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NATIONAL HOT ROD ASSOCIATION MEDIA CONFERENCEJanuary 28, 2015John ForceTHE MODERATOR: We are now joined by John Force, driver of the PEAK Antifreeze Chevrolet Camaro Funny Car. John enters the 2015 season with a new sponsor, new Funny Car manufacturer, and looks to once again improve on his second place finish in the points. John recently tested with his new car and new team in Phoenix, and all three of John Force racing Funny Cars will be Chevrolet Camaros for the upcoming season. John, coming off that test session you guys from afar, looked like you had a successful test session with some pretty strong numbers. What are your overall thoughts on that test session? JOHN FORCE: Well, it was good, a lot of work went into it, a lot of preparation. The racetrack there did a great job, and some NHRA help that came in to give us a great racetrack. Of course conditions were great every day. Lanny McGleasy (phon) worked on the track, as well, and of course my cars have all run in the threes before, so that was no big deal. That many runs in a row, pretty good. The dragster was probably the highlight, even though it's not official, it doesn't matter. We know it has the potential to run good, and we'll have to see what we can do at Pomona. Testing was good. We've got our four Chevrolets there‑‑ three Chevrolets and a dragster, so life is good. A little overworked, but it's starting to come together with a lot of good friends helping. Q. Overcoming all the problems that you had last year and putting a plan together to get a sponsor or sponsors and getting a new car manufacturer and all that and get it all done, that's got to be a tremendously satisfying feeling to you. Talk a little bit about just getting that done and then being able to roll into the season with that done. JOHN FORCE: If my hair wasn't gray enough, it is now. But luckily, in this tough economy, I put it back together. Working with friends, Robert Hight and I seven days a week, the JMI group, we just signed a contract with a new sponsor, No Limits. So we're pretty excited. PEAK Antifreeze and Coolant coming on board, it led the way to lead the charge for John Force personally to be able to chase the championship. Of course everyone knows that we have Auto Club as one of our greatest partners. They've always stood by us, and of course Traxxas with Courtney, and Mac Tools. But then when Lucas Oil signed, boy, he's going to work us, and I love it, we'll be filming for him, the Dave Despain Show next week with MAVTV next Wednesday, so we're pretty excited about that, but probably the icing on the cake was Chevrolet coming in with the Camaro SS and all the work that it took to redesign what we had, to put it into play, we're okay, and then we went to testing and the car went down the racetrack, and we're pretty excited. I got Mike Neff heads our charge. He's my new Austin Coil. He runs everything. But Jon Schaffer, I've got a young team that put my hotrod in the threes, and Jon Schaffer, he was Little Jon, now we call him Big Jon, but he's trained since he was 17 years old, and he's only worked on Top Fuel cars, and Neff said he was ready, and he proved he could get the job done. Young team, kind of an old guy over here, me, but it's a balance, and we work great together. And of course my daughter's dragster, some of the Al‑Anabi guys that had left over there because of the changes they have, and we want to wish Alan Johnson, he'll put it back together, he's a racer like me, we need these teams. We need Alan Johnson and his drivers. I've got some good kids and working with Todd Smith, Ronnie Thompson, they put that dragster. It wasn't a perfect test session, but it ran some big numbers, so we're pretty excited. Q. John, last year, you were just a couple of points, a couple rounds away from back‑to‑back NHRA Mello Yello world championships with a lot of chaos on your mind, a lot going on, sponsors, manufacturers, people leaving your team, all of that going on. Now that much of that has been settled and now you're refocused, talk about driving in 2015, and do you feel freed to focus on what is really the most important thing that you do, get the car down the racetrack and turn on win lights? JOHN FORCE: Yeah, but driving is what I really do. The rest of this stuff, it's the day‑to‑day business that will wear and tear you. When I got to testing, everybody said my personality changed, because you get back into what you really love, and that's driving a race car on the NHRA circuit. I can't wait to get to the Winter Nationals. I'm excited because driving that car is‑‑ I'm good at it. It's not like they told me Jeff Gordon, I did some interviews that he's going to be retiring, and boy, I've probably got 25 years on him. But retiring is not an option to me. I love what I do. I'm still good at it. I've got sponsors that have stepped up like Chevrolet. That really