We are sitting in Phoenix watching it rain. Everyone is getting an unwanted day off from testing, so I thought I would fill you in on what’s been going on so far.

Melanie and I flew to Las Vegas on Tuesday to pick up our motorhome at Monaco Las Vegas. They stored it and did some work to it this winter for us. We took the dogs with us and Rottie didn’t like the flight Tuesday. We didn’t get to sit together and I didn’t mind because Rottie did her fair share of barking and letting us know of her displeasure with the flight. We jumped in the motorhome and headed to Phoenix. We got into the track about 6, got parked and then went to dinner with Barry Feldner from NHRA.

Wednesday I did a photo shoot at the track for Monster Energy Drink. I thought it would be a couple of hours and done. Wrong, it was an all-day shoot and we finished up about 6:30. We got some really cool shots. I can’t wait to see them all, but from what I’ve seen already they are great. Monster is going to do a new web site so you can keep up with our team. They have a lot of cool things in the works for the '08 season so be sure and check it out. I’ll let you know the web address as soon as I get it.

We were going to make some runs on Thursday but the track required some work so all we did Thursday was get things finished up and fired the car to make sure everything was ready to go on Friday. Mel’s team rolled into Phoenix Thursday also.

We only made one run on Friday. We waited awhile to make our run so the track had a little more grip. I always look forward to getting the first run of the year out of the way and especially this year with all new people and routines. Everything feels so strange and much harder the first run, but not this time. It looked like I had made the last pass of last season in the Monster car and came right back out to make this year's first run. Jimmy Walsh told me to take it to the 330 mark if everything felt good. Without a hitch at all the car left and I ran it to 330. Everything couldn’t have gone smoother for a first run of the year. Let’s hope that is how things are going to go all year.

We took our time doing the service and didn’t want to rush because we have some new guys on the team that have never done a service before. Everything went like clockwork so we were ready to go Saturday. We started doing some side by side runs on Saturday and I ran against Tim Wilkerson our first run. Nobody had run in the left lane on Friday so we didn’t go as far as we would have liked, but it did make it a couple of hundred feet before coming loose. Our third run we were way too aggressive and it shook early. We made it back up for one last run just as the sun went down so it was pretty dark and our first attempt to make a night run this year. Let me tell you that it is a pretty dark track in Phoenix at night. Especially when you forget to put on your clear shield instead of a light smoke shield. I decided that it was just good practice for some of the really dark Friday night runs we’ll make this year. We softened up the tune up so we could just get down the track further to make sure everything was good with the engine and fuel system. It went straight down the track and I clicked it off about 800 feet to a 5.22 at 216. Probably would have run a 4.88 or so if I had taken it all the way.

Everything is going smoothly with the Monster team and we are happy with our test session so far. Melanie’s team has had some struggles with a few gremlins, but that is what testing is for. They have found all of their problems and are now just waiting on the rain to quit so they can start making some runs further down the track. Both of our weekends have been filled with photo shoots and plenty of interviews. I have a feeling it is going to be a busy year with the media. I’ve had my picture taken probably a 1,000 times this weekend and haven’t broke a camera yet. They build them good now days.

We are hanging out in the motorhome watching TV and surfing the web while it rains. I think we might go to the movies later and pick up some dog food plus a little shopping or something. A little side note: The Giants are staying across the street from the track so we’ll see if we can’t disrupt some of the press coverage over there with some nitro noise this week.

I want to also say that our heart goes out to Doug Herbert and his family for the loss of his two sons. Melanie and I don’t have kids and can only imagine what they are going through. I talked to my mom and dad yesterday after my runs and we talked about how short life can be. You have to live every minute to its fullest. Please keep Doug and his family in your thoughts.