NHRA News: Reher-Morrison's Allen aims for '03 title with renewed enthusiasm (12/30/2002)

Reher-Morrison's Allen aims for '03 title with renewed enthusiasm

By Rob Geiger, NHRA.com
12/30/2002

"This coming year feels like it's going to be special."
– Bruce Allen

A pair of wins during the 2001 season, one in which 15 different drivers visited the Victory Circle, placed veteran Pro Stock driver Bruce Allen third in the season-long points standings. A pair of wins in 2002, a season that featured 13 different winners, awarded Allen the No. 13 spot. So goes life in the NHRA's Pro Stock ranks.

Allen, a 52-year-old Michigan native with 18 years experience in the category, isn't surprised by the seemingly vast disparity in his last two seasons. He and co-team owner David Reher have virtually seen it all in their years in the sport and say the nip-and-tuck racing make victory that much sweeter.

"The rules have stayed the same for so long now," Allen said. "There is so much common knowledge throughout the Pro Stock pits. You have guys that have drifted from one team to the other and on to another. Other than flat-out driving ability and making horsepower back at the shop, there really isn't a lot of tweaking left to do.

"That's why you can see a new guy come along with some money to spend and within a very short amount of time he can be running right there with the rest of us. He'll just buy the right car, lease a good motor, hire a few guys that know what they're doing, and he's on his way. It didn't used to be like that.

Bruce Allen will campaign his Reher-Morrison-powered, Speedco Truck Lube Pontiac Grand Am in his 19th season in 2003.

"Without question it's tougher to win. It's tougher just to qualify. There are so many good teams and you can easily end up on the sidelines at any race. Of course, it's so tough now that winning is so much more satisfying."

Allen also points out that there has never been a time when performance is affected so much by a team's finances, as is the case with today's million-dollar-plus operations. Fortunately, his team just re-signed Speedco Truck Lube as a major associate sponsor, and will continue to receive support from Pontiac as well as their own engine lease program. Currently, three other Pro Stock competitors – Mark Whisnant, George Marnell, and Don Smith – have signed on for another year of Reher-Morrison's famed horsepower.

"It used to be that experience and hard work were the keys to success," Allen said. "Now you need experience and hard work from everyone involved with the team, plus a bunch of money. That's why drivers spend so much time touting their sponsors. We have to keep them happy.

"In our case, we run our program primarily from the proceeds of the engine lease program. Without that, we wouldn't be racing, period. It puts a lot of pressure on the guys at the engine shop because they know they have to stay ahead of the curve with finding horsepower or we could be in big trouble. If we're not making good power, we won't have any customers."

The right breaks
Allen posted a 29-21 elimination day record in 2001, the year he finished third in the points to lock down his 11th top-10 finish and seventh top-five ending. In 2002, he only raced 26 times on Sunday, posting a dead-even 13-13 mark.

"We weren't very consistent," Allen said. "I don't think we did a very good job of making the necessary adjustments from race-to-race. We lost our way at times."

Allen (second from right) has been one of the few multiple event winners over the last two seasons, winning twice in 2001 and 2002.

The proof is in his performance. After winning the second race of year in Phoenix, Allen barely qualified in Gainesville before losing in the first round to Marnell. His second victory, at the Chicago event in May – which made him the first two-time winner of the year – was followed by a failure to qualify in Columbus.

"Truth be told, you should probably take the third-place finish in 2001 and the 13th place finish this past year and average them out," Allen said. "I don't think we were as bad as 13th this year and if we hadn't been rained out in Pomona I think we could have been as high as eighth, the points were that close. At the same time, being third in 2001 might have been a little bit of a reach.

"In 2001, we got all the breaks. We always seemed to be in the right lane during the right session, and we could really show off our stuff. This year was the exact opposite. If something bad could happen to us, it did. The races where we ran good and won, everything went right. Everywhere else, we were fighting everything you can think of."

Coming attractions
Allen, a longtime proponent of a qualifying system that takes the top-four drivers from each of the four qualifying sessions to create an elimination field, doesn't expect to see any changes in 2003. He knows the Pro Stock class will be every bit as tough as it has been over the past few seasons.

Recently, to bolster his enthusiasm, Allen tested with several other Pro Stock rivals in Florida where, between the rain showers, he had the fastest car, posting elapsed times of 6.75, 6.77, and 6.79 in one outing.

"We've addressed every issue we had with our program," Allen said. "I know the guys have made some more strides in the engine department, so much so that I'm very much looking forward to the season starting, and I don't usually say that because I enjoy the off-season as much as anyone. But this coming year feels like it's going to be special. I wouldn't even say that the championship is out of reach for us."

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