We have a busy week heading into Indy. Last week, we attended an NHRA test session in Indianapolis and I’m really glad we did. We gained a lot of valuable data from those two test days. At the end of the session, we were on top of the charts with the quickest and fastest run with a 4.07 second pass at nearly 310 miles per hour.
Over the last few weeks, we’ve been struggling with lifters. We’ve had lifter failure at the last couple of races and we also had a lifter failure on the test session, so we made some changes. All of us, my crew chiefs Chris Cunningham and Marc Denner and the entire team, were very happy with the remainder of the test session. You always learn something when you drive these Funny Cars and the teams always learn something. We will use the test data to help us run some quick times during the Friday and Saturday night runs in Indianapolis.
After the test, I was off to Montreal. I was invited by Ford Racing and Ford of Canada to participate in the Ford Racing Crescent Street Festival that is held in conjunction with the NASCAR Nationwide Series race. Even though my trip was short, I had a great experience. I hadn’t been to Canada in a long time and just to see the excitement and enthusiasm for racing was really cool. What was really neat about the whole thing, a lot of people had never seen a fuel Funny Car before, so to have the opportunity to talk and explain it to them was amazing. To see their reactions at just how cool they thought my Motorcraft/Quick Lane Funny Car was and they saw our film on a lot of the different runs we made.
Then I was blown away by how many people actually knew what we did, who we were and actually followed the sport of NHRA racing from Canada. It was a great experience, a lot of fun. Ford had just a wonderful presence up and down the street. I flew home on Sunday and we’re just a few days away from heading out to Indianapolis for arguably the biggest race of the year.
The boys are back in hockey now too. They had a hockey tournament this past weekend, the first of the season with practice and tryouts. As our NHRA season is staring to wind down, their hockey season is just starting. I know the boys are excited about it. I missed the tournament this past weekend but I was getting blow by blow via text messages. I’m not sure who is more excited to get back – the boys to hockey or me to the race track.
If you are coming to Indianapolis, be sure to stop by and say hello. We’re running the FordParts.com paint scheme this weekend. That blue and white Mustang brought me some good fortune our way in Englishtown. Let’s see if we can get that magic back and bring home another Wally!
Last week we were in Brainerd and ended the regular season. We had a great first round win against John Force, man, there was inches separating John and I throughout the entire run. I think that’s been kind of a trend here these last couple of races. There’s just be incredible side-by-side racing with literally inches separating cars going over 300 mile per hour. Then we lost a tight race in the second race against Bob Bode.
Now that the regular season over, our sights are set on the championship. These next six races are going to be action packed. The first three are certainly going to pose their challenges with some warmer conditions. Then with the last three I think you’ll see some record setting runs in the Top Fuel classes.
Five out of the ten Top Fuel Funny Cars are Fords. Ford has definitely positioned themselves to be tough to beat here going into the Countdown.
Next week, I’m going to be going to Montreal for the Ford Racing Crescent Street Festival. This is my first venture to Montreal for the street festival and I’m looking forward to it. Ford of Canada hosts the street festival every year during the NASCAR Nationwide race at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve. We’re going to have our Funny Car out there on Crescent Street and spend a couple of days up there which should be pretty neat. They say the crowds up there you can get up to 300,000 people come through that event.
After Montreal, we’ll be right back into racing at Indianapolis and the final races of the 2010 season. Indy kicks of the Countdown and we’re planning to come out of the gate strong and build momentum. To win a championship you’re going to have to pick up your fair share of wins over these next six races. I can’t wait.
I want to thank all of my fans for supporting Motorcraft, Quick Lane Ford Motor Company. The best part of our season is just ahead of us and I can tell you that our team is ready to go.
Thanks for checking in and I’ll see you at the race track.
Hello Race Fans!We had an exciting week in Houston.For the second year in a row, I was invited to tour the NASA Johnson Space Center.Last year I had a terrific time and made some good friends with astronauts Mark Kelly and his twin brother Scott. The father and son duo of Mike and Jeff Fox are engineers at NASA and they were instrumental in this year’s tour.I would say the coolest part of my job is meeting people in other industries and developing new relationships.
