Since I haven't written for a couple of weeks, I thought I would get you all back up to speed on what has gone on the last two weeks and what's coming up for our DHL Toyota Funny Car team. We started off the Gainesville race by coming in a few days early to do a display at DHL Headquarters down in Plantation, Florida. It was the first time for me ever making the trip down there and all I can say about the facility was - impressive! DHL employs over 600 people down at their headquarters and the location is spectacular with two big office buildings overlooking a pond. It was great to meet some of the employees at DHL that we don't get to see on a regular basis at the races. Everything was first-rate from the signage that they had up to the Peruvian food that we enjoyed afterwards. Even though a lot of the employees haven't made it out to a race yet, their enthusiasm and love for the sport made it a real treat for all of us to be down there.

After the display we all made the five-hour drive up north to Gainesville Raceway to get set up for the race. On Q1, we actually had a timing malfunction that gave us a red light and a bunch of skewed numbers. Even though we smoked the tires just past 300', had we made it to the finish line, our e.t. would have been about three tenths off what we ran. So maybe that was a good thing that it didn't make it on that lap. On Q2, Jon O, Nicky and the boys sent me down the track to a respectable 4.15 which kept our DHL Toyota Camry in the top 12. The nice thing as well, was that Alexis and her Patron team also clung onto a top 12 spot.

On Saturday, the weather changed quite a bit bringing overcast skies and cooler temperatures. The Top Fuel cars were flying and I was looking forward to Q3. At the hit of the throttle our DHL Toyota left the line hard but soon overpowered the track about 200 feet out. On Q4 we made another conservative lap of 4.16, but that's not what my DHL boys were looking for. Even though the track was still a bit tricky, there were quite a few low to mid-4.0 runs made and that moved us back all the way to the lucky number 13 spot and earned us a first-round match up with Mike Neff. Not really the guy you want to have to race in the first round. Zippy's car has been running great for the first three races of the year and with a 4.10, 2- 4.08s and a 4.06 in qualifying, I wasn't liking our chances all that much. However, I did tell my guys, "When’s the last time you saw a Funny Car make five good passes in a row?" Ha.

On Saturday night I made my way over to the Darrell Gwynn Foundation BBQ. I have known Darrell for a long time as well as his dad, Jerry. Jerry actually signed my nitro Funny Car license way back in 1994 when I drove Paul Smith's car, so we have always stayed in touch since then. What Darrell, Jerry and his family and foundation do for handicapped people is unbelievable. Much like the Doug Herbert story and his B.R.A.K.E.S. foundation, it would have been pretty easy for Darrell to kind of "hang it up" and just exist after his accident. Instead Darrell and his family have made the best out of an unfortunate situation and now literally change some people’s lives for the better by raising money and donating specialized power wheelchairs to those who don't have the means to get one. I met the latest recipient at the BBQ. Austin Praught and his friend were out for a drive and got into an accident. There were no alcohol or drugs involved and this once athletic and very smart individual was now paralyzed from the next down. It's one of those things that you hear about now and then but his life was literally changed in a second. Darrell and his foundation raised enough money to buy this fellow a very specialized power wheelchair that is controlled by a straw-like device that he blows into. He had only been in the chair for about an hour but you could see how happy he was. He is also now going to be able to return to University and finish his courses. Talk about unbelievable!

Sunday morning, a bunch of the NHRA Pro drivers and I made it out for the Darrell Gwynn track walk. Basically if you have never heard about it, it goes like this. Spectators with a $20 donation to the foundation get to walk the full quarter-mile with the drivers and ask them questions. I am sure it is exciting for them and we really enjoy answering their questions and supporting Darrell's foundation. After driver intros, it was time to race. At the flash of the yellow, I managed to get a bit of a jump on Zippy, but his 4.07 out-powered our 4.14 and we were done for the day. Two pairs later, Alexis and her Patron-sponsored Toyota were up against none other than John Force. I remember the first time I raced against John. It was back at my home track in Canada in 1996 and we ended up not only beating him, but taking the Canadian track record away from him as well. Now, I imagine that John didn't like this too much, because over the next 10 years of me driving on and off, I raced him 10 times and lost all of them. It wasn't until a couple of years ago that I finally got my first round-win against him believe it or not. At the start, John looked to have a little advantage but soon after he smoked the tires and Alexis and her Del Worsham-tuned Toyota made a great 4.11 run to put him on the trailer. I was very excited for Alexis to get her first Professional round-win, and to get it against John Force just makes it all the better.

