Allen Johnson
I went into Denver early on Tuesday, July 7, so I could be at Morton’s Steakhouse in downtown Denver for the NHRA press conference prior to the Mopar® Mile-High Nationals. Wednesday morning I met up with my fellow Mopar Pro Stocker, V. Gaines, and toured his rod and crankshaft shop which was exciting. I was in awe of what he had going on. It was very impressive.
Then I went to the press conference, along with Morgan Lucas and Tim Wilkerson. I was interviewed by Sara Geiger, the seven-year-old daughter of Rob Geiger, who covers the NHRA on his Web site, www.go2geiger.com. I was one of the first drivers there, and Rob introduced me to her. She’s going to follow in her father’s footsteps as a reporter. I sat down with Sara for about 15 minutes and gave her a lot of attention and time. She took like three pages of notes on the questions she asked and a few days later Rob sent me the story she had typed up herself on the computer with very little help. It was very, very impressive and I think she’s well on her way to becoming a member of the media!
My daughter Kimmie flew in from Hawaii for the race, which was nice, as I only get to see her a few times a year. My grandson, Andrew, was with her. So that made the Mopar Mile-High weekend, which is always a huge event for me, even more special.
On Thursday I took part in the Mopar Big Block Party in downtown Golden, Colo. Having all the Mopar execs and Mopar employees there is just an awesome deal, to be able to share time with them at the Block Party and talk about plans and about ways to further our program. We did a “Mopar Squares” game show on the Mopar stage, where I was asked questions and fans could either agree or disagree with my answers, and if they guessed correct they won a Mopar freebie. I had a lot of fans come up to me during the Mopar autograph signing and say how cool that was. It was fun, and stuff like that is good for me because it helps to break up the intensity of the weekend. The party was as good and as big as ever. Thanks to Jim Sassorossi, Stephanie, Andrea, Janna and everyone from Mopar who was there, because the event was awesome.
We did great in Mopar Mile-High qualifying, holding the No. 1 spot and also the Bandimere Speedway track record briefly. We planned all that and tested hard the week before the event, and to go out there and show it in the first two qualifying runs the way we did was just awesome. Friday night, when I saw Greg [Anderson] run the first six second run at Bandimere right before us, it disappointed me a bit not to be the first one to do it, because I knew we could. But like I said, I don’t think it’s the first that matters much, it’s the best run of all, and we went and kicked him right between the you-know-what, claiming the track record right after his run. The next day Mike [Edwards] went out and upped us one to take the No. 1 spot, so we knew we had some work to do.
Come race day I went into the first round a little nervous for a couple of reasons. First of all, I knew we had the car to beat, I knew we had the plan and I knew everything was there, I just needed to do my job well. And I had Danny [Gruninger] in the first round, who is a newcomer. Not to take anything away from him, but I knew I had a big cushion. It was creeping into my mind, you know, “You don’t need to red light. You don’t need to do this, you don’t need to do that.” Anytime you start to think too much, you’re going to mess up. So it was hard for me to get my focus to go up there and just do a good job. But once I got that behind me I was okay.
It was a little bit of a downer to have to race my partner, Johnny Gray, in the second round, because I know he’s having to go rounds right now, and I’m wanting him to go rounds right now, to get in the Countdown. In the back of my mind I was thinking, “Man, he needs to be the one to go on and win this thing and get some points.” It’s just a hard position for me. Then going to the semis against Rickie Jones, I’m thinking, “Darn, I’ve raced a Mopar Dodge three rounds in a row! Mopar’s going to get mad at me for beating all the Dodges.” But I got over that real quick.
In the finals I was really up for it. I owed Jason [Line] one from Gainesville, where he beat me on a holeshot in the finals. I went up there and was very calm and did my job and we pulled it out—on a holeshot, at that. From there it was great going to winner’s circle and enjoying it with the Mopar and Chrysler Group LLC execs, Jim Sassorossi and Byron Kearney. It was just an all-around awesome weekend, giving Mopar a win at their biggest event!