The NASA folks were kind enough to invite me back and this time it was action packed, to say the least. I had a chance to fly the shuttle simulator, taking the space shuttle out of orbit and landing it at Cape Canaveral. It wasn’t a clean landing, but it was survivable. It always helps to know that you have a master commander in Scott Kelly next to you to give you some coaching instructions. It was a lot of fun.
We also went to see the Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory, or the NBL.The NBL has the world’s largest pool with 6.2 million gallons of water.In the pool is about two-thirds of the International Space Station.Mike Fox gave us a tour of the NBL and showed us how the astronauts train in the pool.We learned that for every hour the astronauts are scheduled to be on a space walk, they spent 10 hours in the pool.Amazing.
I found that really interesting how buttoned down and organized they are and that their working procedures are not that different than what we do on our Motorcraft/Quick Lane Shelby Mustang. They have various double-check procedures and ‘Plan B’ scenarios that we don’t necessarily have. At the end of the day, they’re dealing with life or death situations, no different than what we deal with. There were a lot of things that I could compare to our race team – especially from the safety aspect where you need to be extra organized and double-check every task.
The check and balance that they have at NASA, we have on our race car as well. For example, when we torque the wheels, we have two different people at two different times torque the rear tires. Often we get asked why we have the double-check – that’s because of the speeds and the risks that we have, no different than they have with the space program. It’s always nice to see the same safety precautions in other fields.
What I really liked about my experience at NASA was to drive the Lunar Electric Rover. Antron Brown and I got a shot at taking it up some mountains and craters.We went out to a special field at NASA where they had two areas – one area simulated the ground on Mars while the other was the Moon.A lot of people find the engineering on our race car fascinating, but I found the engineering that they do fascinating. It was just incredible the capabilities of the Lunar Electric Rover. It was the anti-Funny Car. Whatever they could do, we couldn’t do and vice versa. From climbing up hills, and into craters and going up boulders, you can really see the challenges they have to overcome. They really have to get it right because where they’re going, there’s no pit crew to fix the problem. From all the training and testing on the ground, they hopefully will be prepared for what they see when they get back to the Moon or to Mars.
After NASA tour on Thursday, we were back to business on Friday at the race track. Houston was a transitional race for us. My grandfather must have been looking down from above because he had a motto that you never test on race day, and you never want to test on race day. But we have committed to make this change to put in the BOSS 500 platform into our Shelby Mustang. It’s absolutely imperative for us to make this change in order to compete for a championship.
I look at last year and for me, evaluating the season, we did exceptional going into the Countdown - we were fourth in the points. Then we fell off when the conditions came back to what they were like earlier in the season and we didn’t have a tune-up that could compete with the 4.04, 4.05 category. We believe this BOSS 500 platform has that.
Unfortunately, we have to make this change during the season, but I’m very confident in our team and very confident about the progress we made in Houston. In Las Vegas, we won’t be in test mode. We’ll still be working, but we have some great data to look at from our Houston runs and unfortunately we raced Del Worsham and he ran low ET of the round, and I think we would have beat twelve other drivers in the first round.
We have all of the key elements of the BOSS 500 platform in our Shelby Mustang and I think we’re poised to really break out with some really big numbers. There’s a lot of racing ahead. Five races have only gone by. I don’t even look at where we are in the points at this point. It’s such a small spread between where we are and the top five in the points. I’m excited about the BOSS engine. I’m excited about Las Vegas. I love the track in Vegas. It’s a track I’ve been at many times, it’s a great city to race in and I think we have as good a chance as anybody out there to qualify top one through four and compete for the trophy on Sunday.
We’re going to take advantage of one of our test sessions in Vegas where we’ll be able to refine this BOSS 500 platform even more. We’re in full tilt here. This is a team that’s not happy with how we did in Charlotte and Houston. We expect more at every race. Whether you win or not, sometimes you need a little luck to win some of these races, but competing for that trophy is what we want to do. There were some lessons learned in Charlotte and Houston, and we’ll apply those in Vegas. Learn on Monday in Vegas with our test session and start to turn the heat up as this season unfolds.
My grandfather always wanted, to a certain degree, for John Force’s program and our Tasca Racing program to work together. He thought the world of John and sometimes when I would beat Force on the track, I don’t know if he was happy or sad. He was always very close with John and his camp and obviously thought the world of what John had done on the race track. He isn’t here to see what we’ve been able to put together, but I know he’s up there smiling at us from above.