Alexis ended up losing in the next round, and Doug made it to the semi’s and ran a career-best 4.78 against Morgan Lucas but it wasn't to be as Morgan's car was running spectacular numbers all day. It was nice to see that Jim O and Doug were able to run that well, and I have a feeling that now that they are warmed up, the competition better look out!

On Monday, Alexis and I stayed in Gainesville to do some testing. While both our cars have been running well, it is very important to get our consistency down and pick up that extra five-hundredths that we need to consistently get us into the top half of the field. I feel that with all of the great Funny Car teams that are out there now and the amount of them, 2012 could just go down in history of having the tightest and hardest fields to get into ever. I can already see that in Top Fuel right now as you have quite a few teams this year that have really stepped up their programs and with a bunch of those driver's cutting .040-.050 lights all day, I am kind of glad that I am driving a Funny Car!

I have a few cool things coming up this week. On Wednesday, I am playing golf at SeaCliff Country Club over in Huntington Beach and after will be giving a short speech and doing a Q&A with about 80 members there from the SCGA. Thanks to my friend and race fan, John Thompson, for setting that up. Then on Thursday morning, Windy and I are making it over to Toyota Headquarters in Torrance for their annual Toyota Motorsports Day. It should be a great time as we will get to meet some of the other Toyota Motorsports drivers and employees from Toyota Headquarters. After that it is time to start getting ready for the Vegas race.

I know the guys back at the shop have been thrashing and that our new Toyota Camry is almost done. I don't know yet if we will have it in Vegas but I imagine we will be racing it in Charlotte and I can't wait. Just take a look at Alexis's car and you can see why. It definitely has my vote as the best looking body and on top of that, it is super aerodynamic.

In closing, I also want to congratulate one of my crew guys, Michael Morris, for running in and completing the L.A. Marathon. He flew out here all the way from Detroit on Saturday and then ran the Marathon Sunday (sorry about the less than ideal weather… not very often it is nicer in Detroit than LA!) and then back to the shop Sunday night to be back at work Monday to get back to work on the DHL Toyota. Great job Mikey!

Take care and thanks for reading!

After some strange weather in Pomona, you couldn't have asked for better conditions in Phoenix. It was basically a "Chamber of Commerce" perfect 3 days with sunny skies and temps in the mid-60s to mid-70s. On Q1 all you are usually looking for is a nice, safe A-Z run that will give you an idea of what the track is going to be like. That was our plan but then Jim Head ripped off a 4.10 and then Tony P. went a 4.14 right in front of us. With not enough time to change anything, we made a safe 4.20 A-Z run that we were happy with. On Q2, Nicky and Jon O tried to tune up our DHL Toyota a bit but we ended up overpowering the track at about the 330 foot mark. That was the bad news. The good news is that we hung on to the No. 12 spot.
 
On Saturday, the “Yella Fellas” made a few adjustments to try and make a mid-teen run, but all we could muster was another 4.20 which put us in the No. 14 spot. I was a little worried as there were quite a few cars that were going to run ahead of us in Q4 that could bump us out. One by one though, they failed to outrun our 4.20 and by the time we had to run, I knew our DHL Toyota would be racing on Sunday. Good thing because we ended up smoking the tires very early in the run. Remember that Jim Head guy I was talking about earlier? That's who we ended up getting paired with for the first round.

