitta's mishap.

Others in Top Fuel to watch this weekend: Brandon Bernstein had the quickest car in the E-town final, but his reaction time (.081 seconds to Schumacher's .034) cost him his first win of the year; Cory McClenathan was also a holeshot victim last week, losing in the semis to Schumacher with an uncharacteristically late .131 reaction time; "Hot Rod" Fuller advanced to the Joliet final before falling in the E-town semis to Bernstein, giving him a 5-2 round record in the last two races.

Funny Car
The shock of Kalitta's fatal accident will still be fresh in the minds of the Funny Car community this weekend. One driver most outspoken about the sense of loss being shared throughout the sport is Tim Wilkerson, whose third win of 2008 last week was severely blunted by Kalitta's death.

Wilkerson is the biggest surprise of the season, taking a commanding lead in the points while surrounded by a host of multi-car teams boasting lavish racing budgets. His four elapsed times in E-town on a hot racetrack were all within six-hundredths of a second of each other, and by maintaining lane choice throughout eliminations, Wilkerson made the most of his opportunities.

Meanwhile, the class's two biggest operations, John Force Racing and Don Schumacher Racing, will be out to pick up their paces. Force's rookie driver, Mike Neff, lost to Wilkerson in the E-town final by six-thousandths of a second, but that was the only upbeat news to be found from either team. The three Schumacher drivers who qualified -- Gary Scelzi, Ron Capps and Jerry Toliver -- all fell in Round 1 while Force was the only JFR driver besides Neff to survive Round 2.

Weather could be a factor on Friday and Saturday with thunderstorms -- some possibly severe -- forecast for the area. But for now, the downbeat mood within the F/C class amidst the continuing squabble to make the top 10 with seven more races in the Countdown to 10 will be the prevailing battleground this weekend.

Pro Stock
The $50,000 winner's check in the 24th K&N Horsepower Challenge will be dispensed to the Pro Stock driver who bullies his way through the select eight-car field as part of Saturday's qualifying show. Greg Anderson, who accumulated the most points in a special qualifying fund tallied over the past year, will head into the Challenge as the top seed for the fifth consecutive year.

All this comes on the heels of his latest national event win last week in E-town. Anderson continues to trail Kurt Johnson, who leads the POWERade points and hasn't been the unshakable dreadnought he has been in the past. In fact, Anderson will be the first one to admit that the parity in Pro Stock is as tight as it's ever been. Only 191 points separate the top five drivers in the standings, and at times during Anderson's three remarkable POWERade titles, that margin was the distance between him and his closest pursuer.

It will be a homecoming of sorts in Norwalk this weekend as former NBA star and veteran Pro Stock owner/driver Larry Nance will try to make the 16-car field after a long absence, while Richie Stevens will be aboard Kenny Koretsky's NitroFish Chevy Cobalt after losing his ride with Don Schumacher's Mopar effort at the end of last year.

Keep an eye on: Dave Connolly, the defending Norwalk champion, who continues to move closer to the top 10 after giving the entire category a five-race head start to begin the year. He has moved from 25th to 11th in the points by virtue of one win out of three final-round appearances, including last week in E-town, in the six races he has competed; Warren Johnson, whose holeshot loss to V. Gaines in the first round last week has placed him in serious jeopardy of being overtaken by Connolly for 10th place; Mike Edwards, who fouled out in the E-town semifinals to Anderson but has a car that can win when he hits the combination.

Pro Stock Motorcycle
Being outnumbered doesn't necessarily mean you'll be outrun.

Chip Ellis proved that last week with an impressive win in Englishtown aboard the only Suzuki in the class that has tasted an NHRA winner's circle this year. Ellis and his Don Schumacher Racing crew chief Steve Tartaglia were on a mission in E-town, not only scoring the win but posting the event's top PSM speed, 192.88 mph, and picking off No. 1 qualifier Chris Rivas in the final when Rivas left too soon and fouled out.

Three-time POWERade champion and defending Norwalk champ Andrew Hines leads in the standings but got tripped up in the E-town semis by Rivas. Hines won last year's event by beating Matt Smith in the final, but it was Smith who went on to dethrone Hines for the 2007 category crown. There's a lot of swirling chemistry circulating in the bike class, and the Harley-Davidson/Buell/Suzuki mix has now intensified thanks to Ellis' underdog victory at Raceway Park.

Don't overlook: Matt Guidera, the Gainesville winner, who has now lost in three straight first rounds and has dropped from first to fifth in the points; Ed Krawiec, Hines' teammate, who has won only six rounds of eliminations this year and has the Suzuki of Craig Treble on his tail for seventh place; three-time POWERade champion Angelle Sampey, who remains winless this year with one of the most talent-heavy teams in the class.

Bill Stephens covers the NHRA for ESPN.com.