Tasca Racing and John Force Racing are still two separate race teams that compete to win a race on Sunday, no different than we’ve done in the past. When it comes to Ford technology, and all of the investment and engineering that John’s team and Ford have done in his program over the years, that’s where we’re really going to come together and work. This is not only to put the BOSS technology in our Motorcraft/Quick Lane Shelby Mustang, but to continue to develop the technology both from a safety standpoint and performance standpoint. We made that big announcement at Charlotte. There’s a great picture that comes to my mind, where we’re all in the circle with our hands in the middle, and I think it shows the unity of Ford Motor Company, John Force Racing and Tasca Racing. A major turning point in my racing career, and I know it’s a turning point for John and for Ford to bring these teams together at a certain level. We want to both win on Sunday and we’ll let the chips fall where they may.
This isn’t something that just developed in the last three months. The Tasca Family and the Force family have shared a special relationship that has spanned for many years. There’s no question about that. It’s only natural for the all-Ford car to get tapped into the all-Ford power with the BOSS set-up. It’s a win-win for John. It’s a win-win for us. We have struggled with cool weather tune-ups. Although we’ve made progress, we haven’t got to the level where we know we need to be at so this gives us a big advantage. Looking at it long term, lining the Force camp and our camp and Ford to continue to develop performance and safety technology, is a win for all three. A lot of good stuff has come out of the last couple of weeks.
Just before I left for Pomona, my brother Michael got married and my cousin Carl, and I were the best men. We had a lot of fun that day.Michael and Brianna had their reception at the same place where Terri and I had ours - the Alpine Country Club. It was great to be around so many friends and family for such a happy occasion.With everything that has happened over the last several months, it was nice to celebrate. My boys had a role in the wedding too, they were the ring bearers. It was a big event for them, because they had never been in a wedding before. They got in their tuxedos and they were about as happy as you can believe to be a part of the wedding. They were really excited about it. They got a kick out of walking down the aisle in front of everyone. I’m happy to welcome my new sister-in-law, Brianna, to our family.
On my way to Pomona, I made a pit stop at the Cobra Jet assembly plant in Flat Rock, Michigan. It was real special because the Cobra Jet was the car that my grandfather really pioneered. On the flight to Detroit, I wondered how many manufacturers would have invested all this time and energy into building a special run of 50 cars? When you look at the big picture, there will be over 13 million cars sold in America, and yet Ford designated a team of people, and dedicated an assembly line for 50 cars. It’s a tribute to the importance Ford Motor Company places on its racing programs and its dedication to the Ford racers. It was always my grandfather’s passion to support the racer, because they’re really the catalyst in the marketplace. They are the ones that their friends and families go to for advice on cars. They’re the ones that go into their own pocket, spend their own money on race cars, race trailers, racing parts, and are so passionate about their manufacturer. In this case it’s Ford, and for Ford to invest the resources to build 50 cars, it shows how much respect they have for the racing fans, and the racers themselves. It might only be 50 out of 13 million cars sold, but there will be no other vehicles that will create the memories, experiences that those 50 cars will create over the years as racers across the country take them to the track, and put them in the winner’s circle. The Cobra Jet legend lives on.
I know that if my grandfather would have been there, he would have been impressed not only with the outpouring of gratitude and excitement of the racers, but the passion and excitement of all the Ford assembly workers. This was built inside a Ford assembly plant, not an off-site operation. This was built inside the same plant that builds the Mustangs that are in the Ford showrooms today. The excitement of the Ford UAW team at that plant was just incredible. It’s a tribute to the racers, to the UAW workers, and all the people that are involved in that program. I’m looking forward to seeing the 2010 Cobra Jets race this year. We’ve bought one that my Uncle Carl is getting tuned up to get behind the wheel of this season.
I had a few days off between Pomona and Phoenix, so the whole family flew in and met me in Phoenix. It was nice to spend some time with them. We spent a few days at the pool and we also went to the Phoenix Zoo. The best part of the Phoenix Zoo, I would have to say was the monkeys. The kids absolutely loved the monkeys. It was a lot of fun to spend some time with my family.