On Sunday, Jon O and Nicky got more serious and knew we couldn't take Jim Head lightly. The boys came up with a great tune up and at the flash of the yellow, I could tell our car was making some steam. I never did see Jim and we ended up running a great 4.11, which was our quickest and fastest run of the year so far. That earned us a date with Jack Beckman in the second round. Unfortunately though, this time at the flash of the yellow, I could soon tell that we had a cylinder out. It didn't get much better as I ended up watching Jack put a couple of car lengths on us early and we could never catch back up. The good news is that when all was said and done, that round win moved us into the top ten in the No. 9 spot.
 
After the race, my guys came up with a few things that they wanted to change before our next stop in Gainesville. Back at the shop, they have been busy changing a few things and trying to get our car more consistent. We are going to be testing on Monday after Gainesville and I am looking forward to trying out a few new things.
 
When you start off the season with back to back races it is pretty cool, but when the next race is 2 1/2 weeks away, for a driver anyways, it gets a little boring. I have found quite a few things to do around the house as well as getting our less than 8 month old mortgage refinanced. Who would have ever thought that interest rates would go so low. For about an hour’s worth of work it's going to save us a bunch of money in the long run. Thanks to my buddy Wally Nikowitz from Better Home Financial in San Dimas. It was also my daughter Jenna's 12th birthday last week. Windy and I are lucky to have such a great daughter, but I wish time would slow down just a bit. Before long it's going to be boys and driving! Arrgh!
 
Speaking of driving, Del Worsham and his wife Connie and Windy and I went to the B.R.A.K.E.S fundraiser over at the NHRA Museum last Friday night. It was nice to see Doug Herbert again as well as Matt Reilly. As I have said before, I am a staunch supporter and believer in the B.R.A.K.E.S program and firmly believe it is going to save some lives and keep new teenager drivers from getting into accidents. The turnout was pretty good and I know they raised some well needed dollars to keep their program alive. Thanks as well to Cowboy Bob from Technicoat for his generous donation. On Sunday, I made it over to the B.R.A.K.E.S school they were having in Pomona to spend a bit of time with the families that were there for the course and just kind of hang out and watch all the fun that the kids were having. I wish they would have had that kind of driving school when I was young!

Then of course on Monday I had to watch the Daytona 500. I am sure that most of you saw it but it was pretty amazing watching a race in prime time. It also looked like a Hollywood director directed it as there was lots of drama, spin outs and well, a HUGE fire from a track dryer. Unbelievable.

Well, I am off to Fort Lauderdale, Florida next Tuesday. We have a display to do at DHL Corporate Headquarters in Plantation on Wednesday and then we will make the drive up to Gainesville to get set up for the race. I am looking forward to great weather and a great race for our DHL Toyota Camry team. If you are lucky enough to make it out to Gainesville drop by our DHL pit and say Hi and if not follow us on Twitter or Facebook, and of course watch us on ESPN2.
 
Take care and thanks for reading.

It's been a busy week, so I will give you a little recap of what went on. Wednesday night, Windy, Jenna and I hosted our bi-annual crew party at our place before the race. We just bought a new place back in August and we are literally about a mile from the race track now. Most of the people from our DHL team as well as Alexis' Patron team swung by our place for a little food and relaxation. We barbequed up about 20 pounds of tri tip (thanks Eddie Preston) as well as a few pounds of pulled pork thanks to my father in law, Jim. We had a few other friends come over as well including Eileen Atkinson from Fram and Alex Baca and seeing as one of our neighbors called the cops, I'd say it was a pretty fun time!
 
Thursday, it was finally time to run. Unfortunately our DHL Funny Car smoked the tires pretty early in the run and the day was over. What did that mean? More people over to the house for some more fun! Jason Sharp and Melanie Troxel dropped by for a few beverages and we hung out by the ol’ fire pit again for a while.
 
Friday we got to get another attempt at the Pomona racetrack but this time our car dropped a cylinder early and shook. I went by the NHRA Museum with Grubby for the "Night of Champions" autograph signing and had a great time. Erica Enders, Antron Brown, Morgan Lucas and Jack Beckman were also there and with Bob Frey doing the announcing and asking us all questions, it was really a lot of fun. If you get the chance to go, I think it is well worth it. After the session, Grubby, Doug Kalitta and I made it back to the ol’ fire pit again, and this time Jenna got to hang out and have a sleep over with the Worsham girls.
 