put me over the top where I could run my four race cars financially, and I'm excited about that. Already got deals happening. I'll be at Mark Christopher Chevrolet in Ontario Wednesday, February 4, 6:00 to 8:00. Already the dealers are calling all over the country. Everybody is excited to see John Force back, and then I'm in business and back to my roots where I came from, General Motors. Life is good, but the car is what I do, and that's what‑‑ I get in it, I swear to God, I always said, one day at the end of the my career I'm going to drive naked and blindfolded. I believe I could still get the job done. It wouldn't be pretty but I could get it done. I'm ready to drag race. I want to thank you, Joe. Last week I got a little upside down, and you bailed me out. I owe you one. Q. Hagan, he's got what you want, the Hagan‑Force rivalry building and brewing, incredibly entertaining now for several years, he got one, you got one, he got one, you got one, that kind of deal, and we want to see this next round of great rivalry in Funny Car. What do you think of this match‑up in 2015? JOHN FORCE: Well, he's got‑‑ when I talked to Schumacher the other day just briefly, you know, I said, I need to race you. You're part of what drives me. You know what I mean? It's what gets me up in the morning. And Don Schumacher funds a lot of teams, gives a lot of jobs, and we ought to thank him for that. And Hagan is one of his best, him and Dickie Venables. I'm ready, but Hagan will tell you, if he focused on me and I focused on him, well then Cruz Pedregon or Robert Hight or Courtney or Ron Capps is going to go around us. So what do we do? We take them a day at a time. I like Hagan because he's respectful, and if he loses he's respectful, and if he wins he's respectful. Some guys find it hard to handle either way. But at the end of the day, it is hard when you lose. It was hard on me, especially in the situation I was in. Like I said, we're in a tough economy, but corporate America, the world is out there starting to realize let's rebuild America, and John Force, I'm going to help rebuild drag racing. I think we have a great product in NHRA. I think the leaders at the top are trying to get us to build this sport to the next level. We've got a lot of work, all of us to do, and if we work together, we'll get there. I think Pomona is going to be a home run. I know how the fans are reacting to me coming back in the Chevrolet, and with PEAK Antifreeze, so bring it on. Bring on Hagan. I'm ready for you, kid. Q. Happy new year. JOHN FORCE: I've got a smile on my face. Last time I saw you I know I looked a little under the weather, beat out, but the good Lord don't guarantee you this job. You've got to earn the right to drive a Fuel Funny Car, and I have. I've got some gray hair, but in my heart I'm alive and well, and that's where I need to be to be a top contender. Q. You're coming out to Mark Christopher Chevrolet. I just thought I'd tell you about the local laws that you can't be naked, okay? JOHN FORCE: I won't be naked. Hey, I'm going to bring at least one of my nostalgia cars from my early Chevrolet days I'll have there, and I'm going to‑‑ it looks like we're going to have one of our new Camaros there, so I'm excited about that. Either Robert Hight or Courtney or myself, the PEAK Antifreeze, I don't know which one. But it was exciting to have the dealers call. I know they're involved with a lot of different teams, and that's exciting, but to get to be a part of it and start off for Chevrolet right out of the box, working those dealers, that's what it's all about. They're the ones that pay the bill. Q. This is a very competitive class this year. How do you see this thing playing out at the end of the year? JOHN FORCE: Well, Robert Hight wants a championship as much as I do, and he knows how to do it. Courtney, she's ready. She's got a race car. She knows how to drive it. She's living it. This wedding that she's going to with this Rahal, if she can keep her focus, and she will, she's my daughter and she knows the drill. We had meetings this morning. But there's a lot of other kids out there that are overdue. Ron Capps has got a great team. Any day this could happen, and it would be well deserved. We'll be back in the hunt. Wilkerson ran 02 over there, 03; Cruz Pedregon ran 4 flat or 4:01, I don't know the numbers, at Phoenix. It's exciting times to watch this. I had a fear that I wasn't going to get to drive anymore, and I had nightmares at night. I went to bed, I felt like I‑‑ it was like it was the end of the world to me, and nothing should take you there mentally, but it did because it's all I know, it's all I understand. I thought of Hagan being out there and my girls without me, you know what I mean? I had to be there, and I made it. I'm ready to rock and roll. Q. We'll see you at the dealership. JOHN FORCE: I'm excited. I met the family and the marketing people from that group, Mark