Allen Johnson
I went and tested with Johnny Gray in early December at the West Palm Beach drag strip prior to the Performance Racing Industry Trade Show in Orlando. Johnny is partnering up with our J&J Racing team next year. The West Palm facility is just awesome. They just redid it, and I heard they spent $30 million on the project. It looks it! The weather in West Palm was great and the area down there is really upscale. Just a really, really nice place to test.
We had three really good days of testing with my team and Johnny’s team, and then Johnny stayed an additional day because he wasn’t quite satisfied with his car, although he did make a lot of progress with it. The test sessions gave the two crews, and also my new co-crew chief, Jeff Perley, who will work with Mark Ingersoll, a really good chance to jell and get everyone’s personalities in sync with one another. Johnny and I spent a lot of time together; we ate breakfast and dinner together almost every day and talked about the upcoming year, our plans and our goals. He and I jelled perfectly just like our crew guys did. I think it was a great initial trial run of the new two-team set up. We got a lot accomplished and we were really tickled with how it went. I’m really excited about next year.
From there, we all drove to Orlando for the PRI show. We spent a few days shaking the hands of the vendors who give us stuff—and asking them for more! We checked out the new racing technology available, and there’s a lot of it out there. We met a lot of new faces that we liked that Jeff brought to the table. Mark and Jeff spent two full days there just going around visiting. There’s a lot of new stuff on the horizon.
I spent a lot of time with the folks from Mopar®, my primary sponsor, and it’s always good to catch up with them. I’ve been a part of the Mopar family for so long and I’m glad to be back next year. I took part in a signing near the Mopar display with Mopar driver Samuel Hübinette and also Don Garlits, and of course talked with SpeedFreaks on the Mopar Stage, discussing my partnership with Johnny for 2009 and also the challenges the automotive industry is facing right now.
My wife Pam and I met a couple that had moved from my hometown of Greeneville, Tenn. to the Orlando area for dinner one night during the show. They were old friends so it was really good to see them. We went out with the Mopar folks for dinner one night and hung out a bit. I didn’t do a whole lot, since I was only in Orlando for two nights. I left PRI on a Friday and flew to Maryland with Justin Humphreys and his dad, Walter. Walter didn’t know it, but we were going for a surprise 60th birthday party for him! My excuse was that I was going up to watch a Baltimore Ravens game on Sunday. We pulled it off pretty good and gave him a good surprise!
Now we’re getting ready for Christmas here in Greeneville. I’ll have my two daughters in, and we’ll go to my Mom and Dad’s for breakfast on Christmas Day. It’s kind of a tradition to get up early and go over there. My mom makes ham, sausage, gravy, everything you can think of. It’s a feast for about 30-40 people. Then we start running around to other houses, my wife’s family and other relatives.
We’ll go back to Orlando for New Year’s Eve, and spend it with Dave Connolly and his girlfriend at a resort. We’ll stay a few days, and then it’s time to get ready for testing in early January.
To everyone out there and to all the people in the Mopar Nation, Happy Holidays!