Saturday morning, Allen Johnson, Jeg Coughlin and I did an autograph signing over at the Top Eliminator Club and then I made our way back to our DHL pit. Jon O, Nicky and my team had changed about everything on my car trying to duplicate the setup we had from last year at the World Finals. I can honestly say between that and the threat of rain, my confidence level was not that high. Fast forward to Q3 and our DHL Toyota left the line hard and just kept on pulling pretty good down the track. We ended up running a great 4.13 that put us in the No. 7 spot. Nice job boys! After hanging around for a few hours because of drizzle, NHRA made one last attempt to get the session in, but as they got close, it started to rain again and the day was done. We hung around the Patron Hospitality for a while and let me tell you that it was rocking pretty well all weekend. We even got to meet the famous actor Danny Trejo who is in one of my favorite TV shows, Sons of Anarchy. He was also in one of my favorite movies, Heat, and when I told him that, he said that was his favorite movie as well. Later on we ended up going out for dinner to celebrate Del Worsham's birthday and then after that, it was back to the fire pit again with a few friends.
 
Sunday morning, I felt great and knew that we had our old car back. We had a match up with Gary Densham who had run a 4.17 and a 4.15 in qualifying. Gary is a great guy and we talked for quite a while before our run. Jon O, Nicky and I talked about the setup of our car and had decided just to try and improve a bit on our qualifying time and make a solid run. At the flash of the green we got a little jump on Gary and I never saw him until I hit the chutes at the end of the run. Unfortunately I didn't see our win light on and they told me over the radio that his 4.10 beat our 4.16. I got to give credit to Gary as he made almost a career-best run against us. Had we run a 4.15 or him a 4.11 we would have been going on to the second round but that's racing. I was proud of our DHL Toyota team for making a solid run and not smoking the tires. I would rather lose a close race then give it away.

Of course as the day goes on and you plug your car into the second round, it was pretty easy to see with the way things unfolded that day that we could have been in the final with a possible win. What a difference a hundredth of a second makes. So guess where we ended up later that night? Yep, the ol’ fire pit. This time we had a pretty good party again with lots of friends. Alexis and her boyfriend Noah and daughter Bella and Andy, Caveman and Marla from the Patron Team made it over. James Riola from Grubby's team and Chris Cunningham, his wife Sheila as well as Marc Denner and Big Tom from Tasca's, along with Don Trapp from A1 Fasteners rounded out most of the people. My buddy Dannie Althouse supplied all the pizza and we had another great night!
 
Monday morning, Alexis and I were invited by our friends and sponsor, Toyota Racing to drive the Lexus LFA supercar over at a road course they had set up at AutoClub Speedway out in Fontana. When you get a chance to drive a $380,000 car, you have got to make it over. It was first class all the way as they had pro drivers there to teach us the finer art of road racing. Morgan Lucas, Brandon Bernstein, Shaun Langdon, Alan Johnson, Alexis and I rounded out the NHRA drivers and owners that were there. First of all we got to learn the track in the Lexus IS series cars. It was actually drizzling a bit on and off for the first couple of hours we practiced and I could not believe the "grip" these cars had. To tell you the truth I had never driven the Lexus IS series cars before and I was blown away by the power and traction they had. After the first session, one of the instructors and Brandon and I were kind of teamed up and we had a riot chasing each other and sliding the cars around the road course. I am not going to say it was more fun than driving my DHL Toyota Camry Funny Car but it was a close second. The adrenalin was high and later that day I was still thinking about it. After learning the course, we all got a chance to drive the LFA. This car was wicked and sounded like a Formula 1 car. As AJ told me, it was probably because the engine was a pretty close version of it. A 4.8 liter V10 that you shift at 9,000 rpm and a paddle shift automatic geared after the F1 version. It was awesome. We got to make a few laps following factory LFA driver and racing legend Scott Pruitt and the power, speed and traction the LFA had was mind blowing. It's hard to believe that this is a production car that you can drive on the street! After we all drove it, we got to go for a ride along with Scott in the car to see how a pro could drive it. The control that he had and way he applied the power and brakes was really cool to experience. On one of the straightaways we got close to 150 mph before he got on the brakes hard and made a tight right turn. Exhilarating! I want to thank Don, Andre, Erika and everybody else from Toyota Racing for a once in a lifetime experience. Count me in if you ever do it again!
 
