{"id":23893,"date":"2016-02-10T17:20:18","date_gmt":"2016-02-11T01:20:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/?p=23893"},"modified":"2016-02-10T17:39:59","modified_gmt":"2016-02-11T01:39:59","slug":"mike-dunn-named-new-ihra-president","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/mike-dunn-named-new-ihra-president\/","title":{"rendered":"Mike Dunn Named New IHRA President"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The International Hot Rod Association and its parent company IRG Sports and Entertainment announced the appointment of former driver and TV Commentator, Mike Dunn as its new president of the drag racing sanctioning body effective immediately in a complete revamping of the racing organization personnel.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe welcome Mike Dunn, one of the most respected figures not just in drag racing but in all of motorsports, to the IRGSE family of companies and specifically the IHRA as we begin to reshape the entire organization into a first class motorsports and entertainment platform,\u201d said Chris Lencheski, Vice Chairman and CEO of IRGSE.\u00a0 \u201cThe future of the IHRA intends on delivering the world\u2019s fastest race cars, in important automotive manufacturer influenced global markets, as a platform for growth in the important 9-19 socially active generation Z consumers, while re-igniting the platform of our traditional drag racing consumers with new investment and engagement.\u00a0 Mike has been a part of the most memorable moments that this sport has ever seen, and we are excited to have his expertise as a winning driver, businessman and influential media member to help lead us forward.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dunn\u2019s credentials show him winning 22 NHRA National events in his time behind the wheel of either a Top Fuel or Funny Car breaking the 280 mph barrier in Funny Cars in 1987.\u00a0 He is the son of Hall-of-Fame Drag racer, \u2018Big Jim\u2019 Dunn and at the age of 20, he ventured into the business by becoming a crew member for legendary car owner Roland Leong starting in 1976.\u00a0 He left competitive driving in 2002 joining ESPN telecasts for the NHRA Drag Racing series, a position he held until leaving last fall.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI welcome this new opportunity after so many years in a race car and in front of the screen at ESPN,\u201d Dunn said.\u00a0 \u201cI think the vision that IRGSE and the IHRA are putting together fits a younger and engaged fan base that loves action, speed and the personalities around those elements.\u00a0 I am looking forward to working with Chris and the entire IRGSE family of tracks and properties, the current drivers, the current race teams and the traditional IHRA tracks and all fans of this great sport to get things moving forward quickly.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe IRGSE Board is committed to their decisions and vision for drag racing into the future but are staying flexible in their approach to teams, markets, promoters, media, and sponsorship.\u00a0 I think they may have the best vision to come along in Drag Racing in a very long time and I am excited to be a part of the leadership team.\u201d<\/p>\n

2016 will be serving as an interim year between the current format and the restructuring format that the sanctioning body is updating.\u00a0 The Racing schedule begins at the Orlando, Florida\u2019s Speed World Dragway on March 4, for the AMSOIL Spring Nitro Nationals.\u00a0 Other stops this season land the IHRA in San Antonio, Texas, Grand Bend, Ontario, Canada, Edmonton, Alberta, Martin, Michigan, West Salem, Ohio and Budds Creek in Maryland.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The IHRA announced the appointment of former driver and TV Commentator, Mike Dunn as its new president of the drag racing.<\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":23896,"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":[3470],"tags":[4799,4057,41,7],"class_list":["post-23893","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-ihra","tag-mike-dunn","tag-news","tag-nhra"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/02\/ihra-new-e1455154792839.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p42YSK-6dn","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23893","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\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23893"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23893\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23897,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23893\/revisions\/23897"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23896"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23893"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23893"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23893"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}