Christopher, and they're just really good people, really love NHRA, love the racing. They're going to have signs on Tony Pedregon's car. Maybe I shouldn't say that announcement, but it looked awesome, and I know they work with the Pro Stock group and Erica Enders and all that, and they love our sport and we need that kind of sport, but Chevrolet dealers Moss Motors called me, wanted to help. I've got dealers in Phoenix already, dealers back East. John Force Racing, we're back in the hunt. Q. So if I tell them I know you I can get like 25 percent off a new Chevy? JOHN FORCE: I'll get you a deal. Whatever I can get you, I'll get you a deal. Q. Did you say you hired some of the Al‑Anabi guys and was that for Brittany's car? JOHN FORCE: On the dragster, Ronnie Thompson came over, and then a clutch kid. I don't know from which team. I know they said they were only going to run one of the teams, so there was people looking for jobs. Yeah, they came over there, and it was really funny, we're all a little bit slow. Neff's team with Robert Hight, Auto Club was right on the deal right out of the box. Ron Douglas and my son‑in‑law Daniel Hood and Courtney right out of the box they were good, but I've got to be honest, we were a little slow, and I rented the truck there for four days, and the first date learning it with some of these new guys. We had one kid, it was so funny, he come from a dragster team, and he turned from my Funny Car and he started running, and I said, where are you going, and he goes, no, it's stupid. Later we found out he's so used to running around a dragster because they're real long, he took off thinking when he left the motor that he had to go a certain direction. So what we did, we ran so good, we took the cars back. I said, we know how to run fast, so what we're going to do is teardown contests. So we filmed it. I think it's on the internet. We filmed it, but we took the whole car, gutted it, put it back together, first run was like 58 minutes, and they put it back together, I get in it, we fire it up, and then they tore it down again and we went through that process all afternoon, and we got it down to 51 minutes, and really, first I think they looked at me like I was nuts, but after we were done, Jon Schaffer said, boy, these guys got fast, just a matter of drill and training. Same thing they do in the Marine Corps. It was fun, though, watching them, and we'll be ready to make the call at Pomona. Q. When you look at this season and everything that you went through last year to get to this point, does this make this season one of the most challenging you've ever entered or maybe one of the most exciting that you've ever entered? JOHN FORCE: The most exciting. It takes me back to my roots. I've had to go back 10 years of my program financially to address how I was able to race. I had to evaluate budgets, and that's what Chevrolet said when they come in. Mr.Campbell, he said, we want you competitive, and we want safety, and boy, we agreed on that because that is key to everything in this sport. You want to be able to compete and win, and I've got enough money financially now to do that and to still continue to build safety. We've got a lot of work. We did a redesign on what we had and we got it approved by NHRA. We haven't even started on the engine program, but we will, and in time we'll change it. But the excitement to me is I get to race, and I get to race with my daughters and my grandkids. We're going out this weekend with Autumn. Robert is taking her out to drive the junior dragster that they own. Challenging, yeah, but I understand the challenge. It's what you've got to do. Nothing is a gift. It was a lot of work, and we're not done yet. Just signed this company No Limits just a few days ago with JMI. We're looking at other deals. I've got a potential sponsor. I can't talk about it. I hope it comes any day. They tell me it'll probably be before Gainesville. But we're going to be okay. Right now just getting to race and we can be competitive. I built a team‑‑ I never build a team based off of any one man: Not off of me, not off of my driver or any crew chief or any clutch or bottom‑end guy. I build a team A, B and C plan; somebody gets sick, somebody quits, whatever happens, we won't fail. I've got to admit this time we got hit pretty hard, but in the midst of it, we recovered. That don't mean we're going to run out and win a championship right off the bat, but we'll be a contender, I'll give you my word on that. Q. And I've also heard a rumor that you have now established that you plan to at least retire as a driver prior to age 100. Is that accurate? JOHN FORCE: You had me scared there. Yeah, if I live to 100. I have days‑‑ I'm not kidding anybody, at my age I wake up and old muscles are aching, but I get down in that gym, and 30 minutes in that gym, I'm 20 years old again. Put me in that fire suit, I'm 16 years old. Maybe I'll a little