Allen Johnson
Going into the Atlanta race, our Mopar® Dodge Avenger J&J Racing team felt really confident because we had tested there earlier, and also because we felt like we had picked up some horsepower at the previous event in St. Louis. I think we demonstrated what we could do at Atlanta and showed that we’ve caught up with Mike Edwards performance-wise. We reached the semis at Atlanta; right before the finish line we seized a bearing and lost by nine thousands of a second. But we were very happy with that outing, and happy with our Mopar HEMI® engines and the power we found.
We went to Topeka next and we were pretty dominant, I think. I was happy with every phase of our Mopar Dodge team—the car, the motor, my driving was okay. We just ran into the “buzz saw” again there at the end. You’ve got to be great to beat Mike. He did a great job, and I did a good job. The ESPN crew gave us a lot of TV time during the race coverage from Topeka, so that was cool. This little rivalry that’s brewing between Mike and me, how we’re keeping up with him now in the horsepower department—I think that’s going to give them something to cover for quite awhile.
I didn’t do much else at Topeka besides race! My wife Pam won’t go to Topeka. The first drag race she ever went to with me was there, back in 1999. It got down to 30-some degrees at night, and it was only 50 degrees during the day with a cold, hard rain blowing. She liked to freeze to death, so she won’t go there anymore.
I’ve been playing a little golf lately. I took part in my company’s charity tournament, the Greeneville Oil and Petroleum Quick Stop Market’s tournament that we put on, with our vendors supporting it.
We raised about $15,000 for two charities here in Greeneville, Tenn., the food bank, which gives out food to people who are down on their luck and helps pay their light bills during the winter, and a foster care agency in town that provides items to people who have just adopted a child or become foster parents and need support.
We tested at Bristol earlier this week. We had a good session, but more significant was that my dad, Roy, got his Mopar Dodge Challenger Drag Pak car out on the track for the first time. He ran a second under the index and ran under the national record the first time out, and the car still wasn’t quite right. He was really, really happy with it. He did exceptionally well driving. The first couple of runs he was a little rusty, but by the third or fourth run he looked like he had never quit. His first race will be at Bristol, our home track, during the NHRA Thunder Valley Nationals on June 18–20. If you’re in the area, come on down and watch Dad race, and me as well.
Pam and I are leaving this morning to spend Memorial Day weekend in Key West. It’s good to have a little R&R, since starting with the Route 66 NHRA Nationals near Chicago next week, we’ll have four races back-to-back, then a week off, then head off on the Western Swing. Should be a busy summer—and hopefully a successful one for the Mopar Dodge Avenger J&J Racing team!