Even though I have a couple weeks off from the race track, I really have no down time with my involvement with the family dealerships and the race team. We’ll be doing a lot of work here in the next two weeks, gearing up for the Gatornationals at Gainesville. I’m planning on spending a lot of time working in the shop in Charlotte for a few days and then I’m off to Detroit for some meetings before heading back home just in time to get back on the airplane and get on out to Gainesville. There’s a lot going on between now and the Gatornationals, and when you have a car and a team that I know is capable of winning, as a driver you just want to get back out there. I prefer to get right back out and keep racing.I’m looking forward to Gainesville. It’s a race track where I’m coming in as the defending champ. I’ve had a lot of success there in the past.
Hockey Update: We’re heading into the playoffs! After our plane landed from Phoenix, my father-in-law was waiting out front for my son Bobby to head to a hockey game. We literally landed at 6:00 pm and he was on the ice by 6:50 pm. I know the kids are happy to get back to hockey. We have a couple of games the next couple of weeks, and the season ends at the end of March. There will be some tournaments coming up. My older son’s team is in a position to play for the state championship, so we’ll see how that turns out.
The off-season is flying by and a big part of the off-season, in addition to getting the race cars and a lot of the things back in gear on the race side is spending time with the family.For me, the off-season is about my three boys and my wife Terri.However, the last several weeks have been a transition from drag strips to ice rinks.
We went to a Thanksgiving hockey tournament for my son Bob in New Haven, Connecticut.We spent the weekend with the entire hockey team and the kids went to their first finals.It was really exciting for me to see how competitive these kids are at such a young age.They won two games on Saturday, which put them into the finals on Sunday.Although they didn’t win the tournament, coming in second and getting trophies as a team was fun the team and for me, especially to see Bob get his first trophy.He carried the trophy with him all day long even when we went shopping on the way from Connecticut, and at Austin’s hockey game.
In addition to their second-place title, Bob scored his first goal in that tournament.That goal was a turning point for him.He’s in a very competitive league and he’s one of the younger ones on the team. To see him get his first goal was as special for me as it was for him.
This past weekend Bob and his team had another big hockey game which the won with a 2-0 score.Bob had one of the two goals in that big win over a local state rival.At this rate, they could potentially reach the state finals and win the championship.I really enjoy watching the boys play hockey and to be able to attend a lot of the games during the off-season is great.
It is amazing to watch my sons and their friends.One day in the hotel, there were seven kids, all seven years old, sitting shoulder-to-shoulder playing Nintendo DS.What I didn’t realize was that they had their games synchronized.They were playing a race car game against each other.They were so intent on competing with this game, which is why I took a picture of them playing.Bob is sitting on the blue chair in the back. Then my youngest, Cameron, was sitting in-between the boys looking at the games.I remember playing Atari when I was a kid, so this was fascinating to watch.
In addition to all the hockey games, I can’t forget to tell you about my favorite holiday – Thanksgiving.Ever since I can remember, Thanksgiving is the only holiday as a family that we spend together. The Tasca family is a big family and as you can imagine, we get pulled in a lot of different directions as most families do around the holiday time.
Although Christmas we all go our own ways, Thanksgiving is a holiday that we spend together on the Tasca side of the family.Thanksgiving is, without question, my favorite holiday because Thanksgiving is more about family and appreciating what God has given us as a family and to celebrate that day together.We spent Thanksgiving at my grandmother’s house.We watched football games and ate too much, although I was good because I want to stay in fight weight here with the season just around the corner.
Coming up, I’m going to the PRI show (Performance Racing Industry), which will be the time first for me.Then I’ll spend a week at the race shop and with the guys getting a lot of the final plans in place as we approach the season.I’ve got more hockey in my future here and we have a big Christmas tournament with Bob, so we’ll be somewhere up in Massachusetts, so it will be exciting to see them compete again.
More hockey updates in my next blog!I hope everyone is enjoying their off-season.We’ll be back on track very soon.
It’s been a while since my last blog and I have so much news to share with all of you. Unfortunately time has eluded me these last few weeks but I’m bring you up to speed on all the latest and greatest from Tasca, Motorcraft and Quick Lane. Since Charlotte and then four races in a row – I’ve been in race and championship mode – there’s not much going on other than what you see on ESPN from race to race.