nuts, but man, I just love it. I look at my Chevrolets now, I have great partners, and I want to wish all of them well, but I've got partners that I feel like I've gone home with Chevrolet, that I've got back to cars that I won championships in, and I'm able to bring them out of my museum. I already got them on the road heading to a show with Mac Tools at their big convention, I think it's at the Lucas Stadium. We're going to have a day there, and now I can show a lot of my history. But my museums are my museums. I have lots of different types of cars. So no, I'm ready. I look at that bowtie, and I'm ready. Going to need some luck, but I've got a job, and that's what's most important so I can keep my family in shoes and I can help build the NHRA because the fans deserve it, and the future players in our sport, the kids that'll ‑‑ my grandkids will be racing here someday, I believe. Q. I know you addressed the little bit of a controversy about rebranding the Mustang bodies as Camaros already, so I was wondering is there going to be a real Camaro body coming out this year, and if so, when would that be happening? JOHN FORCE: That was one of the issues. We knew financially where we stood with Chevrolet. I knew that four or five months ago. It was about could we deliver a car. Could we have a Camaro that looked like a Camaro and not just because of decals. We had to do a major redesign, and we had help in that. We worked with a group out of Indy that does the aero and stuff there in miniature scale. They've worked on this car, Mike Neff was on top of it, Robert Hight. We got the designs, we got them to NHRA, we showed them what we wanted to do, they wanted to see it, we had to go back. They were about $8,000 a pro. That's why I didn't go with Pro to West Palm Beach. One of the reasons, I didn't think‑‑ up to the last day we made the deal to run Phoenix within a week to two weeks that we thought we'd at least have a couple of bodies done, and my guys worked around the clock in the paint shops branding to get these cars painted, and it has been a roller coaster ride. I didn't think I was going to make it. But we got the cars done. Like I said, we redesigned what we had. That's all we could do. We did get approval from Ford Motor Company and GM. We moved ahead, but GM wanted that car to have all the specs, even though it's a spec NHRA body and it's got to get in a mold, it had to have all of the characteristics of the Camaro, and it does. I was amazed when I saw it finished. I was really excited, and it looks good. Now, you put paint on it, I've got a Camaro, NHRA approved it. Yeah, they drug us through the hot coals, but we made it right at the last day and we rolled. Yeah, the bodies are heavy. They're 15, 17 pounds heavy and we've just got to live with that. But sometimes it just works. And they ran good, so proof is in the pudding. Q. So the bodies that you're running right now, is that what we're going to see all of this year, or will there be a new dedicated Camaro body still to come? JOHN FORCE: I apologize, I never answer a question I get so excited. When we spoke with the group at Chevrolet, there's a brand new car coming in 2016. We even looked at unveiling‑‑ I thought we could unveil it at Indy. I own some of the races still that I haven't sold yet, but after we looked at what it really takes to build a car, you're talking about an eight‑ to 12‑month project to do it right, to get it approved, because you build a mold, you end up changing it. I know, I build the molds. I've been through this process with metal crafter and these guys, and there was no way we could make it, and the truth is, they're selling the 2015 Chevrolet SS Camaro right now. There was no reason for them to try to put out a 2016. I don't know anything about it. They've got it under wraps. They won't talk about it. I tried to get to a few insiders, and they said, we don't know. When it's time, the bosses will tell me, time to start the process. We just got this thing signed, and so we're going to be talking in the next few weeks, in the next month, but I guarantee you a new car by 2016. I hope before that, but by then we'll have it. That is in the plan. Q. Are there a bunch of new Camaros in the John Force Racing parking lot? Are the girls driving one now? JOHN FORCE: Yeah, we haven't got our new demos yet. I want to thank Ford. They've been nothing but good. They said, use our cars if you need them. You know, they were just a great partner. And I want to wish them luck. But I want to say that dealers are calling me, everybody is trying to give me cars, you know what I mean, and trying to make sure that we're right for Pomona. Yeah, the girls are excited. They picked out‑‑ they got these hotrod Camaro SS's and they're loving it. They look like IndyCars. They don't look like drag race cars. They're really cool. We're moving that way. All this went down just after Christmas, before