NHRA News: Johnson Jr. was snakebit by drag racing bug early (7/01/2004)

Johnson Jr. was snakebit by drag racing bug early

7/01/2004

Tommy Johnson Jr.

Tommy Johnson Jr. was destined to drag race. Just two weeks after his birth, the Iowa native attended his first drag race. It should come as no surprise that some three decades later, Johnson has collected five "Wally" trophies and is now driving for arguably the biggest icon in the sport.

Johnson's father, Tommy Sr., a longtime drag racer who operates his own mail-order parts business, piloted a variety of Chevrolet Camaros in an assortment of sportsmen categories. The elder Johnson also authored the popular 'Tommy's B.S.' column in his advertisements in the pages of drag racing's bible, National DRAGSTER.

Born into a racing family in Ottumwa, Iowa, Johnson spent the majority of his younger days at quarter-mile tracks across the country with his parents. Like all young boys, he played Little League baseball and rode bikes with his buddies, but his interest was tunneled towards the race track and he began riding mini bikes at eight years-old.

The family that races together …

Tommy Johnson Jr. grew up at the dragstrip, and never left.
Photo courtesy of snakeracing.com

"I don't ever remember not going to the dragstrip," Johnson said. "I started racing when I was eight on mini-bikes at the local dragstrip. They didn't have Jr. dragsters back in the early '70s. I've been pretty much full-time at the dragstrip ever since I was eight years-old.

Johnson, 36, earned his first NHRA license at 15, a few months before he received his Iowa drivers license. The blonde-locked Iowan competed in his first NHRA national event historic Gainesville Raceway in Super Gas at 15. Three years later, the pride of Ottumwa had progressed to the Top Alcohol Funny Car class when he defeated category stalwart Pat Austin at Columbus in 1988 to score his first national event victory.

There's a picture in the Johnson family archives of the '88 TA/FC final at Columbus with Johnson's younger sister Wendy and current wife Melanie standing together underneath the tower at National Trail Raceway during the final round.

"When Wendy came along, we didn't stop going to the races," Johnson said. "She came right with us. When I started driving and was touring nationally, she went with us. She's been going to the races ever since she was born. It's been bred into us I think."

Wendy, 29, also made NHRA history as the sport's youngest national event winner when she won Super Comp at Heartland Park Topeka at 17 years old. After high school, Wendy attended Northern Iowa University where she left racing behind to concentrate on her studies. Upon graduating from N.I.U., she took a marketing position with Action Performance and headed for Charlotte and the ovals of the NASCAR world. After working for the likes of Ray Evernham and Jack Roush, she got out of racing and became business partners with Kelly Earnhardt in a scrapbook store.

NHRA drag racing has a rich, storied tradition and one of the great selling points of the sport -whether on a local or national touring level - is family involvement. Names like Dixon, Bernstein, Force, Schumacher and Kalitta instantly invoke images of the greats of quarter mile racing. The Johnsons were no different.

"My dad and I used to race together on the weekends," Johnson said. "I'd race my motorcycles and he'd take his car and we'd all go to the dragstrip on the weekends. I think the way you're allowed in the pits at the drag races, you can bring your entire family and they can hang out in the pits. At a lot of the circle track racing, they only allow adults in the pit area. It's a little tougher to get the kids involved. Drag racing has a good family atmosphere to it."

Entering the Pro ranks

In 1999, the Johnson family field this Fram SureGrip Top Fueler in Chicago.

In 1990, Johnson continued his progression up the ranks, graduating to Top Fuel where he remained through the 1997 NHRA campaign. Despite running on a limited budget, Johnson worked with a group of talented tuners during his Top Fuel days, including Jim Brissette, Bob Noice, Dave Settles, Ronnie Swearingen and Mike Kloeber, driving to two Top Fuel victories (Seattle 1993 and Memphis 1994). He is just one of five drivers in both the Cragar 4-Second Club (4.964 seconds, Sept. 29, 1990 - Topeka, Kan.) and the Slick 50 300-mph Club (302.01 mph, March 5, 1994 - Houston), which he considers his career highlight to date.