It's time to get ready for Phoenix now. I think we have a good car and with a little tweaking we are going to have a great car. I am looking forward to the first qualifier on Friday already.
 
On a sad note I also want to express my condolences as well as those from Kalitta Motorsports to the family of Terry Manton from Manton Pushrods. Terry passed away last Thursday at his home and he was only 44. Terry was really nice guy and had formed a great relationship with my family and me. We are truly going to miss him. RIP Terry.

I just got home from our test session in West Palm Beach. Towards the end of the race season last year once we knew that our DHL team was going to have a teammate in Alexis DeJoria and her Tequila Patron-sponsored car, the decision was made to build both cars as identical as possible. For us this meant a new chassis with a different design than we had run in the past. The new chassis was delivered to Kalitta Motorsports early in December and my DHL crew guys got to work on it right away. Since it was a bare chassis -- everything from brake lines to all the tabs to mount everything -- had to be fabricated and installed. Long story short, the boys thrashed away to get everything done and by the time I got to the shop a couple of weeks ago, the majority of the work was done.

Jon O and Nicky had some great plans for testing where we were going to try out everything from superchargers, to our spare ignitions and some different clutch stuff. Sometimes the best laid plans don't work out. With the data Del had learned from testing with Alexis's car last month, we thought we had a good baseline to start off with. Unfortunately our car didn't think the same thing and we ended up smoking the tires for the first day and a half long before we ever got to the tree. Eventually after making some big changes, the boys started to make some headway. On Wednesday we made a nice half-track run with numbers to run in the 4.15 range and then later in the day when the track was the hottest we laid down a great 4.16 run. Unfortunately, that's when we noticed that the flat black body we had borrowed from Alexis' team didn't work or fit quite the same way as it did on her car. Both front struts came through the body on that run and basically ended our day as the repair was going to take quite a few hours to fix properly. That was just the start and it took another day or two to get it right. I felt really bad for my guys Dan and Jared because I don't think they got out of the track until close to midnight for the next three days as they were constantly doing carbon fiber repairs on top of their normal duties. I want to thank Steve from Aerodyne Composites (who thought he was just going to hang out as a spectator) for coming over and getting his hands dirty helping my guys do some of the repairs and passing his knowledge along.

Enough about the body - We finally got it all figured out and all is good now. Jon O, Nicky, and Del got their heads together and we made a nice lap on Friday night running a 4.12 at over 306 mph, with the engine pretty backed down. On Saturday we finally got to test some new clutch stuff and it started to look pretty promising. We made an early shutoff 4.18 run and then on our last run, tried to run a 4.08. After a good launch, we ended up smoking the tires pretty early but the data on the computer still looked good, so I feel pretty good where we are at right now going into Pomona.

Alexis' car made some good runs as well and they got to test a lot of new things. The Kalitta Top Fuel cars were running really strong in testing with Connie and Grubby leading the pack for the first few days. Even though they weren't making full runs they had some of the best numbers to half-track out of anybody there.  Jim O and Doug's car was running good as well recording many runs in the low 3.80 range. Then on their last run of testing on Saturday night they ripped off a fantastic 3.78 which was good for low E.T. of the day. Great job guys!

All the rigs should be back at the shop by now and the boys will be hard at work for the next couple of weeks before they make the long drive out to Pomona for the Winternationals. We have a new paint scheme for our DHL Toyota Camry and I am looking forward to seeing it when it gets out here. It's going to be a tough year whether you are in Top Fuel or Funny Car but we have set new goals for all the Kalitta Motorsports cars and I am hoping for a great season for all of us.

See you at the races and thanks for reading!