Christmas, and when we started making the move, and we got our orders in now. We'll be okay. We'll be flexing our muscles in Chevrolets from now on. Q. You talked about this new sponsor. Can you give us a little bit more about who that is, and then also, you had spoken in Las Vegas last year about‑‑ you said, one of these days I'm going to be milking cows or selling milk or in the milk business or something like that. Are you talking about the Coca‑Cola new milk brand by any chance? JOHN FORCE: No. Let me tell you, I've signed a confidentiality‑‑ hell, I can't tell anybody. NHRA has asked me, but it's a Federal Government deal, and that's why I know the deal is real. It isn't like someone has promised me a deal, and it could still not happen. Things could not happen. But I met the president of the company, that started the company. He personally told me where we stood and why. They've wrote me a contract. It's going together right now, but it's all based on this thing happening. It has happened because the stock has already gone up, and that's about as much as I can say about it. But we're continually chasing new sponsors. I've got JMI in San Francisco as we speak today talking with other groups. We're not done yet. It's just a lot tougher than we thought, and that's why it was so key. I kept telling you, I had an announcement at Vegas. Well, we unveiled PEAK Antifreeze and Coolant and Blue Def, and then I said we'd have an announcement by SEMA. Couldn't get it done. Couldn't get the bodies approved even though we knew what the deal was, and if I can't get them approved, I can't announce something. Then Lucas Oil, we finally announced it at Pomona. Those deals are what's keeping me alive. The Chevrolet deal, like I said, was the icing on the cake. It put me in the business. I've got my own personal money. I have endorsement monies. I have Mac Tools, I have Auto Club. They sponsor all my cars, Auto Club. I have extra money there to help fund this dragster. We're moving ahead. My daughter worked hard to get a shot at racing, Brittany, and it would break my heart not to give her that shot. I had to go. I had to make a move. I'm tied to too many sponsors for the next five years. I just sat down one day, and I said, what am I really? Is this about money or spending my retirement? I didn't have any money when I started. This is about I am a drag racer. This is all I do. This is all my family‑‑ it's what we do. Let's get over whether we're going to go racing or not. Let's go, make the move, I made the call, and we're going, and we're going to make it, because that's the way it is. I'm not the only race team out there, and I'm financially‑‑ like Robert said, if you look at our budget, we're probably still in the top three. Just my operation got big, TV studios, road shows, midways. I've had to change a lot of stuff of how I'm going to run it and how we're going to make it work, but we're going to make it. But right now the focus is running, not building, not growing any more buildings or rentals or bigger movie theaters. None of that. Everything is building race cars that can win and keeping the drivers safe, and that's where we're going, and that's what John Force does until the day he drops, and then my kids and Robert Hight will take it on from there. Q. Have you had enough time or have you been paying attention to the Super Bowl match‑up, and if you have, are you for the Seahawks or the Patriots? JOHN FORCE: You had to tell me who was playing? I knew Brady was playing because I read all the stuff about the flat footballs. No, I'm kind of like Tony Schumacher on that. I follow quarterbacks. I don't know Seattle much. I know that they've got a guy out there on defense, a corner guy that's just a killer, that boy, he says what he feels. They've got this quarterback that's a hot rod. You know what I mean? But Patriots, you know, I follow him, so I don't know. It's really funny, the big football game, college football, Graham Rahal is going to marry my daughter, I guess, and Rahal, you know, is from Ohio, that's his team, and when they put in that fourth string quarterback that looked like a linebacker and he ran over everybody, I really kind of got into that game, too, against Oregon. No, I'll tell you what, I'm going to the phone and back to the table and maybe I'm watching it passing the screen. Super Bowl Sunday I'll be working. I'm not done yet. I ain't going to be done probably until the middle of the year putting this thing back together. But I do love football. No, I don't have a priority really. Q. I think it's really kind of a miracle the way things happen with losing Ford and Chevy picking you up. I don't know, I've always been one to say, friends don't let friends drive Fords. But I think it shows how important you are to the sport to pick up Chevy as a sponsor. Would you agree with that? JOHN FORCE: I really appreciate you saying it. Maybe my timing‑‑ timing is