"I think a lot of the accomplishments would be my career highlight to this point," Johnson said. "Winning races is great, but it's more the record book stuff like the 4-Second Club and the 300-mph Club. We held the national speed record there for a while too (306.64 mph in 1994). It is things like that that stand out. The trophies are nice. You win races and then the money is gone, but being able to compete in a professional category with my family owning the team was another highlight. Being able to say you made it in the sport when Don Prudhomme will hire you, those are all highlights. I don't know if any one thing stands alone."

Double doings
At Maple Grove Raceway in Reading, Pa. in 1999, Johnson joined another group of elite drivers, including Prudhomme and fellow Snake Racing driver Ron Capps, when he became one of a handful of drivers to have earned victories in both the Top Fuel and Funny Car categories.

"That's a pretty cool accomplishment," Johnson said. "I guess to catch (Gary) Scelzi I have to run Alcohol Dragster. I won Alcohol Funny Car and Top Fuel, then Funny Car, so to catch him I have to go run Alky Dragster. There are only 13 guys that have won in both, so it's pretty neat."

Having spent seven years behind the wheel of a Top Fuel dragster and the past five seasons piloting nitro floppers, there aren't many drivers more qualified to speak on the differences of driving the two kings of the sport.

"They each have their own characteristics," Johnson said. "I like the challenge of the Funny Cars; they're much harder to drive than a dragster. The dragster is a more thrilling ride. You're three inches off the ground going 330 mph and you're out in the open with the wind blowing on you. It's pretty intense. With a Funny Car, you're going 320 mph and you're fighting the thing because it doesn't want to go straight. You get out of the groove and it smokes the tires. So, you really have to be on your toes in a Funny Car, where a dragster is a little more forgiving."

Cold turkey
Once you've bitten with the drag racing bug, it's very difficult to find any medication to treat the nitromethane infection. It's very difficult to just wake up one morning and walk away from the drag strip. That's what Johnson had to do following the 1997 season due to lack of funding. He was without a sponsor and couldn't afford to keep up with the escalating costs of operating a Top Fuel operation on a family budget. So, he missed the entire 1998 season and nearly half of the 1999 NHRA campaign.

"It took a while for me to get used to not being at the track," Johnson said. "I used to check the internet like every 10 minutes to get results. I went to the races for a while and then I got tired of being there and not driving. I started a collectables business and tried to stay involved in the sport somehow. I still wanted to stay in touch with the sport.

"It was tough not being there. You tried to distance yourself a little bit knowing you couldn't compete, but at the same time stay involved because you want to be at the track in case somebody had a position open. I stayed involved by selling the collectables. It was a real tough time actually. When you're not doing something, a year seems like forever."

Back in the saddle

Toward the end of the '99 season, T.J. was called to the seat of Joe Gibbs' Internstate Batteries Funny Car. he's been a flopper man ever since.

After being out of the cockpit for nearly 18 months, Johnson remained a spectator until former Super Bowl winning NFL coach-turned race team owner Joe Gibbs tabbed Johnson to drive the Interstate Batteries car beginning at the 1999 Columbus race in June. In just 13 races, Johnson raced to two victories (Reading, Pa. and Memphis, Tenn.) in four final-round appearances.

"I guess the Interstate Batteries car would be my favorite," Johnson said. "I had a lot of success in a short period of time there. I had a good time. When you win races, it's always fun.

"I didn't work with him (Joe Gibbs) much. I came in at a bad time where he was deciding whether to stay in drag racing or sell his operation. It was my first taste of a real professional race team that was run like a business. I learned a lot on how things needed to be done and what you need to do to compete at a top level. It was a good learning experience, but I never worked with Gibbs much and he sold the team after the 1999 season."

Racing since his childhood days, it was quite difficult for Johnson to make the transition to onlooker during the 1998 and part of the '99 season, while his rivals and racing friends were still doing battle on the track.

Family affairs
Consequently, having experienced what it's like to be searching for a sponsor and the right situation to make a comeback, Johnson is the perfect person to counsel his wife and former Top Fuel star Melanie Troxel while she eye a return to the driver's seat.

"I see exactly what she goes through," Johnson said. "I know exactly what her frustration level is. Most of the time, you don't have any control over it. It's all out of your hands. You just do what you can do and not worry about anything else. I try to relay that to her, even though it's tough for her to hear. There are probably some ways I've made it easier on her because I've went through it for myself. The most important thing is to keep your spirits up and not let it get you down."