Since the last time we blogged, I had the opportunity to go to my first NASCAR race and that was a pretty wild experience. It’s amazing how different their platform is than ours. But there’s still all the excitement of racing and teamwork. I had the pleasure of being guests of the Wood Brothers and Bill Elliott during the Charlotte race. We swapped racing stories with the Wood Brothers back in Chicago when they came to our race, so they invited me and the entire team to be their guests in Charlotte. Thanks to Eddie and Len Wood, Bill Elliott and their entire Motorcraft team. When I’m not at the race track, I spend a lot of time with my family and the family business. I’ve been working with the Tasca Ford management team on the fixed ops stop side of the dealership, which really works well with my race sponsors. I’m really lucky to have two jobs – one at the dealership and the other at the track because I’m able to connect with a lot of Quick Lanes and Motorcraft customers and distributors in a very unique way. Being back at the store keeps me at the top of my game on what’s going on in the fix stop operations end.
When I’m home, other than being at the dealership, I’d say the second place I spend a lot of time at is the hockey rink. All three of my boys, two of them (Bobby and Austin) are active in hockey. Cameron is learning how to skate and will catch-up to the older boys pretty soon. Terri and I take turns picking up kids and dropping kids off at the hockey rink for practices and games. It’s great for me to see, at such a young age, Bobby (age 7) and Austin (age 5), how competitive they are and how competitive as a whole how five and seven year olds are. I really enjoy watching them develop and work as a team. Watching the boys play hockey reminds me about the dynamic of my race team. We work, win and lose together as a team and to see my kids go through something so similar at such a young age and in such a competitive sport as hockey, is remarkable. It’s been real fun for me. Soon I’ll be traveling with the boys because once my season ends, their road season begins. They go to a couple of tournaments around New England, so that will be fun traveling with the boys and their hockey league.
We went into Las Vegas, clearly our “Game 7” and we needed a win to help keep our championship hopes alive. We qualified well but unfortunately we just missed it by a little, but enough to smoke the tires in the first round against Del and ending our championship hopes. I’ve said all season, what a remarkable job Chris Cunningham, Marc Denner and my guys have done to make our second year our breakout year. I think it shows the spirit of our team and the desire of our team to win. Winning a championship is the only reason why we race and it’s the only acceptable outcome to a season. This year our championship hopes might have been extinguished but clearly we’re well on our way to achieving our goal of winning a championship. So hopefully, we’ll end this year with one more win, that’s all were looking for. Next year, we’ll come out of the box strong again and compete for this championship.
I missed my family last weekend in Las Vegas because I didn’t get to see the boys dressed for Halloween. Unfortunately, they didn’t come to Las Vegas last week, but they sure had fun. Terri took the boys trick-or-treating through the neighborhood. Bobby was a zombie, Austin was the Hulk and Cameron was Woody from Toy Story. I tried to get one of them to dress like a race car driver, maybe next year.
Wait until you see what I’ve been working of for 2010. Starting in Pomona next February, it will be easier to find Tasca Racing apparel at the race track. I can’t tell you how many times people have asked me, “Where can I get a Tasca shirt?” You won’t have to ask that question anymore because we are working on a state-of-the-art merchandise trailer that will have a complete line not only of Tasca Racing merchandise but Ford Racing merchandise. It will be the official trailer for Ford Racing and Ford Racing apparel, so that will be debut at the 50th Annual Winternationals. Working on the design and getting everything ready consumes a lot of time, not to mention getting the whole apparel line pulled together. Be sure to stop by the trailer next year. I’ll keep you posted on the details.
In addition to the merchandise trailer, there will be a show car. You’ll see that pop-up at Quick Lanes near race tracks and in between different races. We’re going to help drive traffic and get fans into Quick Lane Tire & Auto Centers nearby them to see our race car, and see services that Quick Lane provides. Trust me, this won’t be an ordinary show car – this will be an interactive show car with a 52 inch plasma that comes out of the roof with a video highlighting our season and some of our technology throughout the years. It will be a pretty cool experience to see the show car at a Quick Lane, hopefully near you.