everything in life. I was coming home last night thinking about, you make the wrong turn on a corner and somebody runs into you, and you don't know why you went that way, you just did. I'm giving that as a hypothetical, but timing in life is everything. But I also know that you don't give up. Maybe I got a little religious in my older years, but it's like if you keep beating that road and you keep chasing what you love and you don't lose the dream, if you don't lose the dream, you won't lose the fire, and every time you get turned down, you just pick yourself up and you go back and you start again. I stood on the start line with a young kid, Jon Schaffer, and I looked at this kid, and I thought, I have dumped the weight of the world on him. Now, I know he's got Mike Neff. Mike Neff is now the teacher. He's running Robert's car but he's overlooking all these cars, and Jon Schaffer worked underneath him for four years. We knew John could run a race car. One of the things Robert said to me, John, you're forgetting something. Some of these kids have come from pro mods, dragsters, alcohol, super comp cars, and they're working with a legend. I don't think of myself as a legend. I'm just a race car driver and I love it, but he said, you need to give them more love, you need to get in there with them. They all had a big dinner Saturday night after the races. It's a matter that I didn't realize the pressure that I put on these kids without even saying it, with never raising my voice, just telling them, hey, come on, let's get it done, that pressure is build in to deliver because they know as a drive I deliver championships just like Robert Hight. I looked down at Jon Schaffer, and I thought, God, I never thought about that, Robert. And I said that, had a sit‑down with Jon. If we win, we win together. If we lose, we lose together. But as long as we've got the dream, we're going to be okay, Jon, and we've dumped a lot on you, and boy, he rose to the occasion. Never panicked when it smoked the tires, when it got sideways. He was right down there, okay, let's go back again. He really led that team, and I know Mike Neff is helping him, but I was truly impressed with this team because Jimmy Prock ran my cars, he's one of the great ones, but Jimmy Prock was 26 years old when he came out. Somebody said he ran one of the quickest runs in history, young kid, and he evolved to a champion. And yet I've got a kid the same age, 25 or 26 years old. I'm going to be okay. And it ain't because I ran a good ET, that we ran in the threes. It ain't because of that. We did it a number of times. It's because of the attitude of the people, the ones that are with me now. I know where I'm going. I don't have to wake up living in fear. You know what I mean? You can't bind somebody by a contract. It don't work that way. If somebody needs to leave for whatever their reasons, God bless them. But you've got to know where you stand, and I stand tall right now with 50 of them at Phoenix, from my media to my marketing team, Dean Antonelli is running my‑‑ he's general manager now of John Force Racing. He overlooks all my headaches over me and Robert, whatever we‑‑ we just expect him and Kelly, his wife, the day‑to‑day, and it's working, and the proof is in the pudding. Let's see what we can do at Pomona. Could be terrible, could be great, but at least I get to go. And that's what I love. I love NHRA. I'm sorry, I just do. Q. I saw the video that Elon was the cameraman and you were talking about your early days. That was excellent. JOHN FORCE: Thank you. The early days, that's where you find your dreams. You know, the other night I was in‑‑ Ashley was going to drive back to California and she had the two babies with her, and Danny had his truck, and I said, honey, I don't want you driving across the desert without somebody with you. I said, let me drive your car back. No, dad, go get on the plane. Let me drive your car back. I need a little time in the middle of the desert. I need to find myself. There was so much going on in my head. I was back to Chevrolet and all my partners, and I'm out in the middle of the desert. I must have drank five cups of coffee. I was wound up and I stopped out there in a windstorm in the middle of I think it was Needles or something. I don't know where I was at. I saw Needles somewhere, a sign, and I just found‑‑ I remembered crossing that desert in a Chevrolet crew cab pulling a Chaparral trailer and Adrew (phon) was in there and Ashley was in a baby seat. Brittany and Courtney weren't even born. You know what I mean, and it was like, I'm going to be okay. Now you're making me emotional. Why you do that to me? Everybody is good. Got to shut up. THE MODERATOR: Thank you, John. I think that will conclude our conference call for today. John, thanks as always for your time. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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