A few years back, Johnson left his native Iowa for the drag racing capital of the 21st century, Indianapolis. Johnson resides just outside of the capital of the Hoosier State in nearby Avon, Ind., close to the Don Prudhomme Racing shop in Brownsburg, Ind. Following in his footsteps, Tommy Sr. also left the Hawkeye State, moving his business to North Carolina to escape the frigid Midwestern winters.

"I think more than anything, he was tired of the winters in Iowa," Johnson said. "They used to visit my sister in North Carolina and really liked it and decided they were tired of cold the Iowa winters and were looking for a nice climate to retire to. So, they decided that they'd move down there. They have a house on the lake and he moved his business with them. And, since they moved to the Carolinas, the winters haven't been much better than in Iowa.

"Business has been good for dad. He's been doing it like 25 years now. That's the way that we were able to race the Top Fuel car back in the day. He's not as big as Jeg's or Summit probably because I spent all his money on the Top Fuel car. The car ran pretty good for the money we had. It was a pretty tight budget that we raced on."

Being a drag racer for the good majority of his life, Tommy Sr. can't stay too far away from the drag strip and attends around eight NHRA POWERade events each year rooting on his son as he looks to make a charge deep into the top 10 of the Funny Car points chase.

"I still help my dad on his website and we talk several times a week," Johnson said. "They come to several races. My dad would like to retire and come to all the races. That's his goal, to retire in a few years and go on the tour. I love racing, but he loves racing more than I do."

T.J. and Mel

Johnson and fellow Top Fuel racer Mleanie Troxel Tommy Johnson Jr. and Melanie Troxel were joined in holy matrimony New Year's Eve in a small ceremony in downtown Indianapolis.

Having both grown up in a drag racing environment, it's no surprise that Johnson and Troxel are now husband and wife. The racing duo began dating a few years back and got engaged during the 2002 Mac Tools U.S. Nationals at Indianapolis Raceway Park, their home track. They were wed in a small ceremony in Indy last New Year's eve.

Two nitro drivers spending the majority of the time with each other, the bulk of their conversations must consist of drag racing and more drag racing. At the dinner table, watching TV and on the phone, is there anything that Johnson and Troxel do that doesn't involve drag racing?

"There are times that we do things that are not racing-related," Johnson said. "I would say each day revolves around racing at some point. She's looking for sponsorships, where I'm doing sponsor and media stuff and everything that's involved with the crew. Very seldom is there a day that goes by that racing is not involved in our life. It's not quite 24-7, but it's 20-7."

With a life that's dominated by driving an 6,000-horsepower Funny Car, it's not startling that Johnson is bothered by the lack of hobbies in his life. Even if he was an avid golfer or fisher, when you're on the go from February through November, it's hard to have time to dedicate to a pastime and when you do have some downtime you just want to unwind on get your mind off of racing and enjoy your off weekends because during the season an off weekend is a luxury.

"I don't have many hobbies," Johnson said. "I need a few. Melanie likes to snowboard. I tried it once. I don't think it's my cup of tea. I don't do much. I play with my computer a lot. I guess electronics are my hobby. I got a new Palm Pilot, which I'm excited about. I got my new cell phone and I can play with that. I play on eBay a lot. I buy odds and ends, mostly electronics. I buy some stuff and sell some things. I actually sold a PT Cruiser on eBay recently. I need to get a few hobbies. Tommy D. (DeLago) and Mike (Green) are trying to get me into remote-controlled power boats. They bought me a boat. So, one of these days we'll go race boats. Of course, that's still more racing."

With a determined drive and passion to succeed in the sport that he was destined to be vital a part of, Johnson hopes to be competing and involved in NHRA drag racing for a very long time and possibly even follow in the footsteps of his current superior.

"I want to be out here another 25 or 30 years," Johnson said. "I want to be like Snake someday. He's 63 now and I plan on being around the sport then too. Hopefully, I'll be an owner like he is. Ultimately, I'd like to drive for him for as long as he wants me to and stay in the sport and be successful as a hired driver. Then, eventually move to like an owner/driver situation, then become an owner with a hired driver. That's the long term plan. I'm not going anywhere."

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