{"id":23602,"date":"2016-02-01T16:04:44","date_gmt":"2016-02-02T00:04:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/?p=23602"},"modified":"2018-08-16T12:37:48","modified_gmt":"2018-08-16T19:37:48","slug":"what-does-alan-johnsons-involvement-in-john-force-racing-really-mean","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/what-does-alan-johnsons-involvement-in-john-force-racing-really-mean\/","title":{"rendered":"What Does Alan Johnson’s Involvement in John Force Racing Really Mean?"},"content":{"rendered":"

 <\/p>\n

\"Photo:
Photo: Courtesy of the NHRA<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

John Force didn\u2019t get to where he is today \u2013 16 championships of his own and two others from Tony Pedregon and Force\u2019s son-in-law Robert Hight \u2013 without having a decided hands-on approach to everything that races under the John Force Racing banner.<\/p>\n

But turning over the entire operation of one of his racing teams to an outsider, so to speak, is something Force has never done before.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s why his new consultancy agreement with six-time Top Fuel championship team owner Alan Johnson is so revolutionary \u2013 and at the same time, so exciting.<\/p>\n

\"AJR
Alan Johnson is consulting for a few racers this year.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Johnson, as most of you know, saw his Al-Anabi Racing team gutted of its funding prior to the start of last season. Johnson and driver Shawn Langdon nobly soldiered on with little funding, managing to make it through the 18-race regular season before suspending operations due to finances just as the six-race Countdown to the Championship began.<\/p>\n

For 2016, Johnson has his own team and dragster in mothballs, while Langdon has moved on to drive for Don Schumacher Racing.<\/p>\n

But Johnson was a man in demand, and he could potentially be as busy \u2013 if not busier \u2013 this season than if he was back running his own team.<\/p>\n

In a unique twist, Johnson will not only serve as a consultant to Steve Torrence Racing\u2019s Top Fuel team this season, he\u2019ll also be a consultant (and primary engine tuner) to JFR and the Top Fuel team of Force\u2019s daughter Brittany.<\/p>\n

But here\u2019s where the most interesting aspect of the deal rests: Johnson will essentially not only oversee everything in Brittany\u2019s program, he\u2019ll also provide all the parts, pieces and everything else necessary to build a competitive dragster.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s like the Golden State Warriors taking over the lowly Los Angeles Lakers and say they\u2019re doing things the Warrior way from now on, and with the Warrior\u2019s ball.<\/p>\n

This is an unprecedented situation in NHRA annals. Sure, other former owners, drivers or crew chiefs have served as consultants, but when was the last time you heard of someone bringing in their own equipment and overseeing the entire operation \u2013 as if it were there own?<\/p>\n

I give a lot of credit to Force and Hight, who is also JFR president, for their foresight in going out and bringing Johnson into the JFR fold. It\u2019s rare you can get someone of Johnson\u2019s talents and experience to help you out, especially given he\u2019s a former competitor.<\/p>\n

Johnson knows about building Top Fuel champions. He\u2019s done so six different times in his tenure as a team owner \u2013 1997, 1998, 2000, 2010, 2011 and 2013 \u2013 with five different drivers: Gary Scelzi, Tony Schumacher, Larry Dixon, Del Worsham and most recently Langdon. He also won five other Top Fuel championships as a crew chief while working for Don Schumacher Racing.<\/p>\n

On the flip side, although she\u2019s shown promise in her Top Fuel career, Brittany Force still hasn\u2019t won her first race in the sport\u2019s fastest racing class.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s likely to change \u2013 and probably more than once \u2013 with Johnson and his parts and car at the helm in 2016.<\/p>\n

In fact, I wouldn\u2019t be surprised whatsoever to see Brittany Force have her breakout first win next week in the season-opening Winternationals at Auto Club Raceway in Pomona, California.<\/p>\n

And wouldn\u2019t that be coincidental, as Johnson and Langdon won that same race last year, right after the Al-Anabi funding tap was shut.<\/p>\n

In his usual, subtle way, Johnson tried to downplay the association with JFR. But in reality, this is as huge a deal as you can get.<\/p>\n

\u201c(John Force Racing Funny Car crew chief Mike Neff) asked me if I might be interested in helping them this year,\u201d Johnson told NHRA.com. \u201cThen, John and Robert (Hight) called and kind of pressed the issue further. We talked for a while, went out to dinner and came to some sort of an agreement that should work. I think we\u2019re all excited to get Brittany that first win.\u201d<\/p>\n

Johnson couldn\u2019t have a better student. After all, Brittany is a Force. And just like her dad, she\u2019s an astute student who listens to what her father, crew chiefs and now Johnson tell her.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019s really responsive to everything,\u201d Johnson said of Brittany Force. \u201cShe\u2019s really excited and I think it\u2019s going to end up working really well.\u201d<\/p>\n

That John Force has essentially given Johnson carte blanche to do things the way he sees fit \u2013 and to also bring in his own custom-built parts for Brittany\u2019s dragster \u2013 is sure to cause great interest in the NHRA this season.<\/p>\n

\u201cProbably the biggest thing is they will allow us to come in with our own parts,\u201d Johnson told NHRA.com. \u201cAll the things we\u2019ve built here at AJPE (Alan Johnson Performance Engineering) and have been so successful with, to bring those into their team and replace the stuff.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2026 Had we gone in and tried to just work with what they had, it would have been a much more difficult task. But when we got the agreement to bring our stuff in, change everything out and we want to win, that was the ticket there.\u201d<\/p>\n

In his new role with JFR, Johnson will once again be reunited with Brian Husen, who previously worked for AJR and Al-Anabi, and now is crew chief for Brittany Force\u2019s dragster.<\/p>\n

If Johnson and Husen have their way, the season may start out as a reunion party, but it very well could end up with a championship party.
\nFollow me on Twitter @JerryBonkowski<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As Alan Johnson takes on a consulting role for John Force racing, what will this mean for JFR, particularly Brittany Force? Good things probably.<\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":50,"featured_media":23603,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3465,17,3399],"tags":[3815,3488,1749,424,4008,3384,75,423,7,81],"class_list":["post-23602","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-drag-racing","category-guest-column","category-nhra","tag-2016-nhra-mello-yello-drag-racing-series","tag-alan-johnson","tag-alan-johnson-racing","tag-brittany-force","tag-guest-column","tag-jerry-bonkowski","tag-john-force","tag-john-force-racing","tag-nhra","tag-shawn-langdon"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/JohnForceArrow-Charlotte-Small.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p42YSK-68G","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23602","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/50"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23602"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23602\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23672,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23602\/revisions\/23672"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23603"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23602"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23602"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23602"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}