St. Louis was a good weekend for one of us in the Johnson household. Actually it wasn’t bad for both of us. It was great to see Melanie’s team win on Sunday. I was happy for Melanie and her guys to get a win, but I was also happy to get a round win for my team too. After going winless all season it felt like I had won the race too with a 1st round win. The track was tough to get a hold of Sunday and it was a big pedal fest race. Melanie got some lucky breaks, but also did a great job of getting her car to the finish line first ahead of her competitor. First round my car lost traction around half track, but I wasn’t going to let anything keep me from getting across the finish line first. I couldn’t see Tony Bartone so I peddled it to the finish line. It hurt the engine, but the guys where happy to do a little work before second round.

Second round the car did the same thing in the opposite lane as it did first round. Ashley Force made a great run and our day was over. I feel really good about the progress our team has made with our performance lately. It definitely isn’t at the level we are looking for, but we have solved more issues with tire shake and other things that I don’t know we would have fixed if we hadn’t struggled so bad this early in the year. I think it will really make our team tough as we race through the summer months of the season. As tough as funny car is this year, we are still in the race to get into the Countdown to the Championship. A string of a few good races and we are right in the hunt.

After Melanie’s win I hung around with her guys and waited for their winner’s circle celebration. I was hanging out in their tow vehicle and was summonsed over for a couple of pictures with her team. After we left the winner’s circle I went back to the motorhome and got it ready to go home while she went back to her trailer and celebrated with her guys as they tore down their pits. As we pulled out of the pits headed for home I did the driving. Going four rounds on Sunday really wears you out. You wouldn’t think that working for less than twenty seconds would make you so tired, but with the up and down of the adrenaline rushes it wipes you out. I told her that since she won to relax and I would get us home. Thank goodness St. Louis is only four hours from Indy. I was pretty tired myself. We rolled into home about 11:45 Sunday night grabbed the trophy and went inside to go to bed.

We got up Monday and unloaded things from the motorhome and then I took it to the shop. It’s been a really busy week at our shop working on racecars. We had our spare car updated with all the new safety features and had to get the car I was driving to Murf McKinney’s to get it updated. The guys have been putting the new car together after they tore apart the car we where running. As soon as it gets back Friday they will put it back together so we can go out to ORP on Tuesday and test the car. We want to try a couple of things and also give me a chance to drive the car with all the new stuff in it.

We went out to dinner Monday and Tuesday night with Chad and Michelle. Tuesday night was all you can eat sushi at Tegry Bistro and it looked like we where at a race somewhere. We knew about 75 percent of the people in there. The Procks, the Meldins, Morgan Lucas, and Honda, plus several others from the NHRA tour. I think Tegry Bistro could stay open for business just off the drag racing clientele.

We’ve been busy working around the house this week. Melanie is really an animal lover and has had fun this week watching all of the baby birds that we have in nest around the house. She has been out taking pictures of them all week. Last year we had baby doves born in a nest on our satellite dish and this year there are new doves being born in the same nest. Plus now we have baby Robins that where hatched in our pine trees out front. It’s starting to look like a bird sanctuary around here. We where just outside adjusting the sprinkler heads and the dogs thought they where pretty cool. They kept trying to attack them and would jump back and come charging again when the water sprayed them. It was good entertainment.

I will be back at the shop again for awhile tomorrow. I got fitted for a custom molded seat today and we have to do the trimming tomorrow. Melanie and her team have been busy all week installing the new seat belt system in her car. We get our car back tomorrow evening and the guys will work all day Monday getting it ready to test on Tuesday. They have been working the tails off all year so most of them are getting a day off Friday. They have really deserved it with all the extra testing we have done and all the hard work they have put in trying to get our teams performance back.

Melanie and I are headed out Saturday to Lucas Oil Speedway in Wheatland, Mo., to do an autograph session for the Lucases. It is a quick trip as we fly out Saturday morning and back Sunday morning. Can’t think of a better way to spend a Saturday night than at a local dirt track. Kind of brings back memories of my Iowa upbringing. I used to go to a lot of dirt track races on my off weekends. I love all kinds of racing, it doesn’t matter to me what kind as long as it is racing.

So long for now.

TJ